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Tompkins requests public hearing on Dominion pipeline
The former CNG Transmission Station on Ellis Hollow Creek Road, now owned by Dominion. The station has been the site of a petroleum spill of unknown scope, according to new data.
(Photo: NICK REYNOLDS / Staff Photo)
Tompkins County legislators voted Tuesday to request a public hearing discussing the Dominion New Market Pipeline project.
The project would involve the expansion of its existing pipeline systems in New York as well as construction and modification of compressor stations. The 200-mile natural gas pipeline passes through Tompkins County and includes the Borger Compressor Station at 219 Ellis Hollow Creek Road. The Department of Environmental Conservation is accepting public comments until Monday regarding draft air discharge permits.
The issue drew dozens of people to the Tompkins legislature meeting Tuesday, and 16 people spoke in support of the resolution. Local residents opposed to the pipeline voiced concerns about environmental and safety hazards of the pipeline and urged Tompkins County legislators to go further and oppose the project.
The legislature voted unanimously to request the DEC to hold a public hearing.
Walter Hang, president of Toxics Targeting, called on legislators to oppose the pipeline because it would cause additional toxic pollution hazards in Tompkins County and across New York, he said. Hang also said the pipeline would also "help perpetuate America's addiction to fossil fuels" and contribute to global climate change.
"The key thing is, I urge you to take action now because the deadline for comment is ending (Sept.) 12th," Hang said.
At a press conference in early August, Hang told reporters that a number of petroleum spills at several transmission stations along the pipeline's route from Horseheads to Schenectady — including two in Dryden — could put the project in jeopardy as it violated the Clean Water Act. Hang said the spills that occurred on the sites have not been cleaned up.
However, Dominion Transmission disagreed with Hang's claim, saying no sites in New York need cleanup. Dominion Transmission said in a statement that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved the project in April after evaluating all environmental, health and safety concerns associated with the project.
Regi Teasley said Tompkins County should oppose the pipeline to show leadership on issues of climate change. Other local residents said if legislators opposed the pipeline, it would be consistent with their actions over the years regarding fossil fuels and sustainability.
Ultimately, legislators did not add an amendment opposing the project. Many legislators agreed with Dooley Kiefer, D-Cayuga Heights, who said opposing the pipeline would complicate the county's request for a public hearing.
"They would certainly not schedule a public hearing when we've already told them where we stand," Kiefer said. "But I think requesting a public hearing is exactly what we should be doing. ... That does not mean that individuals legislators cannot, as individuals, comment."
Carol Chock, D-Ithaca, moved to add two amendments to the resolution requesting more studies be done. The first study would look at the capacity of the pipeline segments in Tompkins County to see if it could withstand the proposed increased volume and pressure before any permit is issued. The second amendment calls on the DEC to study greenhouse gas emissions along the length of proposed pipeline in New York State, "including carbon equivalents from methane and utilizing recent scientific evidence regarding methane leakage, as has been done in the 2016 Tompkins County Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventory."
Both amendments unanimously passed, as did the full resolution requesting a public hearing.
Three public hearings have passed, but members of the public can still file written comments to the NYS DEC. All comments must be postmarked or submitted electronically by fax or email no later than Monday. Contact: Christopher M. Hogan, NYS DEC - Division of Environmental Permits, 625 Broadway, 4th Floor, Albany, NY 12233-1750, Phone: (518) 402-9151, Fax: (518) 402-9168, Email: NewMarketProject@dec.ny.gov.
Proposed gas pipeline expansion in Tompkins raises climate change fears
Photo by Michael Smith/The Ithaca Voice
ITHACA, NY - On Tuesday, the Tompkins Legislature passed a resolution requesting the New York Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) hold a public hearing for a proposed natural gas pipeline expansion in Ithaca.
Plans are in the works to expand the Dominion New Market Pipeline, which runs through a compressor station on Ellis Hollow Creek Road in Dryden. Ithaca environmental group Toxics Targeting recently revealed that there were uncleaned spills along this pipeline, including in Ithaca.
The project would expand on that station and others along the pipeline, to allow for greater pressure and volume of natural gas to be moved through the pipeline. This would most likely involve hydro-fracked gas being moved other states, like Pennsylvania, through New York and into markets further east, like Massachusetts.
The resolution proposed by the legislature called on the DEC to provide for a public hearing in Tompkins County before issuing any approvals. Hearings in three other affected areas have already occurred.
More than a dozen residents spoke during the public comment period, all stating their opposition to the project. While concerns were expressed about the potential safety issues associated with the pipeline expansion, for many who spoke the primary concern was much broader -- the impact of continued use of natural gas on climate change.
