Day: November 15, 2019

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PennEast will appeal to U.S. Supreme Court over lower court’s adverse ruling | StateImpact Pennsylvania

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PennEast will appeal to U.S. Supreme Court over lower court’s adverse ruling | StateImpact Pennsylvania

PennEast Pipeline LLC yesterday vowed to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court a lower court ruling that looms as a major impediment to its proposed 120 mile-project to bring natural gas from Pennsylvania into New Jersey.

The company announced in a press release it would seek to overturn a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit that denied PennEast’s bid to condemn state-owned lands for its $1 billion project.

Can Congress authorize a private corporation to sue a state over it's objection? This might be a very interesting 11th amendment - sovereign immunity case if it makes it to the Supreme Court. If the Court finds in the favor of PennEast, it would give Congress enormous power to allow them to grant any party the ability to sue a state over any thing Congress see fits. But I doubt the Supreme Court will go that far, but I don't see how you open the barndoor part the way without opening all the way.

I've always thought sovereign immunity is a terrible concept in law, a throwback to the era of Kings and Queens. I don't think the government should be above the law, but instead should be held to same standard as private individuals and businesses. Yes, that would make life more expensive for taxpayers when government screws up. But it would make government more responsible like private businesses.

Heading Up To Dolly Sods

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Country roads, steep and narrow, heading up along a forest service road to Dolly Sods.

Sunday November 3, 2019

‘That’s Vinegar:’ The Ohio River’s History of Contamination and Progress Made – The Allegheny Front

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‘That’s Vinegar:’ The Ohio River’s History of Contamination and Progress Made – The Allegheny Front

In 1958, researchers from the University of Louisville and the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission gathered at a lock on the Monongahela River for routine collecting, counting and comparing of fish species.

At the time, the best way to accomplish this was what’s called lock chamber sampling, or filling a 350-by-56-foot lock with river water, injecting it with cyanide and waiting for the dead fish to float to the top. Archaic, but effective.

On this particular day, researchers opened the chamber to find one fish inside.

One fish.

It shouldn’t have been surprising, said Jerry Schulte, a biologist who managed the source water protection and emergency response team for the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission [ORSANCO] for more than two decades. After all, the steel companies that dotted the region’s riverbanks were dumping their contaminated water right into the rivers. The waterways were so acidic that the steel-hulled boats meant to last 20 years rusted out in three and the pH routinely measured less than 4.