The Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline EIS: Demand FERC Do it Right!

Photo Wendy Lynne Lee

INTRODUCTORY NOTE: 

The following is a letter composed by Restoration Ecologist, Kevin Heatley and Philosophy of Ecology Professor/Writer, Wendy Lynne Lee. It's aim is to provide citizens potentially impacted by Williams Partners' (WPX) proposed construction of a 177 mi. 30-42 inch high pressure natural gas pipeline--the TRANSCO expansion, "Atlantic Sunrise"--with clearly drafted, precise information about the ecological hazards of this project. While this letter's focus is ecological, there are a number of other categories of serious hazard--property rights, the abuse of eminent domain, health hazards, and community division--just to name a few. This set is thus intended neither to be comprehensive nor definitive--but what we know is that if FERC took seriously any one of these DEMANDS, let alone the whole set, fulfilling it would become so expensive, onerous, and time-consuming that WPX would be compelled to abandon the pipeline expansion. Indeed, WPX (or any pipeline company) cannot fulfill these adequately because the harms just are beyond what they can assess, much less repair. We know that, and we know our readers know that. Hence, we invite you to copy this set of citizen DEMANDS for yourselves, your neighbors, include it in part or whole in your own comments to FERC, tack it up on doorways or trees, leave it at diners, bring it to read at the scoping hearings listed below. Send it to your legislators, your county commissioners--to whomever you think relevant to this project.

Our aim is clear: STOP THE PIPELINE.

**************************************************

Dear Citizen,

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has issued a Notice of Intent that it will be preparing an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the proposed Atlantic Sunrise Expansion Project. This pipeline will entail approximately 177 miles of new 30 to 42 inch, high-pressure natural gas transmission line and will bisect at least 8 counties in Pennsylvania. As you are aware, the environmental and socio-economic impacts associated with this project pose a grave threat to the integrity and security of our region.

You can find the notice in full here: ELibrary File List

This FERC Notice of Intent provides us with an early opportunity to register opposition to this ill-conceived and unnecessary expansion of natural gas infrastructure. As a citizen, you have a right to demand FERC develop a thorough and complete EIS. Unfortunately, our experience reviewing FERC EIS and (Environmental Assessment) EA documents associated with the last three interstate pipeline projects in our region (the Constitution, the MARC I, and the Tennessee Expansion) indicates that FERC has a history of producing inadequate and substandard analyses of impacts.

We thus encourage you to utilize the following observations to inform your comments to FERC. Now is the time to insist that FERC fully account for all the social-economic and environmental consequences of yet another massive natural gas transmission line.

This list is intended to demonstrate some of the inconsistencies in past FERC documents. Utilize it freely but we also encourage you to include issues of concern based upon your own personal insights and experience.

Williams Open House,
Columbia County
Photo Wendy Lynne Lee

CITIZEN DEMANDS –

·       FERC has constantly refused to address the full cumulative consequences of expanding interstate transmission pipelines. A recent court decision has found this to be inadequate and unlawful. DEMAND that FERC fully account for the increased upstream drilling activity, and ultimate climate instability, that will result from expanding the natural gas transmission capacity!

For the Circuit Court Decision, please see: 

(http://www.cadc.uscourts.gov/internet/opinions.nsf/30B6F48600A85C1E85257CEF004E34F1/$file/13-1015-1496336.pdf) 

·       FERC is required to develop an “alternatives analysis” that considers other options besides the construction of the proposed pipeline. DEMAND an alternatives analysis that includes decentralized power generation (a model based upon private homeowner and community solar panels and wind turbines).

·       FERC has a history of ignoring the full impacts associated with fragmenting interior forest and creating new forest edge environments. DEMAND that FERC include 300 feet on each side of the pipeline as acreage impacted WHEREVER the pipeline crosses interior forest!

·       FERC has repeatedly allowed the pipeline companies to avoid paying for replanting of removed forest vegetation when “temporary workspaces” (often another 60 feet of right-of-way width) are cleared. DEMAND that FERC require a full restoration and replanting plan for EACH forest area “temporarily” denuded!

