The Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), a destructive, unjust and unneeded pipeline in the Mountain Valley A fracked-gas pipeline running from West Virginia to VirginiaThis should be cancelled. Project completion is already in danger.
During a recent hearing about the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC’s) policy statements about fracked gas certificates, Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, the chair of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, defended the MVP. Manchin claimed the pipeline is 95 percent completed, but opponents cite the company’s own reports, which indicate “final restoration of the pipeline right-of-way is now about 55% complete.”
Moreover, two recent federal court rulings have thrown out key MVP permits, as three more federal agencies have been sent back to the drawing board after failing to analyze the MVP’s harmful impacts. The court found that the United States Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, and the Forest Service had not adequately considered actual sedimentation, erosion, and allowed stream crossings to be authorized before Forest Service rules were followed. The court also found that the United States Fish and Wildlife Service failed in its current assessment of endangered Roanoke Logperch and candy darter and did not account for climate change impacts. A second permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is not possible at the moment because they promised to withhold the permit until they have a valid Endangered Species Agreement biological opinion. This was vacated by Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.
This year, the MVP certificate expires at FERC. It has been extended once already, and FERC may not grant a new extension. FERC will likely decide that the MVP has not shown that the project can be completed in compliance to public safety and health requirements. Key permits are missing and new information clearly shows that the project does not serve the public interest.
The MVP has exploited landowners and communities along the route. The project cancellation could allow affected landowners to regain their land. Their land was taken, in large part, by an unfair use of the eminent domain to gain private profit. The trauma of losing their property would end and their property values would return back to pre-pipeline levels. There would no dangerous 42-inch pipeline transporting fracked gasoline through it.
Most of our neighbors along the MVP are low and middle-income earners. Communities and communities of color as well as elderly residents, communities of color, and Indigenous sites would be most adversely affected by the environmental risks and harms from this pipeline. They could be exposed to potential health effects from air and water pollution as well as property damage. Their biggest investment in their lives was buying their homes and property. The MVP could have suffered the largest loss. These mistakes can be corrected by project cancellation.
The MVP was developed in 2014 to transport fracked gases, a now-defunct resource. We don’t need fracked gas to produce energy. Renewable energy such as solar, wind, and hydroelectric would better serve our energy needs. The energy produced by renewable energy systems is free, robust, and almost inexhaustible. They also emit no greenhouse gases or pollutant emissions once they are in operation.
Other negative project impacts would be greatly reduced if MVP were to be cancelled.
Public safety would be less at risk. The MVP travels on landslide- or earthquake-prone terrain. Landslide risk was assessed by an MVP hired consultant — in an inherent conflict of interest that could understate the risk. The assessment was cited and accepted by FERC. Two families were forced to leave their homes due to a MVP landslide. Another landslide displaced the pipeline, which was already on the ground. There have been many other landslides along the route.
Unscrupulous MVP pipe handling could have also led to increased corrosion risk that could cause pipe failure and possibly a catastrophic explosion.
Additionally, the MVP is a health risk. The gas stream contains a variety of toxins, including radioactive compounds. There are many potential leaks and intentional discharges from fracked-gas transmission lines. Research shows that the MVP would likely leak and produce more than 6,000,000 cubic feet of fracked gases and toxins each day. These toxins could pollute the air and soil in the vicinity of the MVP if it is completed.
If the pipeline were to be canceled, it would cause further damage to our streams and wetlands as well as wildlife, due to the hundreds of pipeline crossings that remain to be completed. Already, the MVP has been cited for hundreds of pollution violations and has paid millions in fines.
If the pipeline were to be canceled, the MVP’s climate-degrading greenhouse gas emissions and downstream combustion of the gas would cease. The U.S. Fourth National Climate Assessment, and the full report from Sixth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Report were both issued after FERC’s environmental impact statement and approval of the MVP. These reports clearly show that we have already negatively and significantly altered the climate. Further greenhouse gas emissions will only make matters worse.
Climate change is our greatest threat. We know we can’t avert the worst of the climate crisis unless we stop throwing fuel on the fire. The MVP’s greenhouse gas emissions will add even more explosives to our climate time bomb, causing a climate that may no longer be able sustain us in future. Once fully operational, the MVP would emitThe same amount of emissions is equivalent to 26 U.S. coke plants or 19,000,000 passenger vehicles per annum.
I am calling on Mountain Valley Pipeline owners, investors, to end the nightmare that property owners have suffered for so long and stop this unjustified, unneeded, and destructive project. Investors have made public their million-dollar losses in relation to the pipeline. are reevaluating its investmentAfter the string of legal losses, the pipeline is now in limbo. People of goodwill should rally to urge Mountain Valley Pipeline not to fail. We have witnessed the incredible work of people on ground who have exposed injustices in their communities. documented and reportedConstruction-related environmental issues. A strong grassroots opposition will not only stop the imminent danger to public safety and health but also prevent the pollution of the environment and permanent destruction of the climate.
