EXTRACTED: Daily News Clips 10/18/21
PIPELINE NEWS
People vs. Fossil Fuels: Mobilization Concludes with Youth-Led Civil Disobedience at the Capitol; 90 Arrested At Capitol; Total Arrests at 655 for the Week
Politico Morning Energy: GREENS SEEING RED
MPR: Enbridge misses aquifer cleanup deadline
The Hill: Supreme Court rebuffs request from St. Louis gas pipeline company
KIWA: Second CO2 Pipeline To Go Through Northwest Iowa
Grist: North Carolina tribes fear pipeline will damage waterways, burial grounds
Associated Press: 1,200-foot ship dragged California oil pipeline, Coast Guard says
San Francisco Chronicle: PG&E, East Bay parks allowed to remove trees for safety, state Supreme Court rules
SeekingAlpha: Energy Transfer Needs To Stop Flouting The Law, But It's Still A Good Investment
MLK50: MLK50’s Byhalia Pipeline stories win national award for breaking barriers in community coverage
WASHINGTON UPDATES
Washington Post: Abandoned wells are a huge climate problem
STATE UPDATES
S&P Global: Financing, engineering setbacks plague North Dakota's $1B carbon capture project
E&E News: After oil spill, advocates call for new Calif. marine sanctuary
EXTRACTION
National Observer: Enviro groups want feds to step in after report reveals Alberta’s tailings ponds are growing
RESEARCH & SCIENCE
NM Political Report: Los Alamos scientists work on technique for estimating stress in earth’s crust from oil and gas activity
CLIMATE FINANCE
RBC Revealed: Canadian fossil-heavy banks join GFANZ
Reuters: Top fossil fuel lender JPMorgan joins UN climate action finance plan
OPINION
The Hill: Gulf communities live California's oil spill every day
The Hill: Regulators can no longer rubber-stamp expansion of the oil and gas industry
PIPELINE NEWS
People vs. Fossil Fuels: Mobilization Concludes with Youth-Led Civil Disobedience at the Capitol; 90 Arrested At Capitol; Total Arrests at 655 for the Week
10/16/21
“Under a banner declaring “We did not vote for fossil fuels,” Indigenous and youth climate activists led a march to the Capitol today for a mass civil disobedience action, demanding Congress and the Biden Administration take urgent action to stop all new fossil fuel projects and launch a just renewable energy revolution. 90 people were arrested on the fifth and final day of the “People vs. Fossil Fuels” mobilization, bringing the total arrested during the week of action to 655. Throughout four days of action at the White House, the “People vs. Fossil Fuels” mobilization pressed President Biden to stop approving new fossil fuel projects and declare a climate emergency to equitably deploy clean, renewable energy solutions and deliver on his commitments to climate and environmental justice and Indigenous rights. The call to action was extended to Congress today, with demonstrators urging elected officials to listen to the people who sent them to Washington and take urgent action to support the phase out of fossil fuels… “In 2020, Native voters and Youth voters–majorities of whom rank climate action as a top concern–turned out at much higher rates than in 2016, and helped secure Biden’s margin of victory in key places. Analysis indicates that young voters were critical to Biden’s winning margins across the country, including in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and beyond. Meanwhile, Native voters heavily backed Biden in swing states like Wisconsin and Arizona. Now, as negotiations around the infrastructure bill drag on in Congress, Indigenous and youth climate organizations are showing an increasing level of frustration with Biden’s inability to deliver on his promise for bold action on climate, fossil fuels, environmental justice, and Indigenous rights.”
Politico Morning Energy: GREENS SEEING RED
Matthew Choi, 10/15/21
“A coalition of environmental and Indigenous rights groups will continue demonstrating in front of the White House this morning before taking their message to the Capitol,” Politico Morning Energy reports. “The groups, which includes the Indigenous Environmental Network, Oil Change International, Gulf Coast Center for Law & Policy and others, have been meeting outside the White House since Monday demanding the Biden administration stop the Line 3 pipeline — which earlier this month began transporting oil — and in general take more unilateral action to wind down U.S. production of fossil fuels. Thursday’s event culminated in a group of protesters occupying the Interior Department headquarters, a move that the department said resulted in one security official being sent to the hospital. Despite the groups’ complaints, the Biden administration has made some major announcements in the past week. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland on Wednesday announced a major increase in the department’s plans for establishing offshore wind power leases, while Biden himself moved last week to establish the larger borders around Bears Ears and other national monuments that the Trump administration had rolled back. But there was a strong sense of dissatisfaction with the pace of change otherwise.”
