Transco’s NESE Goes into Hiding

Just hours before the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection was to make a final
decision on issuing essential permits that would have allowed filling of critical freshwater wetlands and polluting waterways, Williams Transco withdrew those applications.  Transco claims to need to provide additional information, so they are going back to the drawing board.  Notably, this announcement was made just two days after leading opposition groups met with key officials from Governor Murphy’s staff about this monstrous project, which was organized by Food and Water Watch and NJ League of Conservation Voters.

While this is a small victory, have no doubt Transco will likely be back with a vengeance.  Now is the time to strengthen opposition to this project, including thousands of citizens, elected officials, and a network of many organizations.

To recap, the project would cut through the entire State of New Jersey, build a massive and polluting compressor station, and then slice in half the marine ecosystem from the Raritan River to the ocean off NY.  The impact to marine life will be devastating from:

• re-suspension of 800,000 tons of toxin laden muck
• thousands of gallons of drilling muds spilling and cutting into the water
• noisy pile-driving

All this devastation for this $1 billion project to allegedly bring an “incremental amount of gas” to New York City is a farce.  COA believes this is a pipeline that will be used to build an offshore liquefied natural gas (LNG) port to in the region to export Marcellus Shale, exponentially increasing
to fracking.  Stay tuned for updates and ways to get involved.