Forest fragmentation
Photo Wendy Lynne Lee

·       FERC often requires that agricultural soils be separated, stockpiled, and replaced during pipeline construction. However, they devalue and destroy forest soils, despite the inherent fragility of these resources. DEMAND that FERC require the pipeline company fully protect ALL soil systems.

·       FERC consistently fails to provide for adequate and comprehensive invasive species control. DEMAND that FERC require the same level of invasive suppression in both wetland and upland systems for the ENTIRE service life of the pipeline AND for newly created forest edge habitat adjacent to the maintained right-of-way!

·       FERC repeatedly allows open trenching of small and medium size streams during pipeline construction. Yet they require directional drilling under LARGE streams. This preferential treatment of watercourses is arbitrary and ultimately damaging to watershed health. The cumulative linear footage of water crossings involving smaller streams is potentially orders of magnitude greater than that associated with one or two larger water bodies. DEMAND that FERC require directional drilling during all stream crossings!

Impacted stream at pipeline cut,
Photo Wendy Lynne Lee

·       FERC allows pipeline companies to permanently maintain and mow a right-of-way width of 50 feet in upland systems. Yet they restrict the width to 10 foot in wetlands. There is no ecological rationale behind this arbitrary difference in right-of-way width. If a smaller right-of-way is possible for wetlands, it is possible for uplands. DEMAND that FERC respect the private property rights of upland land owners!

HOW TO FILE?

Citizen comments are due on or before August 18, 2014. We encourage you to submit your comments electronically using the “eComment” feature located on the FERC website (www.ferc.gov) under the link “Documents and Filings.”

WHY TO FILE?

FERC has a long history of advancing virtually every project seeking approval. Hence, it is unrealistic to expect FERC to deny the Atlantic Sunrise Expansion solely based upon community concerns or the comments of private citizens. If, however, citizens DEMAND that FERC develop a thorough and comprehensive EIS that addresses the full spectrum of socio-economic and environmental impacts associated with this pipeline, it will become apparent to both FERC and Williams Partners that this project is cost-prohibitive. 

In other words, if FERC took seriously its responsibility to assess the actual impacts of the proposed Atlantic Sunrise expansion,  it would become clear that Williams' Partners' intent is to externalize the risks and the cost onto the taxpayers and communities who will bear the environmental, health, property value and divisive community impacts of this project--but enjoy few if any of the benefits.

The only sound conclusion to draw is not that the pipeline can be moved, relocated, made more efficient. but that the pipeline should not and must not be built.

Kevin Heatley, Restoration Ecologist

Wendy Lynne Lee, Professor of Philosophy

For further information please contact Wendy Lynne Lee: wlee@bloomu.edu

FERC's Public Scoping Meetings: 7-10PM; Williams Partner's Open House, 6-7PM

8.4.14: Millersville University, Student Memorial Center, 21 South George Street
Millersville, PA 17551.

8.5.14: Lebanon Valley College, Arnold Sports Center, 101 North College Ave.

Anneville, PA 17003.

8.6.14: Bloomsburg University, Haas Center for the Arts, 400 East Second Street

Bloomsburg, PA 17815.

8.7.14: Lake Lehmon High School, 1128 Old Route 115, Dallas, PA 18612

Profit-Venture Pipelines are Not Public Utilities

Note: The following is the second of a series of letters to the editor concerning Williams Partner's, MLP (WPZ, formed in 2007) planned expansion of the TRANSCO natural gas pipeline. Each  addition to the series will focus on a specific aspect of the Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Company, LLC's strategy to maximize natural gas transport from frack pad to compressor station to pipeline to export depot. My aim will be to show that--contrary to Williams' claims to concern for the environment, safety, human health, property rights, job opportunities, or community integrity--the Oklahoma company's singular objective is to maximize the profits of its shareholders and its affiliated industry partners at virtually any cost--so long as that cost can be externalized to the public.

