{"id":4719,"date":"2021-01-04T11:15:44","date_gmt":"2021-01-04T11:15:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.radiofree.org\/?p=145871"},"modified":"2021-01-04T11:15:44","modified_gmt":"2021-01-04T11:15:44","slug":"how-activists-successfully-shut-down-key-pipeline-projects-in-new-york","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2021\/01\/04\/how-activists-successfully-shut-down-key-pipeline-projects-in-new-york\/","title":{"rendered":"How activists successfully shut down key pipeline projects in New York"},"content":{"rendered":"
If all had gone according to plan, the Constitution pipeline would be carrying fracked gas 124 miles from the shale gas fields of Pennsylvania through streams, wetlands, and backyards across the Southern Tier of New York until west of Albany. There it would join two existing pipelines, one that extends into New England and the other to the Ontario border as part of a vast network that moves fracked gas throughout the northeastern United States and Canada.<\/p>\n
For a while, everything unfolded as expected. When the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved the project in 2014, the U.S. was in the midst of a fracking boom that would make it the world\u2019s largest producer<\/a> of natural gas and crude oil. Williams Companies, the lead firm developing the project, was awaiting state approval of environmental permits \u2014 a largely perfunctory move at the time \u2014 and so sure everything would fall into place that it had started clearing hundreds of trees under armed guard along the pipeline\u2019s route.<\/p>\n Yet the developers did not anticipate landowners, neighborhood residents, community leaders, and anti-fracking activists statewide forging a coalition to kill the pipeline. In a landmark defeat, New York\u2019s Department of Environmental Conservation denied the project\u2019s water-quality certificate in 2016, leading Williams to abandon it in early 2020<\/a>. The land slated to be cleared, the communities fated to be disrupted, and the waterways destined to be disturbed were preserved by a movement that was far from done.<\/p>\n The defeat of the Constitution pipeline marked the start of an uncertain era for interstate pipelines in New York and beyond. The company behind the Northeast Energy Direct pipeline, which would have carried shale gas through New York into New England, abandoned the project just days before the state rejected the Constitution pipeline. In 2017, developers walked away from the Pilgrim pipelines, which would have funneled fracked oil from New York to New Jersey. In May, state officials denied a key permit for the Northeast Supply Enhancement pipeline, commonly referred to as the Williams pipeline, between New Jersey and New York City.<\/p>\nReaching beyond the Empire State<\/strong><\/h3>\n