Category Archives: Law

Fundraiser to stop FERC shirking LNG oversight

Update 2022-10-26: WWALS response to opposition comments by Eagle LNG about small, inland LNG 2022-10-17.

Update 2022-10-04: WWALS response to FERC on opposition comments of Pivotal LNG about small, inland LNG Rulemaking 2022-10-04.

Update 2022-07-26: You can comment or intervene on the Rulemaking on small inland Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) facilities that WWALS and six co-signers got started with FERC, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. We don’t need more methane leaks and we don’t need highly compressed explosive LNG trucks rolling down I-75 and I-10 with no environmental oversight and no safety plans.

Update 2022-07-22: Petition for Rulemaking on FERC Oversight of Small-Scale Inland LNG Export Facilities 2022-07-22.

Update 2021-07-21: Ghost company: Strom LNG.

Update 2018-11-14: Strom Inc. export through Tampa, Map And Strom wants to export through Port of Tampa, on tanker ships under the I-275 bridge right past St. Pete.

Update 2018-06-13: Press Release.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has abdicated its jurisdictional duties under the Natural Gas Act to regulate the siting, construction, operation and maintenance of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) small-scale inland export facilities.

Instead these facilities operate with basically no Federal oversight.

LNG trucks barrel down I-75 through Georgia past high schools, colleges, businesses, and homes, then on I-10 to Jacksonville for ships at least as far as Puerto Rico. At the ends of the Sabal Trail pipeline chain in Florida, trucks go out from half a dozen LNG export operations authorized by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Fossil Energy (FE). If any of those trucks wrecks, federal standard everyone should be evacuated half a mile downwind, including high schools and hospitals. Very few local emergency responders know this and fewer have appropriate emergency plans.

LNG export routes, Map
Map: by WWALS, from federal and state filings of LNG export operations.

Compounding the problem, Continue reading

2017 Annual Progress Report and 2018 Estimates, Hamilton County Mining Ordinance 2018-05-15

Received May 27, 2018 from WWALS member Chris Mericle:

The Hamilton County BOCC finally at its last meeting (May 15) voted on the Nutrien 5 year permit renewal.

The BOCC voted to approve the permit with the modifications recommended by the environmental consultant and attorney.

[2,3,4,5 Draglines]

I consider this a win for us because it requires Nutrien to: Continue reading

Wanted: Missing Sheboggy Signs

If returned, no questions asked.

Don’t wait for the Sheriff to find them.

Right, Missing

You don’t have to steal them: WWALS will sell you a similar smaller metal sign. Those will be $20 each, available by the end of May 2018, and we’ll have an online order form.

Sheboggy Boat Ramp, Berrien County, Sign
Born, April 25, 2018.

Continue reading

Berrien County about ARWT Landings

WWALS would like to thank the Berrien County Board of Commissioners and staff for years of cooperation about the Alapaha River Water Trail (ARWT) and the many landings on it in Berrien County, as well as the one landing in Berrien County on the Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail (WLRWT).

Here is a letter from September 2016 granting WWALS permission to put signs on county property at all the water trail landings it names, and a Commission vote to change two access points from having Landing in their name to be called instead Sheboggy Boat Ramp and Berrien Beach Boat Ramp.

Letter from Berrien County 2016-09-14

Permission to put signs at all landings, Letter

Thanks to Continue reading

FPL wants Martin-Riviera Pipeline folded into FSC

Update 2019-03-11: And of course FERC and FPSC approved it, this extension of FSC to within 300 feet of an LNG export port.

What is FPL hiding in all that confidential and redacted material in a 117-page petition for approval of folding FPL’s Martin-Riviera Pipeline into Sabal Trail’s downstream Florida Southeast Connection (FSC)? This has been planned at least two years. on the excuse of lower rates for customers. Yet FPL redacted what FSC would charge and future cost projections, so FPL’s customers and the rest of the public affected by these unnecessary pipelines have no way of knowing what they would cost, and emergency responders can’t see what’s on this pipeline.

Indiantown to Riviera Beach
Indiantown to Riviera Beach, in FERC 20180309-5230, Docket CP18-108.

Eagle-eye WWALS member Janet Barrow spotted this Florida Public Service Commission (FPSC) Docket 20170231 (OPEN) — Petition for approval to transfer Martin- Riviera Lateral Pipeline to Florida Southeast Connection and implement associated rate adjustments, by Florida Power & Light Company.

FPSC let FPL redact most anything it wanted to, in Continue reading

Stigma and market fear count, says jury over Sabal Trail

A jury slapped Sabal Trail’s pet consultants with the stigma of market fear:

Sabal Trail contended that there are no damages to market value based on market fear or stigma.

…the jury rendered a verdict in the amount of $309,500. This, of course, is over five-times the amount offered by Sabal….