Photo, Wendy Lynne Lee

My message is simple and clear: this pipeline cannot be built, and if we allow it we will be to blame for the consequent disaster. There's one truth that's as unmistakable as it is undeniable: more pipeline, more frack pads, more compressors, more tractor-trailor, sand can, chem-truck, and waste hauler traffic, more explosions, more abuses of eminent domain, more forced integration, more property condemnations, more water and air pollution, more forest fragmentation, more invasive species, more community division, more cancer, more endocrine disruption, more lung disease, more rashes, more livestock illness, more suffering--more climate change. What this pipeline represents in the continuing liquidation of Pennsylvania's assets, and its systematic  conversion into an industrialized natural gas extraction colony for multinational corporations--just like Williams. 

I will show you.

Letter two:

When is a profit venture whose primary objective is to transport a highly explosive fossil fuel along arteries through forest and fen, farmland and township, past school houses, retirement homes, hospitals, and homes to export terminals bound for the global markets to be counted as a public utility--a public good?

I'd suggest that the answer to that question is: never. 

CYNOG Compressor, PA
Photo, Wendy Lynne Lee

And I recommend strongly that you don't cave to the landman. 

Case in point--and if you're following so far, this will make you gag:

As reported at Lancaster Online (Court blocks use of eminent domain on pipeline to pass through Lancaster County - Local News - lancasteronline.com), Sunoco was denied appeal to the use of eminent domain by Judge Stephen Linebaugh (3.25.14) specifically on the grounds that Sunoco is a pipeline carrier and not a public utility. "Officials for Williams Partners, which wants to build a 35-mile Marcellus Shale natural gas line the length of Lancaster County, north to south, said Wednesday that the court case has no bearing on their project...Stockton [Spokesperson for WPZ] said Williams is under the jurisdiction of the Natural Gas Act [FERC: Natural Gas Pipelines], not the Interstate Commerce Act like Sunoco, and would need to get its power of eminent domain if the project is approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission." 

Two points about FERC:

1. Although FERC claims to "work with" corporations like WPZ to insure the safety of pipeline construction, "[t]he Commission has no jurisdiction over pipeline safety or security" (FERC: Natural Gas Pipelines).

Combine that with: 

2.  FERC virtually never denies a permit application. This is, of course, not surprising since the agency's job just is to grant permits: "FERC, is an independent agency that regulates the interstate transmission of electricity, natural gas, and oil," and because all of its commissioners stand to benefit in one way or another from the energy industries, especially fossil fuels, we can hardly expect them to actually regulate--much less deny--a permit.

Chairperson, Cheryl LaFleur: retired acting CEO of National Grid USA, "responsible for the delivery of electricity to 3.4 million customers in the Northeast" (Cheryl A. LaFleur Biography :: Renewable Energy News and Energy Regulation Information | The Energy Daily). 

Commissioner Tony Clark: From the North Dakota Utility Regulatory Commission, said in a recent interview with the American Gas Association, that the construction of LNG terminals like the one planned by Dominion at Cove Point was good for "energy independence," and insisted--citing "regulatory overreach" that the EPA was not in the best position to evaluate environmental impact--that this should be left to the states (An interview with 2011 NARUC President Tony Clark | True Blue Natural Gas - An Energy Blog from the American Gas Association AGA). In a speech given to a conference of oil and gas operators after his appointment to FERC, he chimed "Keep doing what you’re doing!" (FERC Commissioner—U.S. on Brink of Energy Security | OK Energy Today).

And that's just two of the four current commissioners. Indeed, when commissioner nominee, Ron Binz dared to suggest that natural gas was a "bridge strategy" to renewables, he was attacked  by the Wall Street Journal as a "radical" (More FERC Uproar: Nominee for Chairman Stirs Controversy « Breaking Energy - Energy industry news, analysis, and commentary).     That he  was targeted by the American Energy Alliance and Americans for Prospeity, both Koch Brothers front groups, and thereby forced to withdraw his nomination, should give us a glimpse of the FERC Worldview--or at least who it's not willing to confront (Koch-Fueled Groups Target Ron Binz, Obama's FERC Nominee). 

