Category: RT Newswire

USE ME! Essentially, this is a catch all for everything. This is probably the ONLY category where things that are not directly related to Rising Tide affiliates/allies should go. For example if a coal company goes out of business (and we didn’t directly cause it) it should probably only go here.

No Atlantic Pipeline VA! Over 50 blockade Dominion HQ in downtown Richmond, VA

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noneCross-posted from Virginia People’s Climate March

February 23, 2015

Contact: Shantae Taylor

For Immediate Release

Activists Block Dominion Headquarters and Demand “Stop Selling Our Futures”

At 7:00 a.m. a group of over 50 activists blocked vehicle access to Dominion Resources’ Tredegar Campus in Richmond, Virginia to protest the proposed Atlantic Coast Pipeline. Traffic quickly formed on Tredegar Street as activists stretched large banners across the road and paraded large puppets around the scene. Two activists remain suspended from a pedestrian bridge with a banner reading “Stop Selling Our Futures” while a larger crowd occupy the access way to the campus below.

The Atlantic Coast Pipeline would transport natural gas from West Virginia, where there is a boom in hydraulic fracturing, 550 miles, through Virginia, and into North Carolina. “This proposal would be a dangerous investment in fossil fuel infrastructure at a time when the scientific consensus is clear that we must invest in renewables, such as wind and solar, to avoid further warming of our planet. ” said Whitney Whiting from Newport News, Virginia.

hangThis action follows several months of grassroots resistance in the region against Dominion. On February 3, an activist scaled a crane at a construction site for Dominion’s proposed Cove Point LNG export facilities in Lusby, Maryland. On February 9, activists with the group Beyond Extreme Energy staged a disruption at a Dominion analyst meeting in New York City’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel, also with the message “Stop Selling Our Futures”.

Shantae Taylor from Norfolk, Virginia said, “As a person of color, I am out here because I am disturbed by the climate crisis in the Commonwealth. The Tidewater region is second only to Louisiana for its vulnerability to sea level rise. Now we’re facing the additional threat of offshore oil and gas drilling. I don’t want another Hurricane Katrina or BP oil spill to happen here. It’s time to push back against Dominion’s corrupt political influence and demand an end to fossil fuels.”

“I’ve been born and raised in Virginia, where we have pride in our land”, said Phil Cunningham, from Prince Edward County. “Now Dominion wants to come steal people’s property and sell our futures to the highest bidder. We are here to send the message to Dominion that people matter more than profits. This is our Keystone XL, and we will stop it. ”

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Oil Train Derailment in WV

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By WILSON DIZARD

(Article Cross Posted from Al Jazeera America)

Residents of a West Virginia county started picking up the pieces Tuesday after an oil tanker train derailment and fire forced more than a hundred people from their homes and threatened water supplies for thousands, raising new alarm among environmental activists over the rail transport of crude oil through their state.

By Tuesday evening, power crews were restoring electricity, water treatment plants were going back online, and most of the local residents were back home. Many people had taken shelter in local schools or hotels near the town of Boomer. Others continued to rely on free bottled water from the water utility. CSX, the rail company involved, issued a statement saying it is working with the Red Cross to provide shelter for some 125 people amid frigid temperatures and a fresh foot of snow.

With fears of oil seeping into the adjacent Kanawha River, water authorities shut off an intake plant near the derailment, disrupting the lives of everyone on the water system near the smoky crash site. After testing on Tuesday found no detectable trace of oil in the river, public health officials and the utility, West Virginia American Water (WVAW), started turning the intake plant back on — but it will be several days before water service returns to normal. 

The crash sent one person to a hospital with breathing trouble, but the blaze resulted in no deaths despite sending a massive fireball over the Kanawha River at about 1:30 p.m. EST, around 30 miles southeast of the state capital, Charleston. 

At least 20 tankers were “involved” in fires, CSX said Tuesday, and state environmental officials and the rail company decided to let the fires burn themselves out. “At this point there are still small fires burning, so responders can’t go down to there,” said Kelley Gillenwater, a spokeswoman for the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). “We can’t get to the actual derailment to assess the immediate impact.”

Gillenwater said the DEP remains dedicated to preventing the pollution of water supplies, pointing to its proposal for strong chemical storage safety laws. Her department, however, has nothing to do with overseeing what travels through the state via rail, she said.

According to CSX, the 109-car train was carrying Bakken shale crude oil from North Dakota to Yorktown, Virginia. 

“We don’t have the jurisdiction to regulate that transportation,” Gillenwater said, adding that the DEP will be conducting further tests of the river’s water and watching out for a telltale “sheen” of oil. 

Gillenwater wasn’t certain of who is responsible for environmental safety on the state’s railroads, but pointed to the Department of Transportation as the likely authority. The West Virginia DOT web site says it controls the State Rail Authority, which oversees freight rail. The DOT was not available for comment Tuesday night. 

After the fire burns out, DEP officials will examine how much oil has spilled onto the soil and remove contaminated dirt that could pollute groundwater, Gillenwater said. 

West Virginia University Institute of Technology in Montgomery, the site of the water plant shutoff yesterday, canceled classes until Monday, Feb. 23. Students living on campus will be able to stay at the nearby Beckley branch of WVU, the school said Tuesday, adding that it doesn’t expect to regain water service at its Montgomery campus for another 72 hours. 

