Update 2018-02-08: FERC cry of wolf delays mandate from DC Circuit Court
Instead of answering Sabal Trail’s
Friday cry of wolf by issuing new certificates yesterday,
FERC instead took that cry to the DC Circuit Court,
asking for a delay of today’s issue of a mandate.
FERC did not issue new certificates yesterday,
and the Court did not issue a mandate today.
Of course, today was merely the first day the Court
could have issued a mandate, so we’ll see.
Don’t listen to FERC and Sabal Trail’s cries of wolf, Court!
What’s really eating their pipelines is solar and wind power
taking over the market.
For
the fourth year running, renewable energy has produced more
new U.S. energy than natural gas,
according to
FERC’s own
Office of Energy Projects Energy Infrastructure Update For December 2017.
Four years means ever since the Sabal Trail pipeline was first announced in 2013.
Those are the wolves after those poor pipeline Applicants: solar and wind power.
Gavin Bade, Utility Dive, Feb. 6, 2018,
FERC asks DC Circuit to delay issuing order to halt Sabal Trail pipeline, Continue reading 2018-01-07 2018-02-07.
The illustration
by Francis Barlow Aesop’s fable “The Boy who Cried Wolf”, called by him DE PASTORIS PUERO ET AGRICOLIS, 1687
FERC cries wolf for Sabal Trail to DC Circuit Court
Florida fracking ban passes Senate Committee, needs to move in House 2018-02-07
One of our goals Wednesday in Tallahassee was accomplished: the fracking ban is moving in the Florida statehouse! You can help: call your Florida state Representative or Senator and ask them to vote for the fracking bills. If you don’t know who they are, you can use Florida’s Find Your Legislators.
Photo: John S. Quarterman for WWALS, Tallahassee, 2018-01-31. Do Gale Dickert and these people look like they’re going to give up easily?
Monday SB 462 was uananimously approved by the Senate Environmental Preservation and Conservation Committee, thank you Committee Chair Senator Rob Bradley, whom many people intensively lobbied last Wednesday to schedule a vote in that committee. The indefatigable Continue reading
Hahira is sixth resolution supporting GA HR 158, now in statehouse 2018-02-01
HR 158 may be scheduled for a vote in the Georgia House as soon as tomorrow. Help dedicate state fees to their intended purposes: please contact your Georgia House Representative or Georgia State Senator (follow the links for contact information) and ask them to pass HR 158. If you don’t know who your Georgia Representative or Senator are, see Georgia My Voter Page.
Hahira is the most recent of six local governments representing the majority of the population in the Suwannee River Basin in Georgia, in five Georgia House districts and two Senate districts, that have passed a resolution supporting Georgia HR 158 against state fee diversions, with five stories and an editorial in the biggest circulation newspaper in the Basin. More local resolutions passed elsewhere in the state, but that ain’t bad for the Suwannee River Basin.
- 2018-01-08 Lanier County, House District 176 (Jason Shaw), Senate District 8 (Ellis Black) Continue reading
FERC requires Sabal Trail report mixing of Randy Dowdy’s subsoil and topsoil
Bad news doubled for the little pipeline that cried wolf: FERC did not file any certificates today for Sabal Trail, and Brooks County farmer Randy Dowdy is vindicated with a letter from FERC demanding a plan from Sabal Trail “within 20 days” (emphasis in the original) for “for investigating the actual extent of the topsoil and subsoil mixing on the Dowdy and Robinson properties and the reported mixing on the Jones property.”
Map:
Google, of Sabal Trail pipeline through Randy Dowdy’s soybean fields, next to Little Creek, which runs into Okapilco Creek, into the Withlacoochee River, into the Suwannee, to the Gulf.
That letter refers to an inspection report of November 14, 2017, also filed by FERC today, that documents that “topsoil and subsoil mixing has occurred in agricultural areas during construction of Sabal Trail Transmission, LLC’s (Sabal Trail) Sabal Trail Pipeline Project.”
FERC has thus validated Continue reading
Profit is not an emergency; Sabal Trail is crying wolf 2016-02-05
Profit is not an emergency, say landowners to FERC:
Sabal Trail hopes to cry wolf to get relief. No Emergency exists to warrant the relief they seek. No shortage or national energy crisis exists to warrant the relief that they seek.
Like WWALS and Sierra Club, GBA Associates point out the pipeline has been shut down much of the past six weeks. Like Sierra Club, the landowners cite federal law that requires at least thirty days after an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) before issuing certificates, referring to the so-called Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (FSEIS) FERC filed yesterday after the WWALS motion to deny the Applicants’ cry of wolf.
Attorney Jonathan P. Waters cuts to the chase:
As the Circuit Court stated, “All of these pipelines, of course, are being built for a reason: to make a profit for their shareholders, and their shareholders’ shareholders.” This is the fact driving the Sabal motion.