MPR: Enbridge misses aquifer cleanup deadline
10/17/21
“Enbridge has missed a deadline to fix an aquifer breach near Clearbrook, Minn.,” MPR reports. “The company had until Oct. 15 to stop the unauthorized flow of groundwater that occurred when Line 3 construction crews pierced the aquifer near the Clearbrook Terminal in late January. The breach resulted in millions of gallons of groundwater flowing out of the aquifer. The Department of Natural Resources says while Enbridge has made progress toward stopping the flow, the company will have to compensate the state for the additional loss of groundwater. Meanwhile, the DNR says it is investigating two more sites where the company may have breached aquifers.”
The Hill: Supreme Court rebuffs request from St. Louis gas pipeline company
BY ZACK BUDRYK, 10/15/21
“The Supreme Court on Friday denied a request by a Missouri-based gas company to block a lower court’s ruling against the firm,” The Hill reports. “Chief Justice John Roberts, who is responsible for emergency matters arising in Washington, D.C., denied the request Friday without comment, according to a spokesperson for the nation's highest court. Spire Inc., a St. Louis-headquartered natural gas utility, operates a 65-mile pipeline that carries gas through Missouri and Illinois. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) cleared the pipeline to operate in 2018, but a federal appeals court vacated the permit in June. FERC has since granted temporary permission to operate the pipeline through Dec. 13. In its petition earlier this month, Spire urged the court to stay the lower court decision, writing that halting the pipeline “would create a serious risk of up to 400,000 St. Louis-area homes and businesses losing gas service for prolonged periods of time during the freezing temperatures of the upcoming winter.” The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), whose lawsuit in 2020 led to the lower-court decision, submitted its own motion in opposition Monday. Noting that the pipeline has been approved to operate in the meantime, EDF attorneys argued Spire has not demonstrated “likelihood of irreparable harm” from not granting the stay.”
KIWA: Second CO2 Pipeline To Go Through Northwest Iowa
JUSTIN HELLINGA, 10/14/21
“A second company that has proposed to build a carbon dioxide pipeline across several midwest states, including Iowa, has announced it’s moving forward with its plans,” KIWA reports. “Texas-based Navigator CO2 Ventures LLC announced Wednesday it has obtained necessary board approvals and will be moving on to the next phase of planning for its “Heartland Greenway” project. The approximately 1,200 mile pipeline system will span five states, with origin points in Nebraska, Iowa, South Dakota, Minnesota, and Illinois… “IUB officials say they expect Navigator will soon be filing a request for public informational meetings which are the first steps in the process before a company can file a petition for a hazardous liquid pipeline permit under Iowa law. Navigator has announced that Valero Energy, which operates an ethanol plant in Northwest Iowa, will be its anchor partner in the project.”
Grist: North Carolina tribes fear pipeline will damage waterways, burial grounds
Mark Armao, 10/15/21
“When Crystal Cavalier-Keck heard in 2018 that an energy developer was planning to build a natural-gas pipeline near her hometown of Mebane, North Carolina, she was immediately concerned,” Grist reports. “Cavalier-Keck, who is a member of the Occaneechi Band of the Saponi Nation, knew about the violence against Indigenous women that often takes place when so-called “man camps” are assembled in areas where pipeline projects cut through Native communities. “I immediately thought about the man camps it would bring, and I was thinking we need to alert the people,” Cavalier-Keck, who at the time was serving on the leadership council of the state-recognized tribe, told Grist. She began researching the project, which is known as the Mountain Valley Pipeline Southgate Extension… “When Cavalier-Keck learned the developers were planning to condemn properties in North Carolina so they could build on the ancestral lands of the Occaneechi, the Monacan Indian Nation and other tribes, she decided to take action. In late 2018, she resigned from her position on the tribal council so she could speak out against the project without impeding the tribe’s efforts to consult with the government on the project. Cavalier-Keck has helped lead a grassroots resistance movement over the past three years, organizing protests and marches partly to embolden Occaneechi residents, she said. Owing to the tribe’s history of displacement and forced relocation, she said, members are often afraid to speak out against government-sanctioned actions.”
