Category Archives: Quantity

Sabal Trail slips its in-service request to June; FERC classifies WWALS shutdown request as motion 2017-05-26

They finally admit to FERC the Sabal Trail boondoggle is a month late! And FERC reclassifies the WWALS filing as a motion for all three SMPP pipelines.

Susan Salisbury, Palm Beach Post, 26 May 2017, Sabal Trail seeks new pipeline start date; group wants shutdown,

Sabal Trail Transmission on Friday asked federal regulators for an early June in-service date for its portion of the Alabama-to-Florida natural gas pipeline, a later date than it had requested earlier this month.

With segmented KMI FGT JEP to Jacksonville to Eagle LNG export:

On May 17 Houston-based Sabal Trail had asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission for permission to start sending gas through the pipeline by today — May 26.

Also Friday, the Georgia-based WWALS Watershed Coalition asked FERC to deny all requests to place the pipeline into service, and said FERC should revoke the permit and shut it down.

The Sierra Club recently asked FERC to delay the pipeline’s operation until after pending litigation is resolved.

FERC has yet to act on either of Sabal Trail’s start-up date requests or on The Sierra Club’s request.

Maybe FERC staff have noticed Continue reading →

WWALS asks FERC to deny Sabal Trail’s in-service request and to revoke its permit

Update: 2017-06-05: WWALS files with FERC against Sabal Trail again, about sea change from fossil fuels to sun and wind power.

Update 2017-05-27: Sabal Trail slips its in-service request to June; FERC classifies WWALS shutdown request as motion 2017-05-26.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Hahira, GA, May 26, 2017 — WWALS Watershed Coalition today asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to “stay, stop, or deny all requests to place any project facilities into service” for the Southeast Markets Pipeline Project (SMPP) including Sabal Trail. Further “WWALS as an intervenor formally requests FERC to revoke its Certificate of Convenience and Necessity for SMPP.”

In its thirteen-page filing (available online and in PDF), WWALS listed six reasons, each with its own attachment of details:

  1. The alleged need for this pipeline project, which has been refuted by its funding organization in FPL’s 2016 Ten Year Plan and by other evidence; and
  2. FERC has taken jurisdiction of at least one LNG export chain from Sabal Trail, despite FERC’s own assertion in its February 2016 Certificate; and

    3. Major Gas Pipelines Serving Jacksonville, Florida
    See Sabal Trail to export through Jacksonville, FL.

  3. Failure to assess risks to Floridan Aquifer, the primary water supply for the region; and
  4. Numerous permit violations during construction; and
  5. Failure to address especially egregious violations such as the destruction of Randy Dowdy’s world-record soybean fields; and
  6. The legal challenges recited in the Sierra Club letter of May 18, 2017, FERC Accession Number 20170519-5018, are all completely litigated.

WWALS president and Suwannee Riverkeeper John S. Quarterman said, “It’s not too late for FERC to do its job and actually evaluate all the new evidence that has come to light. Even more, FERC should look at how the world has changed Continue reading →

Wade Spring, 7 miles east of Quitman, GA, May 2017

Local cave diver Aaron Sirmons took these pictures and videos of the formerly famous Wade Springs of Brooks County, Georgia, between Blue Springs Road and the railroad, west of the Withlacoochee River. He has a letter of permission from the landowner.

Concentric circles, late March 2017

Concentric circles, late March 2017

Almost dry, May 2017

Continue reading →

Water low but passable, White Springs to Swift Creek, Suwannee River 2017-05-20

Update 2017-05-17: OK, the water’s gotten too low at the original location, so we’re moving downstream to Woods Ferry Tract Launch to Suwannee Springs.

Hands Across the Sand on the Suwannee Saturday! The river is quite low (48.78 feet NAVD on the White Springs gage), but it looks doable from the put-in and take-out. A ranger at Stephen Foster State Park told me paddling from White Springs to Swift Creek would be doable, perhaps with a few dry spots. I’ll also call a local outfitter or two for their opinions.