The upshot is that we have no reason to trust FERC to act particularly for the public good, and every reason to think its commissioners' interests align with the companies they "regulate," including WPZ.

And that brings us right back around to Sunoco, WPZ and eminent domain. As reported by Keep Tap Water Safe (Former PA DEP Secretary Krancer Wants Sunoco To Condemn Your Property | Keep Tap Water Safe), Sunoco's set back--being denied by Judge Linebaugh the right to act as a public utility--was barely even that. In fact, Sunoco had merely paused to reload its property condemnation guns with former Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) secretary, Michael Krancer, now attorney for Blank Rome, who now stood ready and anxious to execute the industry friendly oil and gas laws he helped to put into place while he was at DEP:

Now, the recently former Department of Environmental Protection Secretary is leading the legal team who is working to win Sunoco LP some special utility status, thereby stripping Pennsylvania landowners of their local zoning protections. If this seems ethically challenged to you, maybe it’s because Krancer is now profiting directly from the free-wheeling gas drilling permit policies he enacted while in public office little more than a year ago. Again, it’s sneaky, but it’s not illegal.

Fact is, "Sunoco must export large amounts of gas liquids in order to be profitable. Selling a little propane to the locals on the side does not a public utility make," and that is what's directly relevant to WPZ's plans for the Atlantic Sunrise pipeline. Selling a little natural gas to the locals does not a profit make. Getting to be a public utility-that's where the big bucks are.

If Williams gets Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approval for the 176-mile line through six Pennsylvania counties, it will begin negotiations to buy roughly 55-foot-wide land easements from property owners along its preferred path. If property owners object, Williams will seek the easements through eminent domain in the courts. (Natural Gas Archives |)

In other words, if you don't sign over your land to the landman when he arrives at your door, he's going to try to take it from you anyways, and another word for that "taking" is theft.  Why? Because, as I argued in the first installment in this series, the Atlantic Sunrise is not intended for the public good; it is intended for global export (THE WRENCH: When Sunrise for the Global Gas Markets is Sunset for Pennsylvania: Williams Partner's "Atlantic Sunrise" Expansion of the TRANSCO). So all that hype about "American,""energy security," and "cheap" is just that--hype to get you to sign away your property to a multinational company masquerading as a good neighbor in a plaid shirt and jeans.

He's not. He is, in fact, a thief who is poised to steal from you through the sheer force of a FERC permit approval what he can't extort from you through your signature. And given what we can readily surmise about FERC, not one iota of what he's going to tell you about safety, environment, property value is something FERC is in any position to give a tinker's damn about. 

Still, if you're not entirely convinced by these facts that you don't want to sign a contract for that easement or right-of way, consider the wise words of Michael Faherty, attorney representing landowners in eminent domain cases against the gas industry  “Landowners need to be wary about these companies that come looking to acquire land, they don’t have an obligation to be telling the truth,” Faherty said. “They need to be wary of land agents.” 
(Natural Gas Archives |).

No obligation to tell the truth--that is the understatement of the year--so far.

Here's just a snippet (we'll get to this in letter three) of what they don't tell you:

1. More pipeline means more unconventional drilling--fracking--and more drilling means--just for example:

In a 2013 survey of 550 people conducted by business researchers at the University of Denver, a strong majority said they would decline to buy a home near a drilling site. The study, published in the Journal of Real Estate Literature, also showed that people bidding on homes near fracking locations reduced their offers by up to 25 percent.

If you think that there's a big difference in having a pipeline going through your property is really that different than having an active frack pad, think again. 

