New Hampshire doesn’t need natural gas
A recent online article (“Hungry for Change at FERC”) reports that a small group of activists has been gathered before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission headquarters in Washington on an 18-day hunger strike to protest the expansion of oil and gas pipelines nationwide. The strike is set to conclude right after Pope Francis, who opposes oil and gas expansion for its role in climate change, addresses a joint session of Congress on Sept. 25.
The activists have come from across the country to protest the spider web of pipelines that runs like capillaries throughout the United States.
One participant is demonstrating against Dominion, a Virginia power company whose proposed enlarged facility was approved by FERC and whose purpose is to convert natural gas to condensed liquefied natural gas for export. Another participant is a grandfather from Fort Bragg, California, and another is a grandmother from Connecticut.
Activists claim that FERC, whose mandate is to regulate interstate oil and gas pipelines by determining need and environmental impact, has, in fact, been co-opted by the energy industry.
A document from FERC itself, titled “An Overview of the Federal Regulatory Commission and Federal Regulations of Public Utilities in the United States,” states that funds equal to the budget recommended by the president and Congress “are reimbursed through . . . filing fees for individual files assessed to the filing entity and annual charges assessed to the regulated industries.” The important words here are “filing fees” and “annual changes,” which mean that FERC is funded in part by the companies it approves, and so it is in FERC’s own best interest to approve applications regardless of need (or lack of need) or the negative environmental impact on its residents.
With this kind of incentive, it’s clear that this agency is not working for the people of the United States. But how about local government?
Here the issue boils down to perceived need and its larger implications. The 17 communities in southern New Hampshire that would be affected by the natural gas pipeline proposed by Kinder Morgan and the Tennessee Gas Pipeline are rural. For the most part they use propane, not natural gas. They don’t need a pipeline for natural gas, yet they’re being asked to bear its consequences, both personal and environmental.
What about electric power for New Hampshire?
Liberty Utilities, which serves only 6 percent of the retail electric customers in southwestern New Hampshire (according to a New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission pdf), is the only company so far to sign on with Kinder Morgan, and Liberty has signed on for .5 bcf, not the 1.5 bcf that is the minimum needed for Kinder Morgan to file a certificate of need. So it doesn’t seem as though New Hampshire needs more electric power — or more natural gas.
Yet Gov. Hassan continues to hedge her position by maintaining that there is a possible future need for additional natural gas in New Hampshire in order to attract business to the state and advantageous power rates for these businesses.
At the present, however, this need is entirely hypothetical: There is no evidence yet that the state needs more natural gas or more electric power.
The residents of southern New Hampshire are not opposed to business expansion in the state nor against supplying the energy necessary for it. But with careful, alternative planning and the use of existing infrastructure, that additional energy can be made available without a new pipeline.
It is possible for Gov. Hassan to plan for business increase without devastating the rural way of life of many New Hampshire residents, but if she refuses to consider options to a new pipeline, we are left with both a federal and a state government focused exclusively on industry at the expense of people.
Sadly, that would mean we must fight our own elected officials in order to force our government to fight for us.