Associated Press: 1,200-foot ship dragged California oil pipeline, Coast Guard says
10/17/21
“Investigators believe a 1,200-foot cargo ship dragging anchor in rough seas caught an underwater oil pipeline and pulled it across the seafloor, months before a leak from the line fouled the Southern California coastline with crude,” the Associated Press reports. “A team of federal investigators trying to chase down the cause of the spill boarded the Panama-registered MSC DANIT just hours after the massive ship arrived this weekend off the Port of Long Beach, the same area where the leak was discovered in early October. During a prior visit by the ship during a heavy storm in January, investigators believe its anchor dragged for an unknown distance before striking the 16-inch steel pipe, Coast Guard Lt. j.g. SondraKay Kneen told AP… “Still undetermined is whether the impact caused the October leak, or if the line was hit by something else at a later date or failed due to a preexisting problem, Kneen said… “The DANIT’s operator, MSC Mediterranean Shipping Company, is headquartered in Switzerland and has a fleet of 600 vessels and more than 100,000 workers, according to the company.”
San Francisco Chronicle: PG&E, East Bay parks allowed to remove trees for safety, state Supreme Court rules
Bob Egelko, 10/14/21
“The state Supreme Court has rejected a challenge by environmental advocates in Lafayette to an agreement by local park officials that allowed Pacific Gas and Electric Co. to remove trees near an underground gas pipeline, one of several legal disputes over parkland trees in or near the East Bay community,” the San Francisco Chronicle reports. “The East Bay Regional Park District agreed in March 2017 to let PG&E uproot 245 trees that were within 14 feet of the pipeline in Briones Regional Park and on the Lafayette-Moraga Regional Trail, in exchange for payments of $1,000 per tree, an additional $10,000 for safety maintenance, and PG&E’s promise to plant 31 replacement trees within city borders. The utility says it has removed all but 17 of the trees, which are the subject of a separate suit by Lafayette before a federal judge who is overseeing PG&E’s bankruptcy. The fate of about 200 more trees is still unsettled, however, and the Lafayette City Council and PG&E are discussing how many need to be removed to protect the pipeline. The environmental group Save Lafayette Trees won a 2019 ruling from a state appeals court allowing it to challenge the removal of those trees.”
SeekingAlpha: Energy Transfer Needs To Stop Flouting The Law, But It's Still A Good Investment
10/13/21
“Energy Transfer (NYSE: ET), a massive almost $27 billion company, is one of the largest midstream companies by enterprise value. The company has consistently struggled with the law, as it tries to take shortcuts wherever possible,” SeekingAlpha reports. “Most recently, the Pennsylvania Attorney General announced 48 criminal charges against the company. Energy Transfer has continued to focus on its export terminal capacity and transport capacity. The company has continued to look for renewable energy contracts, not only to reduce its costs but to improve its overall businesses... “The company's financials have continued to benefit from its strong asset portfolio. The company earned $1.4 billion in 2Q 2021, or $980 million in cash flow after its dividend of just over 6%. This is on top of $1.6 billion in growth capital spending for the year, which the company will be able to continue focusing on.”