An economic analysis by the Headwaters Institute undermines the idea that oil and gas developments fatten the bank accounts of communities and leave them better off than before drilling started. While there may be short-term windfalls, the study of six western states found that over the long-term “oil and gas specialization is observed to have negative effects on change in per capita income, crime rate and education rate.”  (How Fracking Destroys the American Dream | EcoWatch)

Now maybe you're thinking that so long as you don't have a drilling operation right in your back yard, a pipeline is OK--and truth is, the likelihood of a pipeline explosion is fairly small. But, where's there's pipeline, there's compressors, and where there's compressors, the potential for exposure to volatile organic compounds, and to other fugitive emissions accelerates. Here's a little light reading until letter three: 

http://un-naturalgas.org/pipeline%20text%20Dec%2009.pdf

Barto Compressor,
Photo, Wendy Lynne Lee

Air quality concerns raised as gas compressor stations multiply - News - Citizens' Voice

Barto Compressor Station Exceeds Pollution Standards

And then, of course, there are the explosions, for example a Williams' incident just recently in Opal, Wyoming at a natural gas processing plant (Explosion shuts large natural gas processing plant in Wyoming | Reuters):

The Williams plant feeds into the Opal Hub, a crossroads for five pipelines that connect to California, Oregon and Canada and head east across the Rocky Mountains. Gas at the Opal Hub for Thursday delivery rose 6 cents to $4.63 per million British thermal units.
Wyoming and U.S. regulators were not available to comment or say if gas flows at the Hub would be affected. Utilities used a record amount of gas this past winter to meet heating needs during unusual cold snaps that caused volatile prices and left stockpiles at their lowest level since 2003. A string of accidents involving the country's overburdened pipeline and rail infrastructure has prompted new safety concerns as U.S. output of oil and gas surges during an unprecedented boom. On March 31, a pipeline within its liquefied natural gas facility in Washington exploded and shrapnel from the blast caused a leak in one of two liquefied natural gas tanks, prompting evacuation orders near the plant outside the rural town of Plymouth.

On April 7, a Williams unit said that a gas gathering pipeline in West Virginia caught fire.
Williams operates two natural gas processing plants in Wyoming which remove liquids and other impurities from natural gas to allow it to be transported in large pipelines.
Gas comes to the processing plants from the Williams gathering system, a network of 3,500 miles of pipelines which collect gas produced in the region.

So, just to sum it all up (for now): why would anyone in their right mind sign a contract with a company whose 

1. safety record is shoddy, 
2. who's willing to use the power of eminent domain condemnation to get what they want, 
3. whose product is extracted and processed at the immense expense of the health and environments of the people who must live forever in its shadow, 
4. and whose singular aim is to export its product to insure its availability to the highest bidder? 

TRANSCO, Picture Rocks, PA
Photo, Wendy Lynne Lee

When the WPZ landman, and his plaid shirt and jeans, knocks on your door, be polite, but tell him no. And when he says he'll be back, wait for him to leave and go talk to your neighbors.

Or better--go talk to your neighbors right now.

When Sunrise for the Global Gas Markets is Sunset for Pennsylvania: Williams Partner's "Atlantic Sunrise" Expansion of the TRANSCO

Note: The following is the first of what will be a series of letters to the editor concerning Williams Partner's, MLP (WPZ, formed in 2007) planned expansion of the TRANSCO natural gas pipeline. Each  addition to the series will focus on a specific aspect of the Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Company, LLC's strategy to maximize natural gas transport from frack pad to compressor station to pipeline to export depot. My aim will be to show that--contrary to Williams' claims to concern for the environment, safety, human health, property rights, job opportunities, or community integrity--the Oklahoma company's singular objective is to maximize the profits of its shareholders and its affiliated industry partners at virtually any cost--so long as that cost can be externalized to the public.

My message is simple and clear: this pipeline cannot be built, and if we allow it we will be to blame for the disaster that will follow. For there's one truth that's as unmistakable as it is undeniable: more pipeline, more frack pads, more compressors, more tractor-trailor, sand can, chem-truck, and waste hauler traffic, more explosions, more abuses of eminent domain, more forced integration, more property condemnations, more water and air pollution, more forest fragmentation, more invasive species, more community division, more cancer, more endocrine disruption, more lung disease, more rashes, more livestock illness, more suffering--more climate change. What this pipeline represents in the continuing liquidation of Pennsylvania's assets, and its systematic  conversion into an industrialized natural gas extraction colony for multinational corporations--just like Williams. 

