Majority of Supreme Court looks favorably on Atlantic Coast pipeline

Bloomberg/Fuel Fix:

A majority of U.S. Supreme Court justices seemed supportive of a crucial permit for Dominion Energy Inc.’s planned $8 billion Atlantic Coast Pipeline, suggesting the Forest Service acted lawfully by clearing the natural-gas line to cross under the Appalachian Trail.

In an hour-long argument in Washington Monday, Chief Justice John Roberts said the position taken by environmental groups opposed to the pipeline would create an “impermeable barrier” along the 2,200-mile (3540-kilometer) trail, separating consumers on the eastern seaboard from inland energy resources.

A ruling in Dominion’s favor would eliminate the biggest obstacle to the 600-mile pipeline, which would carry as much as 1.5 billion cubic feet of gas per day from the Marcellus shale basin in West Virginia to customers in North Carolina and Virginia.

Without the permit, “the whole enterprise is done,” Justice Department lawyer Anthony Yang told the court Monday. President Donald Trump’s administration is backing Dominion, challenging a federal appeals court ruling that tossed out the permit.

Dominion, which is developing the pipeline with Duke Energy Corp., says it expects to begin construction by mid-year and complete it by the end of 2021. The company is still facing a pending administrative review of the impact on endangered species.

The case will also affect EQM Midstream Partners LP’s Mountain Valley gas pipeline from West Virginia to Virginia. Mountain Valley told the Supreme Court in December that the appeals court ruling forced a halt to its project, which is 90% complete at a cost of more than $4.3 billion.
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But other justices, including Roberts and Democratic appointee Stephen Breyer, focused on the proposed placement of the pipeline more than 600 feet below the trail. Roberts likened the trail to an easement, in which one entity owns the underlying land but others have the right to walk along it in certain places.

This “just doesn’t strike me as that unusual a concept,” the chief justice said.
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Atlantic Coast says more than 50 pipelines already cross the trail, some of them on Forest Service land. But the environmental groups say none of those were authorized under similar circumstances. Some are on state or private land, while others predate the 1968 congressional designation of the Appalachian Trail.

The case is to some degree a proxy for a broader fight over the nation’s energy policy. Business groups are backing the pipeline, as are unions that would benefit from the thousands of jobs it would create. Local property owners are joining environmental advocates in seeking to block the project.
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There is more.

The anti-energy left has opposed most pipelines and has been using the courts to stymie energy infrastructure that actually benefits the environment by allowing the greater use of natural gas in place of coal.

The East Coast of the US has been particularly impacted by the anti-energy movement and liberal judges have looked for excuses to block pipelines.

Up the East Coast, the opposition has led to the ridiculous situation where the US actually imports LNG from Russia because pipelines for US gas are blocked.  The court would do a favor for East Coast residents if they would stop this blockage.