Perhaps farmer Randy Dowdy is also right to object to Sabal Trail’s soil mixing consultants. And I wonder how this precedent might affect other property takings cases.

Lake Erie Road and Bay Lake Road,, Sunderland Groves
Photo: Mark Skogman for WWALS on Southwings flight 2 February 2017 of Sunderland Groves on Lake Erie Road near Bay Lake Road, 28.4775900, -81.9026000

Brigham Property Rights Law Firm ( http://www.propertyrights.com), PRWeb, 20 March 2018, Jury Sides with Property Owners in Eminent Domain Suit with Sabal Trail Pipeline, Continue reading

Farmer Randy Dowdy objects to Sabal Trail’s soil mixing evaluation plan 2018-03-13

How can there be soil mixing yet zero noncompliance incidents? FERC saw soil mixing first visit without digging, Dowdy to FERC Randy Dowdy asked directly to FERC, following up his call in AgWeb for an independent investigation of Sabal Trail’s destruction of his world-record-holding soybean fields in Brooks County, Georgia.

Dowdy doesn’t trust Sabal Trail or anybody it sends to investigate that soil mixing. He’s hardly the first to say Sabal Trail’s inspectors don’t; see for example FERC’s Moultrie Scoping Meeting 2015-09-29 where James Bell said pipeline inspectors stood around until they noticed him watching, Sandra Jones said the surveyors were not qualified, and Attorney Daniel Dunn said Sabal Trail operates under darkness of misinformation. Dowdy may be late to the opposition, but he is determined.

Sabal Trail is still a stagecoach line in an electric car world, except stagecoaches didn’t destroy farmers’ fields.

Letter from Randy Dowdy to FERC

Continue reading

GA HB 879 coal ash dewatering up for full Senate vote 2018-03-15

A Georgia Senate Committee Chair from the Suwannee River Basin, Tyler Harper of Ocilla, got HB 879 out of his committee and onto the full Senate floor for a vote soon. Please remind your Georgia state Senator to vote for it so we’ll get to know more about when Georgia Power (or anybody else) is dewatering a coal ash pond, planning to shop it to local landfills.

Wes Wolfe, Brunswick News, 15 March 2018, Coal ash notification bill heads to full Senate,

coal ash ponds and coal ash in landfills in Georgia

The coal ash pond dewatering bill authored by state Rep. Jeff Jones received unanimous committee approval Tuesday afternoon, moving the public notification legislation one step closer to law. By making it through the state House of Representatives before the crossover deadline, and now ready for a vote by the full Senate, puts it in a rare group of bills to be so successful this session.

Senate Natural Resources and Environment Committee Chairman Tyler Harper, Continue reading

Randy Dowdy calls for independent investigation of Sabal Trail soil mixing 2018-03-06

Dear pipeline companies: if you gouge through a rock-star farmer’s world-record-holding soybean fields, you may find he gets national coverage.

Bryan Mitchell, March 6, 2018 08:16 AM, AgWeb powered by Farm Journal, Pipeline Nightmare: Randy Dowdy Calls For Independent Investigation,

Randy Dowdy’s soil death is no mystery, insists the Georgia producer, and now a federal inspection report appears to back his claims of soil damage on record-breaking farmland due to pipeline construction. A letter (Feb. 6) from the Federal Regulatory Commission (FERC) to the Sabal Trail Pipeline Project describes “topsoil and subsoil mixing” on Dowdy’s farming operation, yet significantly does not address issues of noncompliance.

GA-BR-029.000 Dowdy south field, Little Creek, MP 217, 1657-PL-DG-70197-219,, Dowdy parcel 053 00161 Brooks County, GA
GA-BR-029.000 Dowdy south field, Little Creek, MP 217, 1657-PL-DG-70197-219, 30.9439700, -83.6154600

Dowdy signed Continue reading

Sabal Trail alleged plan for soil mixing 2018-03-09

Yesterday Sabal Trail filed with FERC a sketchy plan to investigate the subsoil and topsoil mixing it caused on four farmers’ lands in two Georgia counties. The tail wagging the dog, Sabal Trail demanded FERC rubberstamp this plan within one week.

GA-BR-028.000 Dowdy north field, Little Creek, MP 216.4, 1657-PL-DG-70197-218
GA-BR-028.000 Dowdy north field, Little Creek, MP 216.4, 1657-PL-DG-70197-218, 30.9503000, -83.6217700

Needless to say FERC didn’t supply the GPS coordinates, nor the county parcel numbers, nor the related Sabal Trail alignment maps: WWALS did that, to figure out things are in what Sabal Trail filed.

The details are on the WWALS website, also including maps by WWALS.

 -jsq, John S. Quarterman, Suwannee RIVERKEEPER®

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