I will show you.
*******************************************************************************
Letter 1: Williams' plans are to pipeline frack-gas from the Marcellus Shale to whatever market--foreign or domestic--that will pay the most for it. Because this market is likely to be foreign, we can expect to see a steep rise in the domestic price of natural gas along with an accelerated expansion of drilling and compressor operations to accommodate so significant an expansion of the TRANSCO. This will be accompanied by the ecological liquidation and community division that are the hallmarks of the fracking industry.
It is genuinely difficult to know where to begin an objective evaluation of Williams Partners plan to construct a $2.1 billion dollar, 42 inch, high pressure, expansion of the TRANSCO natural gas pipeline. From their FERC (Federal Energy Regulatory Commission) request for pre-filing review, 3.31.14 (Docket PF14-):

As a result of significant interest expressed by shippers, the Project will be designed to provide 1,700,000 dekatherms per day (“dt/day”) of incremental firm transportation capacity along two project paths: 850,000 dt/day of firm transportation capacity from various points along Transco’s Leidy Line in north central Pennsylvania to Station 85 in Choctaw County, Alabama; and 850,000 dt/day of firm transportation capacity from a proposed interconnection in Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania (the “Zick Interconnection”) to as far south as Transco’s existing point of interconnection between Transco’s mainline and Dominion Transmission’s Pipeline located in Fairfax County, Virginia.

But even as early as page two of the FERC filing, Williams has already told what will no doubt the first of many half-truths and falsehoods with respect to its real objectives:

There are no LNG [Liquified Natural Gas] terminal facilities related to or proposed as part of the Project.

Half-truth at best: the reference to Fairfax County, Virginia is at least indirectly connected to Dominion's plan to convert an LNG import facility into an LNG export at Cove Point, Maryland. Indeed, Dominion's project slogan is "Support Maryland Sending Clean Energy to the World," and Williams certainly comprehends the opportunity to export to Chinese and Indian buyers. Consider the Gulf Trace Project, for example:

HOUSTON – Williams Partners is planning a $300 million pipeline expansion to carry natural gas to Cheniere Energy’s planned liquefied natural gas export facilities at the Sabine Pass in Louisiana, the company said Friday.
It’s a move to connect abundant supplies of domestic shale gas in the northeastern U.S. with international markets through the nation’s first LNG export facilities, the Oklahoma-based pipeline operator said. Booming U.S. shale-gas production has in recent years prompted companies like Cheniere and Exxon Mobil to plan facilities to send Gulf Coast supplies abroad to eager buyers in China, India and elsewhere.
The development project for Williams Partners’ massive Transco pipeline could carry 1.2 billion cubic feet of natural gas to Cheniere’s natural gas cooling stations on the Gulf Coast, where Cheniere plans to launch LNG tankers to

foreign buyers after its facilities are fully constructed late next year. 

(Fuel Fix » Williams Partners plans $300M pipeline expansion for gas export facility)

In other words, Williams knows where the big money is--and it ain't the U.S. domestic markets. "Once complete, the Sabine Pass LNG terminal will be the first large-scale LNG export facility in operation, in the United States," and if you think for a minute that frack-gas from under your land isn't headed to the global markets, think again. Williams to Expand Transco Pipeline to Deliver Gas to Sabine Pass LNG>> LNG World News.

Just imagine what will happen when Dominion's Cove Point facility goes on-line.

Anyone who believes the patriotic hype about "Cheap! American! Abundant!" just isn't paying attention. Fact is, whether the Atlantic Sunrise expansion is intended for foreign or domestic markets is irrelevant since we can expect to pay whatever the Chinese are willing to pay. Why should Williams sell it to us for any less? 

Unrelated to Gulf Trace, Transco is pursuing several other large-volume projects to serve growing domestic demand for natural gas. By year-end 2017, Williams Partners expects to add approximately 3.4 million dekatherms of natural gas transportation capacity from northeast supplies to high-value growth markets with mainline expansions that include the Dalton Expansion Project, Atlantic Sunrise, Leidy Southeast, Virginia Southside and others.

