Tag Archives: USACE

Push to block Sabal Trail gas pipeline looks to enlist U.S. Army Corps of Engineers –Florida Bulldog

Again tying Florida Governor Rick Scott into the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline invasion, Florida Bulldog reports about last month’s elected official hike at the Suwannee River, Pastured Life, Peurrung, Hildreth Compressor Station but could get no response from hike attendee Ted Yoho FL-03. And FL Bulldog confirmed that as of last week the Corps had not responded to Sanford Bishop GA-02.

Jake Galvin and Dan Christensen, Florida Bulldog, 28 June 2016, Push to block Sabal Trail gas pipeline looks to enlist U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Continue reading

We have a right to expect waterways and groundwater to be clean –Dennis J. Price

Another letter against Sabal Trail and for the rivers and the aquifer in the paper Suwannee Democrat, May 5th 2016.

In response to Jason Bashaw’s, Chairman of the Suwannee County Commission, article in the Suwannee Valley Times, I have this to say. Why is it that if people are concerned about the environment they live in, they are automatically placed into this environmental left category? Like many, many people in our surrounding counties, I hunt, fish, hike and paddle our local rivers. I use the environment as do we all.

I use the environment as do we all. So, for working and paying taxes all my life — as a Vietnam Veteran, as a person who chose to live in this rural part of Florida and raise his kid, as a person who is not now nor ever will be wealthy — I count our public lands, our woods and rivers as a reward for doing the right thing. I do not mind my tax dollars going towards public lands. Mr. Bashaw uses the environmental left in a derogatory manner as a means of denigrating them, and he is including me in it and I resent it. I resent it for my friend’s in WWALS and others who show concern for the pipeline route. I have not met an environmental lefty among them.

WWALS is, Continue reading

WWALS asks Lowndes County to do three things more against Sabal Trail 2016-04-24

Sent yesterday to the Chairman, the other five elected Lowndes County Commissioners, and the County Clerk (PDF). They meet again 5:30PM Tuesday evening, April 25th 2016.

Dear Commissioners,

Thanks to Chairman Bill Slaughter for saying in the Valdosta Daily Times that the Commission signing an easement contract was not an endorsement of the Sabal Trail pipeline.[1] Therefore I ask you to:

  1. Invite the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to investigate on site and on paper the numerous omissions by Sabal Trail of springs and underground water transmissivity in what it told the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission; .please see the letter from WWALS to the Army Corps,[2] attached with the letter from WWALS to you of April 12th.
  2. Ask our U.S. Congress member Austin Scott (GA-08) to join the four Georgia Congress members who have already asked FERC to fix its processes or deny a permit for Sabal Trail.[3]
  3. Join the hundreds of organizations and thousands of individuals who have already asked the U.S. Congress to call in the General Accounting Office (GAO) to review FERC’s permitting processes.[4]

Please find appended further information about the issues the Chairman raised in the VDT of eminent domain, in differences in regulation of oil and gas pipelines, and in environmental and safety issues of natural gas pipelines.

Since I wrote to you on April 12th, two more major natural gas pipelines have run into serious problems.

On April 20th, Kinder Morgan shelved Continue reading

Ensuring Sabal Trail compliance with LWCF

WWALS signed onto a letter asking for Sabal Trail to be examined for LWCF compliance.

Jonathon Berman, Sierra Club Georgia Chapter, 12 April 2016, Conservation groups call for public parks to be put ahead of corporate polluters’ pipeline plans,

Atlanta, GA — Today, seven groups called on the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) state liaison officers for Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and Mississippi to ensure that the proposed Sabal Trail pipeline, a joint venture by Duke Energy, NextEra Energy, Inc., and Spectra Energy Corp, and Magnolia Extension, owned by American Midstream, does not threaten public parks and recreation areas.

Map of Southeast Mid-Stream Natural Gas Pipelines The letter highlights the environmental dangers the proposed Sabal Trail and Magnolia Extension projects pose to at least 11 parks and public recreation areas paid for by the LWCF.

