Constitution Pipeline Permit Denied

On April 22, the New York Depart­ment of Con­ser­va­tion refused to issue a water qual­i­ty per­mit for the Con­sti­tu­tion Pipeline, a 124 mile pipeline that would’ve car­ried nat­ur­al gas from the Mar­cel­lus shale in Penn­syl­va­nia to New York State.

 

Accom­pa­nied by heav­i­ly armed U.S. Mar­shals wear­ing bul­let­proof vests, a Con­sti­tu­tion Pipeline crew began cut­ting down the Holler­an family’s sug­ar maple stand on March 1. North Har­ford Maple is a fam­i­ly busi­ness owned by Cathy Holler­an that pro­duces maple sap and syrup. Cut­ting was com­plet­ed on March 4.

 

The chain­saws start­ed up eleven days after U.S. Dis­trict Court Judge Malachy E. Man­nion dis­missed con­tempt charges against the landown­ers on Feb­ru­ary 19. That order con­demned the prop­er­ty and sev­er­al oth­ers in Susque­han­na Coun­ty, Penn­syl­va­nia via emi­nent domain and gave Con­sti­tu­tion Pipeline Com­pa­ny per­mis­sion to cut with­out landown­er per­mis­sion.  Ener­gy Jus­tice Net­work Direc­tor and attor­ney, Mike Ewall, assist­ed by Nation­al Lawyers Guild attor­neys Ter­ry Lodge and Lar­ry Hildes, kept the prop­er­ty own­ers away from fac­ing jail or fines that could have come with the pipeline com­pa­ny’s con­tempt case.

 

The Con­sti­tu­tion Pipeline is a joint project of the Williams Com­pa­nies and Cabot Oil & Gas. On Jan­u­ary 29 the Fed­er­al Ener­gy Reg­u­la­to­ry Com­mis­sion issued a Notice to Pro­ceed with non-mech­a­nized tree cut­ting, but only for the Penn­syl­va­nia por­tion of the pipeline.

 

The con­struc­tion of the vast major­i­ty of the pro­posed Con­sti­tu­tion Pipeline had been post­poned until Octo­ber 1, reports NPR.

 

Although the longer New York seg­ment of the pipeline has not been approved by the state, the cut­ting has destroyed 90% of the family’s production.

 

Ener­gy Jus­tice Net­work joined with the Holler­an fam­i­ly that owns North Har­ford Maple, as well as oth­er pro­test­ers, to oppose the tree cut­ting. Go here to read more about the cam­paign. The web­site for the shale gas pro­gram is www.energyjusticesummer.org.