"By building infrastructure that enables other states -- Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio -- to move its fracked gas through New York State, we are still enabling, in fact encouraging that to happen elsewhere," said Susan Molter of Ithaca.
Pamela Mackesey, a former Tompkins County legislator, was one of several who urged the legislature to take an even stronger stance on the issue, and amend the resolution to state that the legislature was officially opposed to the project. Mackesey spoke about how during her time in the legislature, the county took a strong stance against fracking and she felt that the same approach was needed here.
"We visibly moved New York State toward a more environmentally responsible that didn't include destruction and deterioration of our amazing environment. It feels as if there isn't that focus and intensity now," Mackesey said. "This is a part of the same battle.... This is an unrelenting effort by a large a powerful industry to get its way in New York State. Vigilance is what we need, and a clear stance about where we stand."
Why not officially oppose the pipeline?
Two additional amendments were added to the resolution. The first asked that the DEC perform a study on the capacity of the pipeline to withstand the additional pressure and volume that would be generated by the expansion. The second requested a similar study on the impacts of greenhouse gas emissions from the expansion.
While sympathetic to the requests for a harder stance, legislators Dooley Kiefer and Anna Kelles both stated that they felt that adding that language to the resolution would undermine the whole thing. They reasoned that if the county was already on record as opposed to the pipeline, the DEC would have little reason to follow through and hold a hearing here.
"What we want is for them to come so we can have the greatest influence, because no phone call or letter will be as powerful as saying something in person," said Kelles.
Kelles attempted to find a middle ground by proposing an amendment that would state the legislature was opposed to the project if the requested public hearing and studies weren't completed, but that amendment failed with four in favor and ten opposed.
The final resolution, with the two amendments requesting studies, passed unanimously.
"A bunch of keystone cops"
However, legislator Mike Sigler expressed a number of issues with the way the arguments against the pipeline were framed. In particular, Sigler said he felt that people were perhaps being too dismissive of the regulatory agencies and companies behind these projects.
Sigler said that it wasn't as if the people who would build the pipeline would out of their way to make a leaky or malfunctioning pipeline, and it wasn't as if the agencies charged with environmental protection didn't care about the environment.
"This idea that the DEC is just a bunch of keystone cops running around and they don't know what they're doing, and we know better than they do... and FERC, they're just a bunch of appointed people who paid their way into those jobs, they don't know what they're doing either," Sigler said.
"I gotta tell ya, I'm at a loss. Who do I believe? ... These guys, this is what they do. I can't believe the people in the EPA have any less concern about the environment than our planning department here in Tompkins County. That's a big stretch. And I haven't lost that much faith in our government that I can make that leap."
19 spills in 32 years: Ithaca firm details U.S. Salt discharges into Seneca Lake; Crestwood downplays findings
This is an aerial photo of the Crestwood/Con-Edison natural-gas-storage site in the Schuyler County town of Reading. It was taken in 2012.
It was taken in 2012.
READING — An Ithaca firm specializing in environmental database services says Seneca Lake has been polluted by south-end brine spills and petroleum releases repeatedly over the past 40 years.
In releasing the information obtained from the state Department of Environmental Conservation, Walter Hang of Toxics Targeting Inc. is asking the state to deny issuing the permits Crestwood Equity Partners LP needs to store natural gas and propane on 576 acres north of Watkins Glen.
Officials from the Houston-based company, which bought the site in 2008, downplayed Hang’s findings.
“We cannot speak to incidents that occurred before we bought U.S. Salt in 2008,” Crestwood vice president Brad Bacon wrote in an email to the Times.
“We knew that significant catch-up investment would be required, and we have spent tens of millions to upgrade and modernize plant operations. Although our goal is an incident-free workplace, the incidents that have occurred since we finished replacing the brine pipeline system in 2013 have been minor.
“Despite what this group would like you to believe, there is nothing nefarious or catastrophic here. The state’s experts had this data before strongly endorsing our propane storage project.”
Hang wrote Gov. Andrew Cuomo in a letter dated Sunday asking him to reject Crestwood’s application and impose a moratorium on new fossil-fuel projects.
“Many spills were never cleaned up to state standards, even though they caused extensive petroleum contamination, resulted in huge brine discharges of up to 470,000 gallons, polluted groundwater or directly impacted Seneca Lake,” Hang said. “Citizens who want to preserve Seneca Lake will be shocked to learn about massive pollution spills reported over the course of four decades at the giant salt mine and gas storage facility in Reading. This information documents that New York authorities are unable to prevent or clean up toxic spills that have polluted one of the most famous lakes in the world.”