Less than two weeks ago, Sabal Trail partner and thus Applicant for the so-called “emergency” relief, Spectra Energy’s new owner Enbridge Energy of Alberta, Canada, told its shareholders and the public in a Quarterly Earnings Call that Enbridge is “the leading developer and operator of wind, solar, and battery storage projects.” While praising solar and wind power at length, that Earnings Call mentioned Sabal Trail only once, yet managed to contradict the public record twice in that one sentence.
Clearly FERC would be doing a favor to Enbridge’s shareholders by Continue reading
FERC rubberstamps FSEIS, FPL backstops, GA Rep Debbie Buckner and Sierra Club object 2018-02-05
In less than three hours since I submitted the WWALS motion to deny Sabal Trail’s sketchy request for emergency certificates, four more major filings appeared: FERC rubberstamped a Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (FSEIS), FPL cheered on the so-called emergency request, Georgia State Rep. Debbie Buckner objected, and Sierra Club objected. Sabal Trail said it best:
The Commission should decline the Applicants’ invitation to subvert the Court’s determination that the Project cannot operate pending compliance with NEPA.
FERC rubberstamps Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (FSEIS)
Continue readingWWALS Motion for FERC to reject Sabal Trail et al. request for reissued or emergency certificates 2018-02-05
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Hahira, GA, February 5, 2018 — Suwannee Riverkeeper objects to Sabal Trail’s last-minute Request to make an end run around an impending mandate from the D.C. Circuit Court that could shut that pipeline down. Granting the Applicants’ Request for reissued or emergency certificates would amount to the same kind of “multi-billion dollar bailout” that FERC recently rejected for the failing coal and nuclear industries, this time targeted at the natural gas industry. The Applicants for that Request claim need for the pipeline, yet they cite themselves for evidence, in a massive conflict of interest, with internal contradictions, and replete with conflicts with other sources deriving from some of those same Applicants.
If, as U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson recently said in Warsaw, Poland, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline being built by Russian gas giant Gazprom PJSC is “undermining Europe’s overall energy stability and security,” and Europe should seek to diversify energy supplies, the same applies to the Sabal Trail natural gas pipeline Canadian gas giant Enbridge is now seven months late building through the U.S. Southeast. The Sunshine State already gets 60% of its electricity from existing pipelines, and it should get on with solar power.
The Applicants listed in Friday’s Request are Continue reading
WWALS booth at Azalea Festival, Valdosta, GA 2018-03-10-11
Come help WWALS celebrate spring with 25,000 of our south Georgia and north Florida friends, at the Azalea Festival in Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia.
When:
10AM-6PM Saturday 10 March 2018
10AM-5PM Sunday 11 March 2018
Volunteer: WWALS members can help at the table!
Where:
Drexel Park
30.846771, -83.285066
Patterson at W. Brookwood Drive, Valdosta, GA
(across Patterson from VSU)
That’s on One Mile Branch, which flows into Sugar Creek, then the Withlacoochee River,
the Suwannee, to the Gulf.
Photo: John S. Quarterman for WWALS at Azalea Festival 2017.
What: Valdosta Daily Times, December 19, 2017:
The festival attracts vendors from throughout the country with Continue reading
Pictures, Azalea Festival 2017-03-11-12
It was a weekend of family fun, with 25,000 of our closest friends and the froggy toss game, in Drexel Park, Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, Spring 2017, on One Mile Branch, upstream of where we did the Cleanup, then flowing into Sugar Creek, and then the Withlacoochee River, just upstream of the newly-rediscovered public access off of Gornto Road, then into the Suwannee River, to the Gulf.
The WWALS booth will be back at Azalea Festival Saturday and Sunday, March 10 and 11, 2018.
Not too busy yet, Early
Continue readingFive Holes Cleanup and Site Exploration, Suwannee River 2018-02-10
Update 2022-05-23: Pictures: Five Holes Cleanup 2018-02-10.
Update 2018-02-10: It’s a Go!.
Join us to clean up and scout a chain of springs and sinks next to the Suwannee River. If it looks good, we may plan a bigger outing later in the year.
No boat required; we’re going by land.
This 5 Holes site exploration is immediately after the Organizing Committee meeting for the Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest; you can come to either or both.
When: 3PM, Saturday, February 10, 2018
Where: CR 141 Boat Ramp, aka Florida Campsites Ramp, in Suwannee River State Park.
GPS: 30.414, -83.159167
Free: This outing is free to WWALS members. For non-members, it is $10.00, per decision of the WWALS board at its 14 January 2018 meeting for all WWALS outings scheduled since then. We recommend you support the work of WWALS by becoming a WWALS member today! If you want to pay for membership or the outing at the site, please bring cash.
Photo by John S. Quarterman for WWALS, along with many more, from August 15, 2015.
Bring: swimming gear (suit, goggles, etc.), and a change of warm clothes. A rope wouldn’t hurt. Trash pickers and trash bags: this is a cleanup. Most of us do not plan to paddle, but if you want to, you can put in at the boat ramp and paddle upstream to 5 Holes; in that case bring Continue reading