MLK50: MLK50’s Byhalia Pipeline stories win national award for breaking barriers in community coverage
Peggy McKenzie, 10/14/21
“MLK50: Justice through Journalism is the winner of a Breaking Barriers Award from the Institute for Nonprofit News for reporter Carrington J. Tatum’s stories about Southwest Memphis residents’ fight against the Byhalia Connection Pipeline. The national award “honors reporting that brought new understanding to an issue or topic affecting people or communities that are historically underrepresented, disadvantaged or marginalized, resulting in impactful change,” according to the INN announcement. The award is one of 24 presented across nine categories; MLK50 won in the medium-size newsroom category. “I’m honored to have contributed toward such a high accolade for MLK50 at such an early time in my career,” said Tatum, 23. “However, to me, this award is a bigger recognition of a new era of journalism that puts marginalized people and communities before anything else. “For so long, our media has allowed poor, Black communities to go unseen and unheard amid injustice. But now, I think there’s a new standard and expectation for what good journalism is and what it could be.”
WASHINGTON UPDATES
Washington Post: Abandoned wells are a huge climate problem
Maxine Joselow, 10/15/21
“The number of abandoned oil and gas wells in the United States is much higher than previously thought, according to an exclusive analysis shared with The Climate 202,” the Washington Post reports. “The analysis, which was done by the Environmental Defense Fund and McGill University, found that there are 81,283 documented orphan wells across the country that were drilled and then improperly abandoned by oil and gas companies. That's nearly 1.5 times the previous estimate of roughly 56,000 wells from the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission, a quasi-governmental organization. Each orphan well is a major climate problem: It spews methane, a potent greenhouse gas. While methane breaks down in the atmosphere faster than carbon dioxide, it's about 86 times more powerful at warming the planet in the short term.The analysis also found that about 9 million Americans live within one mile of an orphan well, including 4.3 million people of color and 550,000 children younger than 5 who are especially vulnerable to health problems tied to air pollution… “Legislation to address the problem was included in the bipartisan infrastructure bill being debated in Congress. The "Revive Economic Growth and Reclaim Orphaned Wells (REGROW) Act" from Sens. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) and Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) would "require the Secretary of the Interior to establish a program to plug, remediate and reclaim orphaned oil and gas wells and surrounding land."
STATE UPDATES
S&P Global: Financing, engineering setbacks plague North Dakota's $1B carbon capture project
Karin Rives, 10/13/21
“The U.S. has seen lawmakers from both parties agree that carbon capture is one important way to rein in greenhouse gas emissions and rural communities are rallying around plans to retrofit large American coal power plants with the technology to save jobs,” S&P Global reports. “But one of the most high-profile carbon capture projects in the U.S., the $1 billion Project Tundra in North Dakota, is facing months of delays after its engineering contractor apparently pulled out in March. The Minnkota Power Cooperative Inc., which is spearheading the project at its 692-MW Milton R. Young coal-fired power plant, has acknowledged it is also having difficulty securing private-sector funding "It's not clear why investors would sink a billion dollars into any risky and controversial coal carbon capture proposal, much less one facing such major outstanding questions," Joe Smyth, a research manager with the Energy and Policy Institute, told S&P… “In all, Project Tundra received $43 million in initial DOE grants under former President Donald Trump. The electric co-op said earlier this year it is seeking a $700 million DOE loan guarantee and expects to tap into a new $250 million state loan program designed specifically for Project Tundra that was signed into law in May. Private-sector support has been harder to secure, however… “Investors in Project Tundra could reap $50 in tax credits for each ton of carbon that is captured and sequestered underground near the plant, a figure that could be higher in the future if Congress boosts the credit.”
E&E News: After oil spill, advocates call for new Calif. marine sanctuary
Jennifer Yachnin, 10/15/21
“Ocean conservation advocates are seizing on the recent oil spill off California’s coast to pressure the Biden administration to finalize a new 10,000-square-mile marine sanctuary,” E&E News reports. “A coalition led by the National Marine Sanctuary Foundation (NMSF) — including environmentalists, aquariums and community organizations — is urging the administration to designate the Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary. The proposed sanctuary, first nominated in 2015, would protect a stretch of California coastline from Gaviota to Cambria, between the existing Monterey Bay and Channel Islands national marine sanctuaries. The advocacy groups pointed to the recent incident when Amplify Energy Corp.’s San Pedro Bay pipeline was damaged and released as many as 144,000 gallons of oil into the waters near Huntington Beach, Calif., to call for immediate action. "The devastating oil spill in Orange County, CA that is spoiling beaches, killing marine wildlife, and threatening local wetlands, demonstrates that the Administration must do more immediately to protect our ocean and coasts," NMSF and its allies wrote in the letter. The letter, addressed to the leaders of the White House Council on Environmental Quality and Commerce and Interior departments, continued: "We urge the Administration to designate Chumash Heritage NMS to allow current and future generations to enjoy, appreciate, and benefit from these underwater national treasures."