White Springs down from ramp

White Springs down from ramp

Meanwhile, bring bug spray (gnats) and a rope (to pull your boat over sand bars), and we’re still on for 9AM Saturday 20 May 2017. See the outing announcement for more details.

Plus: that’s the day of Hands Across the Sand, “Say NO to dirty fuels and YES to clean energy”. WWALS has been saying that for years, so somewhere on the Suwannee we will stop and do Hands Across the Sand against the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline and for solar power.

White Springs low spot

Continue reading →

Nichols Spring ERP, Withlacoochee (south) River, Sumter County, FL

Apparently Charlie Dean has one more day left on an FDEP permit to build a dock at Nichols Spring on the Withlacoochee (south) River at Lat: 28° 50′ 23.6438″ Lon: -82° 12′ 9.8242″ (28.839901, -82.202729), at SR 44 on CR 251 West, Wildwood, in Sumter County, Florida. The nearest house, maybe his, is at 5927 CR 251W, Lake Panasoffkee, FL 33538.

Site Plan

Possibly this is former Florida State Senator Charlie Dean (R-District 5), who represented parts or all of Baker, Citrus, Columbia, Dixie, Gilchrist, Lafayette, Levy, Marion, Suwannee, and Union Counties, Florida, but curiously not Sumter County.

Found via Continue reading →

Lower and Middle Suwannee River Basin Management Action Plan (BMAP) Meeting 2017-04-13

Today in Live Oak: what FDEP is doing about water quality and quantity in the Suwannee Basin below the Withlacoochee Confluence. Agenda

See the PDF or the transcription below.

Lower and Middle Suwannee River Basin Management Action Plan (BMAP) Meeting

DATE: Thursday, April 13, 2017
TIME: 6:00 PM
PLACE: Suwannee River Water Management District
Board Room
9225 CR 49
Live Oak, FL 32060

THIS MEETING IS OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

AGENDA Continue reading →

Sabal Trail a month late and still sending the press disinformation

No, Ms. Grover, your pipeline is not a job generator for Florida, Georgia, or Alabama, and yes, you’ve slipped your schedule.

“Florida is swarming with protests, like an antbed stirred up by a 600-mile pipeline stick,” John S. Quarterman, president, WWALS Watershed Coalition

You know what would bring economic benefits to the Sunshine State? Solar power, which already employs more people than coal, oil, and natural gas combined, which produced 1 in 20 new jobs last year, and last year solar power produced more new electricity than any other source.

Ms. Grover is paid to picture that fossil-fuel cash-out in the best possible light. Yet once you know the actual facts, it looks more like the Picture of Dorian Gray.


“How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be older than this particular day of June…. If it were only the other way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! For that—for that—I would give everything! Yes, there is nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul for that!” —Dorian Gray, in The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde

Joseph A. Mann Jr., FloridaBulldog.org, 23 March 2017, With help from investor-Gov. Scott, Sabal Trail natural gas pipeline looks to open in June, Continue reading →

Videos: Water, Agriculture, and Forestry; WWALS @ VSU 2017-03-28

You can’t use traditional models for the karst Floridan Aquifer; new and harsher pesticides are expected this summer; but you can help raise native species; and later this month you can go see many of them in Berrien County, plus WWALS monthly outings, the Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail, and the Alapaha River Water Trail and some WWALS history.

Yeah, 2,4-D and Dicamba are head-scratchers --Tom Potter
Yeah, coming this summer, and they’re head-scratchers.

All this was at the quarterly WWALS public meeting, this one on Water, Agriculture, and Forestry at Valdosta State University, March 28, 2017.

Here are links to each WWALS video of each talk, with a few notes and a few extra pictures, followed by a WWALS video playlist. Continue reading →

Delineation of Spring Protection Areas

These figures tell the story of springsheds in a coastal lowland karst plain such as much of the Suwannee River Basin. Maybe you already know all this, but if you don’t, these pictures may help make sense of Springsheds and Water Withdrawal Permits in the Suwannee River Basin.

Fig. 11_1: Groundwater Basin

A spring is fed from a ground-water basin.

Fig. 11_1: Groundwater Basin

Fig. 12_1: Springshed Protection Area

Continue reading →