WVAW and the DEP said tests Tuesday showed no detectable levels of oil in the water near intake valves downstream from the spill. But the company had already shut off the system Monday as a precaution. The WVAW has advised residents to boil their water before drinking it after the taps are turned back on. The water restrictions affect about 2,000 people in six different towns, local news channel WVNS reports.

The accident conjures memories of another spill in West Virginia just over a year ago, when 10,000 gallons of a coal processing chemical spilled from a tank along the Elk River, making its way to the waterway — the supply for 300,000 people in and around Charleston. For weeks, emergency management authorities in the state distributed free water to thousands across the region.

Even now, many people in that area report being afraid to drink the water.

“It’s just one thing after another,” said Maria Gunnoe, an environmental activist with the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, who cited the Jan. 2014 chemical spill as an example.

Accidents with coal or gas are so common, Gunnoe said, that people don’t notice them much anymore. She blamed what she sees as a complacent and complicit state legislature.

“Everyone will forget this in three months, and our state leaders will continue to facilitate the oil and gas industry and not protect the people,” Gunnoe said.

“I don’t have all the answers. It’s a massive problem,” she added, saying the freight shipments of oil aren’t handled safely. “They go extremely fast and they’re extremely reckless, and all of our state leaders turn a blind eye until something like this happens.”

T. Paige, 66, a musician, photographer and part-time environmental activist who lives near Monday’s derailment, said Tuesday morning that he could still see smoke coming from the accident site. He said the crash made him feel “very, very, very angry.”

“These trains are not regulated enough,” he said. “They should not have been going through here in the snow storm. It’s dangerous. They’re not taking adequate precautions.”

He blamed what he called a close relationship between industry and elected leaders for what he sees as a dangerous attitude toward regulation.

“Democracy is being derailed and this is one of the symptoms.”

Groups renew call to scrap entire Vermont Gas pipeline project in wake of Phase II cancellation

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Cross-Posted from Rising Tide Vermont

FRT VT2or Immediate Release: February 10 2015

Contact:
Rebecca Foster, Just Power, 646-468-3511
Maeve McBride, 350Vermont, 802-999-2820
Keith Brunner, Rising Tide Vermont, 802-363-9615

Groups renew call to scrap entire Vermont Gas pipeline project in wake of Phase II cancellation

Today a coalition of organizations including Just Power, Rising Tide Vermont, 350Vermont and Toxics Action Center renewed calls to cancel all phases of the Vermont fracked gas pipeline, in the wake of an announcement that Vermont Gas will no longer proceed with Phase II.

The coalition is calling on the Vermont Public Service Board to revoke the Certificate of Public Good for Phase I in light of the near doubling of Phase I costs, the stark climate impacts of fracked gas, and impacts on landowners in the path of the pipeline. Yesterday, the PSB was given permission by the Vermont Supreme Court to undertake a review of the Phase I permit with no time or scope constraints. The groups are calling on the Board to execute a rigorous review of all aspects of the project given the change in the landscape since the initial filing.

Cornwall resident and impacted landowner Mary Martin said, “Today’s announcement is the culmination of years of conversations with neighbors and making our voices heard. While we’re relieved that Phase II is cancelled, we can’t stand idly by and watch our neighbors in Monkton and other towns who are fighting Phase I. Today we’re celebrating, but our fight is not over until the whole project is cancelled. If the costs are too high for IP, then they’re too high for the state of Vermont.”

“The house of fossil fuel cards is falling.” said Maeve McBride, coordinator of 350Vermont, “The cancellation of this pipeline is yet another example of a reckless, misguided fossil fuel project that succumbed to people power and practicalities. In the last few days, we’ve seen a tar sands export terminal near Quebec City cancelled and the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund has pledged to divest billions of dollars from coal and tar sands companies.”

Shaina Kasper, Vermont Community Organizer with Toxics Action Center, an environmental and public health non-profit, called the decision a huge step in the right direction. “We’ve known all along that this pipeline was a bad investment for Vermont’s energy future, and we’re glad Vermont Gas finally agrees,” Kasper said. “We hope the next step is to abandon the entire project so that we can invest in clean energy and a shift away from polluting fossil fuels.”

International Paper had always been the primary beneficiary of this pipeline expansion, and the primary customer of VGS. Now that IP has decided this is a poor investment and has withdrawn from the project, the groups are concerned Vermont ratepayers will be required to pay for the additional $30 million shortfall for Phase I.

Burlington resident and VGS ratepayer Devon Ayers joined the call to scrap Phase I, arguing that “I can’t afford to pay another dime on top of my family’s already sky high heating costs, especially for a fossil fuel project which threatens the world my son will grow up in.”

“Today’s announcement is a victory for grassroots organizing and our growing people’s movement in Vermont,” said Sara Mehalick, a volunteer organizer with Rising Tide Vermont. “From workers’ rights to migrant justice, and human rights to climate justice, today’s decision reaffirms that social movements have the power to change what’s politically possible.”

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NOTES FOR EDITORS

1] Total IP contribution ($135 million) – Phase 2 cost ($105) = IP’s Phase I contribution ($30 million). Based on most recent cost estimates from the VGS press release on Feb. 10th 2015: “Our updated cost estimate for Phase 2 is now $105 million…” said Jim Sinclair, Vermont Gas’ Vice President for System Expansion.  Under the agreement between Vermont Gas and IP, this would mean that IP’s total financial responsibility to Vermont Gas for Phase 2 as well as Phase 1 improvements would have risen from $99 million to $135 million.”