News

But for those still holding out on the hope that Williams flies the American flag for any other purpose than advertising, here's just one of the commitments to which Williams appeals to justify building the Atlantic Sunrise:

The new commitment is to ship from an interconnection in Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, to Transco's existing Zone 5 Pleasant Valley point in northern North Carolina. That point is situated between Transco's mainline and Dominion Transmission's Cove Point Pipeline located in Fairfax County, Virginia, the notice said. The additional commitment will require Transco to extend the Central Penn Line northward from the Leidy Line to the Susquehanna County interconnection. (Transco looks to expand Atlantic Sunrise project - Natural Gas | Platts News Article & Story).

The Cove Point Pipeline may be in Fairfax County, VA, but "Dominion Cove Point’s natural gas

pipeline is connected to Dominion Transmission’s interstate pipeline, as well as to other interstate pipelines that have access to the growing natural gas supplies in the region. Using Dominion Cove Point as an export facility would provide producers with new international markets" (Dominion Cove Point), specifically India and Japan: "Richmond, Va.-based Dominion Resources now wants to turn its entire Cove Point operation around, reversing the flow so it can liquefy the natural gas now pouring out of Pennsylvania wells and load it onto tankers bound for India and Japan" Fuel Fix » Stakes are high for LNG export plan.

And there you have it, the first lie Williams' landmen will tell  to bamboozle and effectively extort property owners all along the route of the Atlantic Sunrise. Appealing to your patriotism, your concern for national and energy security, your sense of duty as a citizen, they'll try to convince you that letting them on your land to add to their 13,900 miles of already extant pipeline is the right thing to do for your country.

But nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, by selling to foreign buyers, Williams actually strengthens the fuel economies of countries whose interests may or may not align with our national security objectives. Is that really worth the despoiling of our forests, the contamination of our water, division in our communities, and the forfeiture of our property rights?

 But just in case you're still not convinced that Williams doesn't have American interests at heart, consider this: Williams partnered with Dominion--the global markets their explicit objective--at least as far back as 2009:

TULSA, Okla., Aug. 10 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Williams (NYSE: WMB) and Dominion (NYSE: D) today announced their intention to form a joint venture to market and develop a new pipeline to transport up to 1 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas produced in the Rockies and Appalachian basins (including the southern Marcellus Shale) to growing markets in the Eastern and Mid-Atlantic regions. The proposal, to be known as the Keystone Connector, would extend from the terminus of the Rockies Express pipeline in eastern Ohio to Williams' Transco Station 195 in southeastern Pennsylvania. Williams and Dominion will be working with potential shippers to determine the level of interest in the proposal. Dominion News

The connector for the Atlantic Sunrise? TRANSCO Station 195.

Here's the upshot: since at least 2006, the big energy companies--like Williams--have been working as hard as they can to extract the last drop of fossil fuel before the wells run dry--or the expense, already mammoth, is just too immense. What we can clearly show in 2014 is that this industry spends millions to avoid litigation for contaminating wells, despoiling forests, and polluting air--and they're more than happy to buy out your property once they've destroyed it and made impossible for you to sell, if you'll just sign a nondisclosure and gets your kids to agree to it too (Pennsylvania Judge Orders Records Opened in Fracking Case - Bloomberg). Williams is no exception. Just ask the folks of Appomatox, Virginia, or Marengo County, Alabama (Owner of PA Natural Gas Facility that Exploded Has Lengthy Record of Pipeline Safety Violations - Natural Gas Watch.org).

But more of this in a coming letter.

For photographs of pipeline similar to the one Williams intend to construct, please see:

More pipeline, more fracking, more destruction - a set on Flickr

For articles relevant to this one, please see:

http://thewrenchphilosleft.blogspot.com/2014/03/anadarko-liquidates-public-lands-for.html
http://thewrenchphilosleft.blogspot.com/2014/03/the-hilcorp-frack-gas-stampede-to-utica.html
http://thewrenchphilosleft.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-corporatization-of-american.html