EXTRACTION
National Observer: Enviro groups want feds to step in after report reveals Alberta’s tailings ponds are growing
By Natasha Bulowski, 10/18/21
“Environmental groups are calling on the federal government to step in after oilsands tailing ponds grew by 90 million cubic metres in 2020 despite a drop in oil production, according to a report released last week by the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER),” the National Observer reports. “Tailings is the death of us,” Alice Rigney, an elder from the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation, told the Observer. She says one of the first tailing ponds she remembers was right on the bank of the Athabasca River. “I remember our chief saying that if ever that gave and there was a spill, we would have to become refugees of our own land because we will have to relocate,” said Rigney. “It's not safe, it's poison.” Oilsands tailings are a thick, sludge-like mixture created through the mining and extraction of bitumen. The mixture contains toxic naphthenic acids and leftover remnants of bitumen, as well as silt, clay, and water, and is stored in man-made ponds called tailings ponds. Alberta tailings ponds currently contain 1.36 billion cubic metres of fluids, according to the report, covering a surface 1.7 times the size of Vancouver… “In September 2020, the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) released a report on Alberta’s oilsands tailings ponds that concluded there is “scientifically valid evidence” tailings ponds are leaking into groundwater, which Environmental Defence and other environmental and Indigenous organizations say is proof the federal government could — and should — enforce the Fisheries Act.”
RESEARCH & SCIENCE
NM Political Report: Los Alamos scientists work on technique for estimating stress in earth’s crust from oil and gas activity
By Hannah Grover, 10/15/21
“A new method developed by scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory could reduce the costs of determining if proposed oil and natural gas activity could lead to earthquakes and which direction fractures are likely to occur during hydraulic fracturing,” according to NM Political Report. “A study published in Nature’s Communications Earth and Environment journal looked at a way to estimate the orientation of stress in the earth’s crust without doing the traditional borehole analysis or looking at past earthquake data… “Delorey said this method costs about 10 to 20 percent what it would cost to do a borehole breakout analysis. “The reason why the oil and gas and other industries that work in the subsurface would be interested in this is because the stress field is an important parameter,” Delorey told the Report… “In terms of earthquakes, that determines which way the fault is going to slip. In terms of fracking, it determines which direction the cracks will form, he said. Delorey said the fractures caused by hydraulic fracturing will open in the direction that has the least compressive stress. This also can be applied to carbon sequestration or injection of produced water, or waste water from oil and gas operations. Delorey said companies need to be careful about “generating too much seismicity,” which could lead to earthquakes.”
CLIMATE FINANCE
RBC Revealed: Canadian fossil-heavy banks join GFANZ
10/15/21
“The news today that Canada’s biggest banks have finally joined Mark Carney’s “Net Zero” banking alliance was met with a giant ho-hum by climate campaigners,” according to RBC Revealed. “It was eerily similar to last Friday’s announcement, when JP Morgan Chase – the world’s #1 backer of fossil fuels and long time target of the climate movement – also joined the alliance. Chase, like RBC and the other big Canadian banks, continues to invest billions in new fossil fuel projects, and has offered no timelines or targets for reducing its climate harming investments. Keith Stewart, senior energy campaigner at Greenpeace Canada, said: “The world is accelerating toward a zero-carbon economy and Canadian banks are still playing catch up. Until they commit to a near-term phasing out of all financial support for fossil fuels and to fully respect Indigenous rights, they will still be part of the problem.” Canada’s big five banks are all on the list of the top 25 largest funders of fossil fuels on Earth. RBC is Canada’s biggest, and the 5th biggest funder of fossil fuels in the world, having financed over $200B in coal, oil and gas since the Paris Climate Agreement was signed.”
