More Pipeline Problems

National Fuel is running into more problems with its WNY pipeline. The citizens of Pendleton and Wheatfield are gaining strength in their opposition to having a “drying station” in their neighborhood. A “drying station” is a gas dehydration station that removes the water form the fracked gas that National Fuel's will be pumping through the pipeline.

Opponents to the station are rightfully concerned about their local concerns – safety of the station with regards to explosion and what to do with the cancer causing chemicals that will result from the dehydration. They also need to focus on the safety of the pipeline – all pipelines leak – and how to clean up and mitigate the damage from the eventual leaks. They also need to look at the environmental damage that fracking is doing in Pennsylvania and its relationship to the wacky weather that we are having here in WNY. It's December 20 and the snow that we have will be melted by Christmas Day. Mostly by the rain in the forecast.

National Fuel, after much pressure, has agreed to a “public” hearing. I put the quotes in there because of the way in which the hearing will be held. Everything that is going to be done uses bullying tactics and is anti-democratic. The rights of the people are being voided in order to server the needs of the corporation.

First – Preregistration by e-mail which will be confirmed by a phone call. Seriously? Make it an open meeting, like a regular town board meeting, that anyone from Pendleton or Wheatfield can attend.

Second – Strict control over the conversation. The first part of the meeting will be one on one sessions between citizens and the representatives of National Fuel. This is a deliberate set up for the representatives of the corporation to pretend to listen to a citizen's concerns and then bully them into the NF line of thinking. Will couples be able to meet with a representative together? They should. It would be better, and more time efficient, for this first hour to be open to public discussion so that the power of the many can be heard, It's not about that. It's about psychologically undermining the confidence of an informed public – a public that is opposed to fracking- to the pipeline project.

Third – The second part of the meeting will be the public presentation of the proposed project. After the public has been cowed into silence, NF will present their pipeline and compressor project to a bullied and acquiescent public, where it will seem that NF will have met the public's concerns about the project and that everything is OK and safe.

This is bull.

This is nothing but a corporation's desire to control the conversation and bully the public into silence. The people of Pendleton and Wheatfield need to stand up against it. The citizens of Wheatfield that went through this bullying process need to get together with the citizens of Pendleton and help them prepare defences against this process.

One other thing of note: Where is 350.org? Where is Greenpeace? Where is the Sierra Club? Where is Food and Water Watch of New York? There was the protest a few weeks ago at Temple Beth Zion on Delaware Avenue. Where are they in opposing this pipeline project? I can't find anything on the web about it on their sites. (Perhaps I have missed it.)

I am especially concerned about Food & Water Watch of New York. I have received e-mails about the Constitution Pipeline in Eastern NY. This is the same exact type of project. It is closer to me than the Constitution Pipeline and matters more to the people of WNY, yet I found nothing on their site about it.

Socialists and environmentalists need to unite forces against this pipeline. We need to oppose it as it is a threat to our safety and the safety of the environment.

To use the adage: An injury against one is an injury against all. This is especially true when it comes to the environment. It's where we live. It's what we breathe. It's what we eat. It's all or nothing.

We need to be a problem to this pipeline.

As much, if not more, than this pipeline is to us.