Battle lines being drawn over proposed gas pipeline project

A showdown between utility companies and local residents over the future of energy production and consumption has been brewing across the commonwealth, and as the last stretch of real estate on a controversial gas pipeline expansion route, the town of Canton is poised to become one of its key battlegrounds.

While Houston-based Kinder Morgan continues its pursuit of its own major pipeline expansion across the western and northern parts of the state, the focus locally has been on the Access Northeast project — a proposed $3 billion upgrade of the Algonquin Gas Transmission system that would be capable of delivering up to 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day to serve the region’s gas-fired power plants.

The yellow line shows the proposed route of the Access Northeast gas pipeline through Canton. (Click to enlarge)

The project’s lead developers include another Houston-based firm, Spectra Energy, along with New England utility giants Eversource and National Grid. Together they are seeking federal approval to construct new and improved pipeline facilities along a 125-mile route from New York state to eastern Massachusetts, ending in Canton on the Randolph town line. As part of the project, the developers would also build new compressor and metering stations as well as additional storage tanks to hold liquefied natural gas.

According to Arthur Diestel, a spokesman for Spectra Energy, the project’s “Q-1 loop” would consist of 22 miles of new 30-inch pipeline that would travel from Medway to Canton parallel to an existing 24-inch Algonquin line. The interactive map on the Access Northeast website shows the five-mile Canton stretch starting roughly at Cobb’s Corner, dipping briefly into Stoughton, then heading northeast under Pleasant Street, Turnpike Street, and finally York Street before ending just south of Randolph Street.

Diestel stressed that almost the entire length of the pipeline, approximately 95 percent, would be constructed in existing Algonquin utility corridors and that the developers are committed to working closely with local officials and property owners to minimize project impacts.

“We want to be good neighbors,” he said last week via telephone. “We’ve been operating in New England for over 60 years and we plan on bringing clean natural gas to the region for many more years to come.”

By expanding the region’s pipeline capacity, proponents of the project believe it will lead to lower electricity prices and increased electric reliability on the coldest winter days, when power plant demand is greatest.

Yet a growing chorus of critics, which include several local grassroots organizations, foresee a project full of unnecessary risks — for the environment, for the electricity ratepayers, and for the health and safety of citizens in the affected communities.

“This is huge, huge, huge,” insisted Pat Reilly, a Canton resident and a vocal pipeline opponent. “If this goes through, it is going to be devastating for the whole trajectory of energy in Massachusetts.”

As a retiree and environmental activist, Reilly has dedicated countless hours to learning everything she can about the Access Northeast project, and what she has found has her gravely concerned.

Not only is she opposed to the processes used to extract the gas — hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” of shale rock; she also has fears about pipeline leaks and environmental contamination and believes the construction of new pipeline would cause “irreparable damage to streets, driveways, and tree-lined landscaped yards.”

For instance, Reilly pointed to locations along the planned route where the pipeline would travel just feet from homes, through children’s playgrounds, and under big stretches of mature trees, which would have to come down. She has gone door to door to speak to affected homeowners and businesses, but most seem uninterested and seem to be content taking money from the developer, she said.

“I believe in global warming and I have been an environmentalist for a long time,” she said, “and I thought that at some point it would become clear to a majority of people that we need to do something and there would be a popular uprising, but it’s just been uphill here.”

Reilly said she has finally made some headway in Walpole, where the pipeline’s proximity to an aquifer has residents concerned; however, she said neither town can match the level of activism that exists in neighboring Sharon, where the opposition is more engaged and well organized.

Tonight at Sharon High School, for instance, a grassroots organization called No Sharon Gas Pipeline is hosting a public forum and panel discussion on the proposed pipeline expansion and its impacts. The event starts at 7 p.m. and will include expert presentations as well as a question-and-answer period.

Panelists include Christophe Courchesne, assistant attorney general and chief of the Environmental Protection Division for the commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as representatives from the Conservation Law Foundation, Dedham Zoning Board of Appeals, StopNED (Northeast Energy Direct – Kinder Morgan), and the Toxics Action Center.

Courchesne’s participation is particularly encouraging to opponents in light of a report by the attorney general’s office that found that new gas pipelines would not be necessary to ensure electric reliability in the region. The study also concluded that pipelines would be costlier than other energy efficiency measures and would increase regional greenhouse gas emissions.

Reilly intends to be there at tonight’s meeting, and she believes a strong turnout would send a message to an attorney general’s office that is already skeptical of a project that is seeking to impose a tariff on electricity ratepayers to offset construction costs — something “never before proposed,” according to the AG-commissioned study.

The tariff issue, which is pending an approval by the state Department of Public Utilities, has become a major rallying cry for opposition groups and has been the subject of much scrutiny by Attorney General Maura Healey herself.

The developers, meanwhile, argue that the tariff would be more than offset by the estimated $1 billion a year in electricity savings that the project is expected to generate. What’s more, they contend that additional gas pipeline capacity is the “only” solution that will provide New England with the benefits of decreased electricity prices and increased electric reliability.

According to the project website, “Access Northeast is in direct response to numerous requests from regional stakeholders and governmental agencies in New England for an environmentally responsible, scalable, efficient and effective pipeline project to meet the growth in natural gas consumption that New England has experienced and will continue to experience over the next decade, while keeping energy prices at competitive levels.”

As for the tariff questions, residents will have an opportunity to learn more themselves at an upcoming DPU hearing on May 23 at Walpole High School. Those who would like to learn more about the proposed Access Northeast project can do so by visiting accessnortheastenergy.com. To learn more about the opposition’s position, visit nosharongaspipeline.org or nofrackedgasinmass.org.

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Posted by Jay Turner on Apr 7 2016. Filed under News. Both comments and pings are currently closed.