To see Sabal Fail in inaction at Dunnellon, jump to The Dunnellon odorant leaks, where the pipeline stooges wrapped it in towels, sprayed a deodorant, and waited until morning. Really, according to the incident report from Marion County Fire Rescue. It doesn’t get better in this summary: none of the state or federal permitting or safety agencies did anything, leaving Marion County to deal with the situation unassisted.
If you want to know some background, see also Continue reading
Update 2017-09-01: Add #StopETP Day of Action one day early to the same event in Live Oak.
Suwannee Riverkeeper John S. Quarterman will show four years of Sabal Fail, and the Three Stooges plumbing in Dunellon. WWALS member Cecile Scofield will talk about LNG export all over Florida. Flint Riverkeeper Gordon Rogers will explain what the fossil fuel industry calls the Great Major Victory by Sierra Club, Flint Riverkeeper, and Chattahoochee Riverkeeper, and what it means (so far as anyone knows). WWALS E.D. Gretchen Quarterman will lay out what you can do to help stop Sabal Trail and reform FERC. Plus videos.
When: 6:30 PM, Thursday, September 7, 2017
Where: Live Oak Woman’s Club, 1308 11th St SW, Live Oak, FL 32064
Free: There is no admission fee and you do not have to be a member of WWALS to attend. Naturally, we do encourage you to join WWALS today. https://wwals.net/blog/donations/
Gordon Rogers, Flint Riverkeeper and Gretchen Quarterman, WWALS Executive Director
“Once the court officially returns the matter to FERC, the pipeline should cease operations while FERC undertakes the new analysis,” wrote Elly Benson, lead attorney for the case Sierra Club just won against Sabal Trail.
She summed up: ”Instead of sacrificing our communities and environment to build unnecessary pipelines that “set up surefire profits” for pipeline companies at the expense of captive ratepayers, the focus should be on transitioning to clean renewable energy and energy efficiency—especially in the Sunshine State. Forcing federal agencies to grapple with the true climate impacts of dirty fossil fuel projects is a big step in the right direction.”
She leads off this fourth in a WWALS news roundup series (1, 2, 3) about that case, followed by Gordon Rogers, Flint Riverkeeper, another party to the case.
WWALS is not a party to that case and does not speak for the parties, so I can be a cheerleader for them. Shut it down! Let the sun rise!
How many pipelines do we want? None!
When do we want them? Never!
—WWALS at the Sabal Trail Suwannee River crossing, 15 August 2015.
Update 2017-08-29: Fourth news roundup: From pipelines to renewable energy and efficiency –Sierra Club 2017-08-29
“This is wind in our sails and could be the end of Sabal Trail,” Quarterman said, on the front page of the newspaper of record in the largest city in the Suwannee Basin, the Valdosta Daily Times.
We got sails no one can see.
Suwannee Riverkeeper Vessel on the Suwannee River protesting Sabal Trail 2017-01-14
As Frank Jackalone says (see below), FERC has been getting away with murder. And now maybe they can’t.
Thomas Lynn, Valdosta Daily Times, 23 August 2017, Court decision to impact Sabal Trail pipeline, Continue reading
Update 2017-08-29: Fourth news roundup: From pipelines to renewable energy and efficiency –Sierra Club 2017-08-29
Update 2017-08-24: Third news roundup: This is wind in our sails and could be the end of Sabal Trail —Suwannee Riverkeeper in VDT 2017-08-24
OilPrice.com calls it “a critical decision yesterday, that could jeopardize the future for pipeline projects across the country”; pipeline companies could be “spooked” and “…the court ruling raises the unsettling possibility that the project may be forced to shut down — after billions were spent putting it in into service.” Other stories say this ‘huge’ win could also affect the Atlantic Sunrise, Penneast, Atlantic Coast, and Rover Pipelines, among others.
