2016 Top Stories: Pipelines in the Spotlight
What to look for on Smart Talk Friday, December 30th, 2016:
Smart Talk concludes a week of re-visiting the top stories of 2016 with a discussion about two pipeline projects that run through the mid-state which have received a significant amount of attention. The Atlantic Sunrise project that will send natural gas from the shale fields of northeastern Pennsylvania to the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions crossing ten counties along the way. The Mariner East 2 pipeline, that would be located next to the Mariner 1 existing pipeline, could carry liquefied natural gas from west to east to the Marcus Hook refinery south of Philadelphia.
There has been opposition to both pipelines from property owners who are concerned about property values, the environment and even the threat of eminent domain in some cases.
The protests in Central Pennsylvania have been somewhat mild compared to those that have taken place in North Dakota. There, the Dakota Access oil pipeline had drawn thousands of protestors from across the country and had turned violent as police used water cannons in sub-freezing temperatures and rubber bullets to subdue protestors trying to get past a barricaded bridge. The biggest fear in North Dakota is water could be polluted and the pipeline is near the Standing Rock Sioux Native American reservation.
These protests led the US Army Corps of Engineers to stop the Dakota pipeline’s construction and re-examine the safety of the route.
What Dakota Access has done is bring more attention to pipelines.
We’ll re-visit the mid-state projects and opposition on Monday’s Smart Talk.
Appearing on the program are Chris Stockton, of Williams Partners — the company building Atlantic Sunrise, Mark Clatterbuck of the group Lancaster Against Pipelines, landowner Susan Cappiello, Cumberland County farmer Ralph Blume, who may lose some of his land through eminent domain and Marie Cusick, WITF’s StateImpact Pennsylvania reporter, who covers Pennsylvania’s energy economy.