Reuters: Top fossil fuel lender JPMorgan joins UN climate action finance plan
By Elizabeth Dilts Marshall, 10/8/21
“JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) said Friday it was joining the United Nation's Net-Zero Banking Alliance, a group of global banks that have committed to dramatically reducing their carbon financing and investment activities,” Reuters reports. “As the largest U.S. bank and a major lender to the fossil fuel industry, JPMorgan has been criticized for not joining the group, which launched in April, sooner. The announcement comes ahead of next month's UN Climate Change Conference, known as COP 26, in Glasgow. JPMorgan followed rivals Bank of America (BAC.N), Citigroup (C.N), Morgan Stanley (MS.N) and others in aligning its climate plan with the UN's Race to Zero campaign… “Critics say the group's targets are too weak and flexible. "Without a plan to stop funding the expansion of fossil fuels, commitments like this are completely inadequate," Ben Cushing, fossil-free finance campaign manager at the Sierra Club, told Reuters.
OPINION
The Hill: Gulf communities live California's oil spill every day
Scott Eustis is the community science director for Healthy Gulf, a nonprofit organization committed to providing Gulf Coast communities with the tools needed to reverse the long pattern of over exploitation of the Gulf of Mexico’s natural resources, 10/16/21
“Headlines across the country are lamenting another environmentally catastrophic offshore oil spill,” Scott Eustis writes for The Hill. “As tragic as another oil spill is for communities’ economic and environmental well-being, the neglect of the oil industry is something we struggle with every day on the Gulf of Mexico. In fact, I recently compiled government data showing that offshore Gulf pipeline leak rates are 10.28 times the national rate. Those are just the reported incidents. It’s even worse than I could have imagined, and I have been working in this field for 11 years. Our coastal areas aren’t lined with high-end mansions that so often garner headline news: Gulf Coast communities are frontline Black, Indigenous and people of color and low-income families who have been living with devastating impacts for decades. The unfortunate reality is that the oil spills impacting the Gulf of Mexico are so frequent that they hardly make headlines. It’s even hard for environmental professionals like me to keep track of them all… “Studies show that oil spills cause increased respiratory problems, pneumonia, migraines, anxiety and depression, among many other adverse human health impacts. In the Gulf, the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster is still harming humans and killing dolphins… “President Biden has broken his promise to America to ban “new oil and gas leasing on public lands and waters.” Why are we still here, subjected to a system that is laying waste to our economically and ecologically valuable coast? The Interior Department Deputy Secretary Tommy Beaudreau’s close ties with Big Oil might help explain it, but it’s a fundamental question Biden must answer.”
The Hill: Regulators can no longer rubber-stamp expansion of the oil and gas industry
Dana Johnson is senior director of strategy and federal policy at We Act For Environmental Justice; Jean Su is the director of the Energy Justice Program and a senior attorney at Center for Biological Diversity, 10/15/21
“For many people of color, low-wealth and Indigenous communities, the climate crisis isn’t hovering in the distance — it’s been living in their homes for decades,” Dana Johnson and Jean Su write for The Hill. “They’ve suffered economic hardships from crushing energy burdens and poor health outcomes from toxic fossil fuel pollution. They’ve endured affordable housing crises in areas prone to severe climate-worsened weather like storms, wildfires and fatal heat waves. President Joe Biden came into office promising to make environmental justice the core of his government’s climate fight. He promised a just, equitable transition away from fossil fuels to renewables in a way that would protect those disproportionately harmed by the fossil fuel economy. Instead, his administration has made questionable decisions on climate. The latest concern is Biden’s nomination of Willie Phillips to fill the vacancy on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. On Tuesday, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee is scheduled to consider Phillips’ nomination. Committee members need to know that Phillips repeatedly made decisions that favor corporations over the needs of the people. Assuming he’s confirmed, vulnerable Americans desperately need him to be a FERC commissioner who can lead our energy system into a climate-resilient and racially just future.”