Stand for Justice: Stop Dominion!
Last Wednesday, activists rallied at the courthouse in Annapolis to support the Sierra Club as they brought their case against Dominion Resources. The Virginia-based company plans to construct a liquefied natural gas export facility in tiny Cove Point, Maryland. If built, the facility would encourage fracking across the region, worsen air quality in surrounding Calvert County, and be the largest climate polluter in Maryland.
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By AMANDA SCOTT
About 100 residents from across the state, including Calvert County, and members and leaders of environmental groups rallied Wednesday morning at the Robert C. Murphy Courts of Appeal Building in Annapolis to support legal opposition to Dominion Cove Point’s proposed liquefied natural gas exportation project.
In March 2012, Dominion filed for a declaratory judgment in Calvert County Circuit Court regarding the implications of language in a March 2005 contract agreement among Dominion, the Sierra Club and the Maryland Conservation Council. Dominion claimed the contract permits the exportation of LNG, while the Sierra Club claims the contract allows for plant expansion but not LNG exportation.
This week’s climate insider will give you the scoop on CCAN’s 2014 legislative priorities in Maryland and Virginia. Both states’ legislative sessions kicked off on Wednesday, January 8th, and CCAN will be busy pushing climate solutions to the forefront of our legislators’ agendas.
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By Lyle Kendrick
A coalition of protesters stuffed papers into passing legislators’ hands calling for an extension of a statewide fracking moratorium as the General Assembly began its opening day Wednesday.
More than 75 protesters and members of environmental organizations, such as the Sierra Club and the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, met in front of the State House for the rally.
The coalition of protesters called for a bill that would mandate an 18-month review period before the General Assembly could allow any drilling permits, after a pending study concludes.
During 2011, Gov. Martin O’Malley issued an executive order preventing the Maryland Department of the Environment from approving drilling permits until the end of a scientific study looking at fracking. The study is planned to be finalized later this year.
Sierra Club legal case challenging Dominion Resources brings activists from across Maryland in show of support
100 demonstrators gather with placards to ask appeals court for justice as Dominion seeks to fast-track massive fossil fuel export facility on the Chesapeake Bay
ANNAPOLIS—Demonstrators from across Maryland gathered at the steps of an Annapolis courthouse Wednesday to support the Sierra Club in a landmark case that could determine the long-term scope and size of gas “fracking” in Maryland and surrounding states. As demonstrators waved placards and held banners outside, oral arguments began inside the courthouse on the Sierra Club’s case challenging Dominion Resources’ plan to export natural gas to Asia through the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay.
Maryland Sierra Club director Josh Tulkin told demonstrators that Dominion, in proposing a $3.8 billion plant in Calvert County to liquefy and export gas from as far away as Ohio, is breaking an explicit and pre-existing legal agreement with the environmental group. That agreement gives the Sierra Club the ability to reject any significant changes to the purpose or “footprint” of the company’s existing facility that presently only imports liquefied natural gas (LNG) from overseas. The facility is located at Cove Point in southern Calvert County.
By Tim Wheeler
Environmentalists concerned about shale gas drilling in Maryland returned to Annapolis Wednesday to try again for a legislative moratorium on “fracking,” as the controversial technique of hydraulic fracturing is called.
Waving signs and chanting “Protect us from fracking,” activists huddled in Lawyers Mall in front of the State House just before the opening of the 90-day session of the General Assembly. Speaker after speaker called for lawmakers to block any drilling in Maryland until studies determine if it can be done safely.
As key August deadline looms, Western MD landowners and environmental leaders call passage of statutory protections imperative this year
Rally-goers display map of gas basins at risk of being fracked across MD, including just south of Annapolis, to underscore the statewide threat
ANNAPOLIS—More than 100 grassroots supporters of fracking moratorium legislation rallied across from the State House in Annapolis on Wednesday to declare 2014 a make-or-break year for General Assembly passage of statutory drilling protections. Western Maryland and statewide environmental leaders warned that, with Governor O’Malley’s three-year executive order halting drilling permits set to expire in August, the decision as to whether or not to frack in Maryland could be made shortly thereafter—regardless of the results of as-yet-incomplete risk studies or the will of the General Assembly.
Rally-goers underscored these stakes by asking arriving lawmakers if they were prepared to sign a “waiver” ceding their “right to protect my constituents from the dangerous impacts of fracking.” Activists, who travelled to Annapolis from as far afield as western Maryland, Frederick, Baltimore, the DC suburbs, and southern Maryland, also displayed a large map of the five gas basins stretching statewide that are at risk of being fracked. Over the border in Virginia, a Texas-based gas company has already declared its intent to begin fracking in the Taylorsville basin—which extends underneath Charles, Prince George’s, Calvert, St. Mary’s and Anne Arundel counties—within the next 18 months.
Research released today by project opponents reveals dearth of evidence that company has secured critical project loan amid escalating legal, grassroots and moral challenges. Opponents caution investors: You will step into instant controversy, uncertainty, and delay.
BALTIMORE, MD– On December 17th, 2013, the U.S. Department of the Interior announced that “Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Director Tommy P. Beaudreau today joined Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley to announce the proposed notice of sale for nearly 80,000 acres offshore Maryland for commercial wind energy leasing.”
Offshore wind is Maryland’s single largest source of clean energy, with enough potential to power more than one third of Maryland’s homes and businesses. So it can and should be a foundational element of Maryland’s strategy for transitioning to a clean energy economy.
Annapolis, Maryland – This week, NRG Energy signaled that it plans to retire the Chalk Point and Dickerson coal plants in May 2017. Chalk Point, located along the Patuxent River in Prince George’s County, and Dickerson, located in Montgomery County, are 2 of only 7 remaining coal plants in the state. Advocates cheered the decision stating that these retirements will protect public health and continue Maryland’s transition from dirty, outdated coal towards more clean energy. Now advocates are calling for NRG Energy, Governor O’Malley and the Maryland legislature, and all people who care about justice and fairness to ensure a responsible transition for affected workers.
“As Maryland invests in more clean energy, polluting coal plants like Chalk Point and Dickerson are now obsolete,” said Michael R. Bloomberg, founder of Bloomberg Philanthropies which has contributed $50 million to Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign. “Marylanders will benefit from the retirement of these two plants with cleaner air, lower healthcare costs, and less climate-disrupting pollution. What’s more, this officially marks 30% of all the nation’s coal plants announcing retirement since 2010. Make no mistake — coal is going away for good.”