This Monday, TV from the much bigger Alachua County to the south covered the water protectors at the Bradford County Commission meeting last Thursday.
Stewardship is a sacred responsibility, not a license to plunder!
Haley Wade, WCJB, 21 August 2017, Protestors Picket Phosphate Mine, Continue reading
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Florida Drops All Charges Against the 14 Gilchrist County Sabal Trail Protesters
Valdosta, July 17, 2017 — Eight months after she and a dozen other people were unnecessarily arrested for holding signs on a public road, WWALS member Cindy Noel reports:
“All charges against those who protested the Sabal Trail Pipeline in Gilchrist County, Florida, on November, 12, 2016, have now been dropped, except for those who were intimidated into accepting plea bargains. Karrie Ford, Jodi Wheeler, Panagioti Tsolkas, Cindy Noel, Allie McDaniel, Alayna Erhard, Felicia Sobieski, Jordan Lacie, Josh Weber, and Nicole Williams were all facing Felony Trespassing on a Construction Site and Disorderly Conduct charges for speaking out against the Sabal Trail Pipeline. The reason cited by the State of Florida when it filed its NOLLE PROSEQUI action was “Insufficient Evidence to Sustain a Prosecution.”
Photo: Cindy Noel. Left to right: David Hensley, Josh Birmingham, Michael Roth (not arrested, left early), Jodi Wheeler, Alayna Erhard, Stephan Barron, Karrie Ford, Felicia Sobieski, Allie McDaniel, Josh Weber, Jordan Lacie, Nicole Williams“These exaggerated charges were intended to Continue reading
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 5, 2017, Hahira, GA — Citing the sea change of solar power overtaking natural gas in new U.S. electricity last year, and generational damage to the fields of farmers such as Randy Dowdy, WWALS Watershed Coalition today filed more evidence and reasons to stop the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline from going into service and to revoke its permit. WWALS filed the same Monday that Sabal Trail Friday asked FERC to authorize turning on the gas. Plus WWALS explicitly requested FERC do a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) to take into account LNG export from Sabal Trail, copious environmental permit violations, and especially new scientific evidence about the Floridan Aquifer.
Suwannee Riverkeeper John S. Quarterman said: “Such irreparable harm outweighs a few billion dollars spent in error by a few companies.”
And that’s without even getting into risks to education, such as
Sabal Trail only a mile from Clyattville Elementary School.
WWALS filed the document today with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). The WWALS cover letter is included below in this message, and the FERC filing is available online.
WWALS wrote in Attachment 1:
“Solar power has actually more than doubled every two years since 2013. Yet FERC only counts utility-scale solar power. Adding rooftop and community solar panels, already a sea change has occurred.
Continue reading
Update 2017-08-03: The Senate already confirmed those two nominees. But there are more nominations to oppose and other things you can do.
Update 2017-06-15: On 6 June 2017 the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee forwarded two FERC nominees, but the full Senate has not voted on them, so you can lobby your Senators to vote no.
You can follow up after five people were arrested Thursday protesting confirmation hearings for FERC nominees in the U.S. Senate Energy Committee. The committee hasn’t made any decisions yet, so there’s still time to tell your Senator or members of that committee what FERC or its rubberstamped pipelines have done, so they can refuse to confirm any nominee who does not vow to turn FERC away from more pipelines and towards sun, wind, and a smart grid.
Photo: Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee considered the nominations of (left to right) Dan Brouillette to be deputy Energy secretary and Neil Chatterjee and Robert Powelson to fill vacancies on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
They’re also considering a nominee for deputy Secretary of the Department of Energy, which department’s Office of Fossil Energy rubberstamped half a dozen LNG export operations in Florida. You can tell the Senators that you don’t want him, either, unless he will turn to the sun.
You can ask the Senate Energy Committee to go beyond that: it can Continue reading
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
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:
- 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
- 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
See Sabal Trail to export through Jacksonville, FL.- Failure to assess risks to Floridan Aquifer, the primary water supply for the region; and
- Numerous permit violations during construction; and
- Failure to address especially egregious violations such as the destruction of Randy Dowdy’s world-record soybean fields; and
- 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
Let the sun rise by the sea, down where Sabal Trail would ship LNG.
When: 6PM Tuesday, May 23, 2017
Where:
Hollywood Beach Culture Center
1301 S. Ocean Drive, Hollywood, FL 33019
Event: facebook
Flyer: Follow this link to PDF, and JPG image below.
“We’ve got loss of production for the future that will take not my lifetime, not my kids’ lifetime, but my kids’ kids’ lifetime to recover from,” Randy Dowdy
Daniel DeMersseman, Valdosta Daily Times, 5 May 2017, Farmer: Sabal Trail devastated farm,
QUITMAN — A Brooks County farmer said Wednesday the controversial Sabal Trail natural gas pipeline has ruined his farmland.
“We’ve got loss of production for the future that will take not my lifetime, not my kids’ lifetime, but my kids’ kids’ lifetime to recover from,” Randy Dowdy, interviewed by Daniel DeMersseman, Valdosta Daily Times.Randy Dowdy is a major corn and soybean producer. In fact, he holds a world’s record for soybean production and a U.S. record for corn production but now he says his award-winning farm is in jeopardy.
Daniel Demersseman (VDT), Randy Dowdy (farmer), photo by John S. Quarterman for WWALS Watershed CoalitionEnvironmentalists held a press conference this week alongside Dowdy to say their worst fears about the pipeline have been realized.
“Sabal Trail gouged its pipeline through Continue reading
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Valdosta, May 3, 2017 — U.S. corn production record holder and world soybean record holder Randy Dowdy, whose record-producing fields were severely eroded in rains after Sabal Trail’s pipeline construction destroyed his terraces and caused massive erosion of his cropland, will be at the Rainwater Conference Center in Valdosta 11:30 AM this morning at a pipeline safety exercise to talk about the implications of Sabal Trail’s destruction for pipeline safety and his livelihood.
Randy Dowdy is the 2014 50-year record holder for U.S. corn production and the world record holder for soybean production. Sabal Trail gouged its pipeline through his terraces on the land he used for those soybeans in Brooks County. Despite his warnings, they left that damage unfixed until rains in January caused massive erosion, washing his topsoil into a nearby creek. Beyond immediate damage, this destruction affects Dowdy’s ability to grow such record yields, and the basic productivity of his fields. What further economic damage has Sabal Trail done to other farmers and landowners? Where else will Sabal Trail’s pipeline cause erosion, perhaps in some places exposing the pipe and risking corrosion and breaks?
The event 11:30 AM this morning at Rainwater Conference Center in Continue reading
Last year paddling the Withlacoochee River Charlie Walker fell in before we got to Langdale Park, but he’s dried off now and ready for the BIG Little River Paddle Race.
As we discussed this morning on
KIX 99.5 FM,
come on down to Reed Bingham State Park between Adel and Moultrie
Saturday morning at 8AM,
and stay for the the grilled lunch and the silent auction.
You do not have to train by paddline upstream;
you can just paddle the excellent course three miles downstream
past cypress, pines, great blue herons, turtles, and fish.
Don’t pet the alligators and they won’t bother you.
Remember to register online or at the event Saturday morning. And you can get tickets for the kayak raffle, either at the race or online!
Here’s the video. Continue reading