Created in 1965, the LWCF is a federal program that provides matching grants and other federal assistance for public parks and recreation areas. The program has safeguards to ensure that lands purchased with its funds are protected for public outdoor recreation. The groups warn that rapidly multiplying planned pipeline projects do not appear to be compliant Continue reading

Videos: WWALS asks Lowndes County to invite Army Corps of Engineers to investigate Sabal Trail discrepancies @ LCC 2016-04-12

Delivered to the Lowndes County Commission Tuesday 12 April 2016 on paper and then by email (PDF, plus 1-page Suwannee County, FL request to U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and 28-page WWALS invitation to U.S. Army Corps of Engineers), following up from two previous addresses to the same Commission.

See also the Carter Way item in that same Commission meeting, also related to Sabal Trail. Continue reading

Thanks for a historic victory against Sabal Trail –WWALS in VDT 2016-04-10

In today’s Sunday April 10th 2016 Valdosta Daily Times:

The Georgia House on March 22nd by an unprecedented 34 ayes to 128 nays rejected easements for Sabal Trail Sunday VDT to drill our Withlacoochee and other Georgia Rivers. This was a historic victory by the Georgia Water Coalition, including Georgia Sierra Club, WWALS, Flint Riverkeeper, Chattahoochee Riverkeeper, plus SpectraBusters, and thanks to all of you who called their state reps.

That same day, Continue reading

WWALS to SBOCC about the Corps, site visits, and independent investigation

Sent this morning to the Suwannee Board of County Commissioners. They meet 6PM tonight, 5 April 2016, at the Suwannee County Judicial Annex, 218 Parshley St. SW, Live Oak, FL, and Sabal Trail is on the agenda.

Exhibit F: Compressors and loops; Suwannee, Columbia, and Bradford Counties, Florida, in Jacksonville Expansion Project, by FGT, for SpectraBusters.org, 31 March 2015 Dear Chairman Bashaw and Commissioners,

Thank you for coming to see with your own eyes at Suwannee River State Park and Falmouth Spring some of what Sabal Trail did not tell FERC. As you know, after that site visit, the Hamilton Board of County Commissioners sent a letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers inviting them to come see for themselves, as well.

Despite what Sabal Trail and FPL will tell you, pipelines are not inevitable.

As you may be aware, Continue reading

WWALS invites Army Corps of Engineers to inspect and investigate Sabal Trail

Sent 5 April 20156. PDF.

Transco-atlantic-sunrise.jpg

You can join this fun and work by becoming a WWALS member today!

Continue reading

Sinkhole Trail on the agenda, Suwannee BOCC, 2016-04-05

Once again, Suwannee County follows Hamilton County’s lead.

Carl McKinney, Suwannee Democrat, 1 April 2016, Suwannee County Commission to discuss Sabal Trail sinkholes,

At its next meeting, the commission will consider sending a letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which must issue a permit for the pipeline project.

The letter would mimic one Hamilton County recently voted to send, said Suwannee County Commissioner Wesley Wainwright.

Wainwright asked Continue reading

FERC makes Hamilton BOCC filing illegible

Does FERC actually look at what counties and other people send it?

Figure 2: LiDAR Map, Suwannee River --Dennis Price to FERC (5 of 8) FERC made the figures illegible in its posting of Dennis Price’s geology report that Hamilton BOCC appended when it forwarded to FERC its site visit request to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

This reminds me of when FERC lost half of Dougherty County’s Sabal Trail resolution and just happened to lose page 3 of Bill Kendall’s letter, the page about lack of need, false pretense, and duress. Does FERC actually care what anybody thinks, other than the industries it “regulates” while they pay all its costs?

FERC Filing 28 March 2016, Accession Number 20160328-0091, “Correspondence from Board of County Commissioners of Hamilton, FL to U.S. Army Corp of Engineers re the Environmental Geology report under CP15-17.” Continue reading