(L to R) Lea Fox, 4, Finn Ryder Purdy, 4, and Mason Dana, 7, of Lake
Worth, sit with gas pipeline protesters outside of Florida Power and
Light headquarters on Universe Boulevard in Juno Beach on October
14, 2016. The Sabal Trail Pipeline began supplying FPL’s plants in
June. Groups opposed the pipeline that will start in Alabama and
bring fracked gas through several counties in Florida’s springs and
wetlands. (Richard Graulich / The Palm Beach Post)
Sad for FPL, Duke, Spectra, and all the other pipeline-building purveyors of fracked methane, maybe, but glad for all the landowners whose land was taken, local citizens who don’t want a 500+-mile IED next to their homes, schools, and waterways, and all people who want clean sun and wind energy, not more polluting fossil fuels.
It’s good the industry press agrees with what I told the VDT: “This is wind in our sails and could be the end of Sabal Trail.”
Here’s a news roundup, in addition to Continue reading
Congratulations Sierra Club, Flint Riverkeeper, Chattahoochee Riverkeeper, and witnesses, who just won their case against FERC about Sabal Trail! Florida landowner Robin Koon is called out by name in the court’s decision to vacate FERC’s order that approved Sabal Trail. Thanks to him and everyone else who for years have demanded to hold regulatory agencies accountable.
Still from WWALS video of
Robin Koon speaking in Tallahassee, 23 January 2017
The actual decision is:
The petition for review in No. 16-1329 is granted. The orders under review are vacated and remanded to FERC for the preparation of an environmental impact statement that is consistent with this opinion. The petition for review in No. 16-1387 is denied.
So ordered.
I am not an attorney, but if I’m reading that right, the court just vacated FERC’s February 2016 Order that approved the Sabal Trail pipeline. Continue reading
It’s not over just because the gas is flowing through Sabal Trail. We’ll be watching, and we’re escalating.
Noelani Mathews, WCTV, June 15, 2017, Local environmentalist groups prepare for Sabal Trail Pipeline to go online,
“We’ve always did a lot online and through legal angles and we’re going to continue doing a lot of that,” says John Quarterman, WWALS President. “If we hear about a sink hole or a leak, we’ll be there taking pictures.”
Sabal Trail Transmission spokeswoman Andrea Grover said, Continue reading
There are still many things you can do, from permit violations to FERC reform, after FPL gloated yesterday about starting the gas through Transco, Sabal Trail, and FSC. Pipelines leak, and another pipeline’s go-ahead just got slapped down by a federal court, plus we need to change the whole legal game. Meanwhile, continuing the rocketing rise of solar power in the Sunshine State and everywhere else is the best way to pry the clammy grip of the fossil fuel industry off our political system.
Photo:
Mitch Allen
Susan Salisbury, Palm Beach Post, 14 June 2017, Sabal Trail, Florida SE Connection are now piping fuel to FPL,
“The start of Florida Southeast Connection and Sabal Trail Transmission natural gas pipeline operations is an important milestone for FPL customers and Florida’s economy,” FPL president and CEO Eric Silagy said.
It may indeed be a milestone of the last pipeline ever built into Florida or through Georgia.
It may even be a milestone of Continue reading
You can still comment by tomorrow, Monday, May 8, 2017
on
Georgia Power’s NIMBY plan for the coal ash it generated,
to send it away from Plant Mitchell to local landfills, maybe yours.
Here are WWALS videos of the GA-EPD public hearing Thursday May 4, 2017 in Albany, GA, which we attended at the invitation of our neighbor Flint Riverkeeper Gordon Rogers, who said at the hearing he is lawyered up, and his attorney Chris Bowers of SELC also spoke.
You don’t have to hire an attorney; you can send in written comments by tomorrow, May 8, 2017, according to the the GA-EPD announcement of March 31, 2017: Continue reading
Our neighbor Flint Riverkeeper Gordon Rogers requests people to come to Albany, GA for a coal ash public hearing. If you can’t go, please send in comments.
When: 7PM, Thursday, May 4, 2017
Where:
Albany Technical College
Kirkland Conference Center
1704 S. Slappey Blvd.
Albany, GA 31701
What:
Public Hearing about draft
National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES)
permit
for Georgia Power Company’s Plant Mitchell.
Why: It’s about coal ash.
Plant Mitchell (Georgia Power Co.) near Albany, GA 7/14/94. Photo courtesy of USGS. T.W. Hale, in
Pamela P. Holliday, Sherpa Guides, unknown date,
The Albany Levee: Trying to Tame the Flint.
Georgia Power proposed Continue reading