Yesterday was the first of the events where landowners are ripping up easement agreements. Remember, tomorrow there will be a press event at the Fisher farm just north of the covered bridge.
Property owners in Northampton and Bucks counties said Wednesday they are breaking up with the energy consortium looking to lay a pipeline through their land.
With Valentine’s Day this weekend, Lower Nazareth Township farmer Guy Wagner hosted a protest featuring a distinct message of love scorned, particularly over PennEast Pipeline Co. LLC’s preliminary offers to buy land easements needed for the project.
“You’re breaking our hearts,” organizer Tara Zrinski, of the Lehigh Valley’s chapter of Food and Water Watch, said, directed at PennEast. “Your one-time payment for loss of crops, livestock, personal property, that’s adding insult to injury.”
PennEast is working to compensate property owners for the right-of-way easements that it needs for the project, and can take under eminent domain for the proposal that is still before federal regulators. Property owners are still responsible for taxes and insurance on their land under easement, the protesters said.
The roughly 118-mile-long, 36-inch-diameter natural gas line is proposed from Luzerne County in Pennsylvania’s Marcellus Shale region where natural gas is being obtained through hydraulic fracturing to Mercer County, New Jersey. PennEast says the pipeline promises to provide enough natural gas for 4.7 million Pennsylvania and New Jersey homes.
The easements are in perpetuity, and would survive any sale of the proposed pipeline to a new owner, said Durham Township resident and attorney David Juall. He offered up language for property owners to use to counter PennEast’s offers, including specifying they permit only the pipeline — not any structures above ground. He also urged pushing for a clause promising the landowner additional money if the pipeline’s gas ends up for sale overseas.
I’m opposed to the incredibly, obscenely, egregiously selfish language … in these oxymoronic agreements … “
“I’m opposed to the incredibly, obscenely, egregiously selfish language that appears in these oxymoronic agreements, because they are not agreements,” Williams Township resident Linda Heindel said. “They are forced statements … .”
Lower Saucon Township Councilwoman Priscilla deLeon called Wednesday on state officials to intervene in the application that continues to evolve before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC.
“The current application is not what was presented in 2013 when we submitted comments at the public hearing,” she said. “Property owners have everything to lose. They need to review this.”
PennEast has asked for FERC approval by Aug. 1, and said it anticipates beginning construction on the pipeline in spring 2017, and putting it into operation late that fall.
Patricia Kornick, spokeswoman for the consortium behind the plan, said Wednesday the initial easement offer is a starting point for discussions.
“If a landowner is not comfortable with certain provisions in the initial easement offer — or wants to add provisions — PennEast encourages landowners to discuss their preferences with the PennEast land agent,” she said in an email. “While signing an easement agreement does not convey endorsement of the proposed pipeline, it enables landowners to share with PennEast their property-specific concerns and negotiate an individualized easement agreement that takes into account landowner preferences.”
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Details of an easement are confidential, Kornick said, with the agreement filed with the property owner’s county stating the sum as $10 plus other consideration, including for potential damages. Payment is immediate, and not subject to FERC’s approval of the pipeline, she said.
“PennEast has explored more than 100 route options and incorporated dozens of other route modifications based on early input from landowners and others, which underscores PennEast’s commitment to an ongoing collaborative effort,” she said.
Durham Township landowner Jeff Porter said at Wednesday’s protest his offer from PennEast was $6,660.
“I actually looked up the meaning of this number online and one source said that when the number 666 appears in your life it’s an indication that your thoughts are out of balance and that you are focused too much on the material aspects of life,” he said.
Delaware Township Citizens Against the Pipeline 