Hang listed information on each of 19 spills or discharges from U.S. Salt, International Salt and Akzo Salt from 1974 to 2016. He wrote that the DEC has a responsibility and obligation through the federal Clean Water Act to establish and implement a policy which protects existing water quality from being degraded.
“Given that mandate and other legal requirements to safeguard New York’s water quality, I respectfully request that you deny hydrocarbon storage permit applications pursuant to the New York State Oil, Gas and Solution Mining Law and related state approvals required for methane and LPG facilities to be built and operated in Reading by Arlington Storage Co. LLC, Crestwood Equity Partners LP, Stagecoach Gas Services LLC, Finger Lakes LPG Gas Storage LLC or other inter-related corporate entities,” he said.
Hang maintained that of the dozens of pollution releases over the past 32 years, most of the spills were never cleaned up in compliance with state standards — and some caused widespread groundwater contamination.
“Others simply dissipated in Seneca Lake without any remedial effort whatsoever, even though heavy soil sheen reportedly spread up to 1.5 miles,” he wrote. “With all due respect, I believe it would be irresponsible to grant approvals for massive new fossil fuel infrastructure projects that can potentially cause irreparable harm to New York’s environmental and public health while perpetuating New York’s addiction to natural gas, LPG and other fossil fuels.”
Seneca Lake, the largest and deepest of the 11 Finger Lakes, provides drinking water for more than 100,000 people, including residents of Geneva and Waterloo.
Where things stand
Houston-based Crestwood Equity Partners LP has two projects in the works for its 576-acre site in the Schuyler County town of Reading.
The first is a joint venture that involves Consolidated Edison. The plan, called Stagecoach Gas Services, would expand natural gas storage in abandoned salt caverns on the site. Earlier this year, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission granted an extension for construction on the expansion to begin.
Meanwhile, Crestwood has scaled back its proposal to store liquefied petroleum gas in other salt caverns. Their revised plan includes propane but not butane, eliminates one of two brine ponds, and takes a rail and truck transportation hub out of the equation. The DEC has yet to rule on Crestwood’s application for a permit.
Opposition to Gas Storage & Related Activities Continues
READING, N.Y. (18 NEWS) -
An Ithaca-based environmental data collection agency known as 'Toxics Targeting' released data it says is compiled from New York State DEC data outlining chemical spills in Seneca Lake. The data released by company president Walter Hang on Monday goes back to nearly 40 years ago.
The data compiled is from the area of the gas storage facility in Reading and the salt mines just south of the facility on Rt. 14.
Hang claims the state DEC was unable to clean the spills to New York's standards.
"The data I'm releasing today totally refute that assertion. New York state DEC has no ability to continue to prevent these massive contamination problems or to clean them up so they have no impact on public health. This is proven by their own data," said Hang.
Based on the findings, Hang and others are calling on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to put a moratorium on all gas related activities in New York.
Environmentalist Says 18 Spills Documented At Crestwood
WENY (Watkins Glen, NY) -- A local environmental firm is looking into the history of spills at Crestwood Midstream.
Toxics Targeting says they obtained Department of Environmental Conservation documents about spills that have occurred at the proposed Liquid Petroleum Gas storage site.
An environmental database firm in Ithaca, Toxics Targeting, released information they say they obtained from the Department of Environmental Conservation about previous spills at the site of Crestwood Midstream's proposed Liquid Petroleum Gas storage facility.
Their documents show 18 spills have occurred dating back to 1974.
However, Crestwood has owned the property since 2008.
"So over the course of more than 40 years we've seen the release of petroleum. We've seen releases of brine, which is toxic. It can kill vegetation. It can kill fish. Many of these problems were never cleaned up to applicable state standards. Much of the contamination impacted Seneca Lake," said Walter Hang, President of Toxics Targeting.
Of the 18 spills, Toxics Targeting says some were minor and affected the surface of Seneca Lake.
They say other spills released upwards of 470-thousand gallons of brine.
"So given those problems and given the state's inability to prevent problems and to clean them up to applicable state standards, we're today calling on Governor Cuomo not to authorize any gas storage permits at this site," said Walter Hang, President of Toxics Targeting.
Now just last week, WENY News exclusively obtained a letter from the DEC that said quote "department staff continues to assert that the project meets all applicable environmental statutory and regulatory standards."
WENY News reached out to Crestwood who said:
"We cannot speak to incidents that occurred before we bought US Salt in 2008. We knew that significant catch-up investment would be required, and we have spent tens of millions to upgrade and modernize the plant operations. Although our goal is an incident-free workplace, the incidents that have occurred since we finished replacing the brine pipeline system in 2013 have been minor. Despite what this group would like you to believe, there is nothing nefarious or catastrophic here - the state's experts had this data before strongly endorsing our propane storage project."