Rupture
‘No telling when or where the first catastrophic failure will occur. It is a perfect storm waiting for its time. The worst-case scenario would be an earthquake in the Giles Seismic Zone triggering a landslide on a steep slope. In turn the pipe may break, producing a fireball over 12 times the magnitude that a 12-inch gas pipe is known to produce. Should that occur in the Jefferson National Forest under drought conditions, there may be a huge forest fire.
The $7.85 billion cost is now over twice the original estimate from around 2016. Just think what that money could have paid for in solar and/or wind-power infrastructure.
Perhaps this monstrous threat to the people and natural environment should be named the ‘Joe Manchin Memorial Pipeline.’
My feeling is similar to knowing that someone dear to you is terminally ill. You know it's coming - but when it arrives, the anticipated shock is still profound.’
- Dr Ernst Kastning, preeminent geologist and karst expert, 24 April 2024
Since Mountain Valley Pipeline construction began in 2018, community members along the 303 mile route have become pipeline and water quality monitors out of necessity. These diligent groups of neighbors piece together information and educate themselves on pipeline construction practices. Many, if not most of the water quality violation reports have been filed by certified water quality monitors who submit their documentation to either the WV Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) or the VA Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ). Maury Johnson, an organic farmer in WV whose farm has been violated by MVP oil spills and trucks refueling close to waterways, has single-handedly filed 341 individual notices of violations to the DEP.
Before MVP’s revoked permits halted construction in fall of 2021, the project incurred more than 350 water quality violations and over $2 million in fines from the VA DEQ. Since the project’s green-lighting, and under the purview of VA DEQ’s new director (Mike Rolband is a former MVP consultant), fines and violations have been dramatically curtailed. That’s not to say MVP’s work has improved. Quite the contrary. Although the monetary fines have been minuscule, the ongoing harms have been enormous, particularly for aquatic species and drinking water sources.
On the morning of May 1, 2024, hydrostatic testing was taking place on Bent Mountain, in Roanoke County VA, where numerous water quality violations have occurred, including the fouling of Bottom Creek, a Tier III ‘exceptional quality’ trout stream. Hydrostatic testing involves filling a section of pipe with water and pressurizing it. An observer noticed red, murky high water in pastureland which the landowner reported to the DEQ. Nearby Mill Creek was observed as fouled. Two days later, evidence was spotted leaving the area.
Nine days earlier, the MVP requested the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) grant an in-service date of May 23, citing near-completion of the project. MVP has for years inflated its rate of completion to 95%, although the true figure is significantly less. MVP admits that less than 2/3 of the route is complete to final restoration, although full completion is a condition of the Consent Decree it agreed to in order to resolve a lawsuit the VA DEQ brought against the MVP.
The MVP spun its pipe rupture as ‘business as usual,’ their spokesperson parroting the standard reassurances of ensuring safety and responsible operation of this project, without using the word ‘rupture,’ instead reporting it as a ‘water release’ and ‘hydrotest disruption.’ Local community members were traumatized by the clear view of the potential catastrophe a ruptured pipe would have unleashed. The reality of the danger of the pipeline became instantly sharper than at any time in the 10 year struggle to resist it.
We have a pipe integrity problem. It may not be that one piece of pipe. It casts suspicion on all the other pipe buried in 2018. - Bent Mountain landowner
The pipe rupture occurred in close proximity to the popular Blue Ridge Parkway, parallels the roughly 875 yard long entrance to the Parkway, at a distance as close as 63 yards, virtually dead-center in the pipeline’s incineration zone.
This event brings up questions. This shouldn’t go into early service. - Bent Mountain landowner
Since it began, the MVP has spun a web of lies around the project in its headlong rush to begin cashing in profits. MVP has cut corners all along, notably letting the pipe degrade for 6+ years without protection from the elements, by not having its protective coating reapplied in a factory setting, by not adding a detectable odorant that would betray a leak, by not initially installing cathodic beds to prevent pipe corrosion… an immense list of infractions beginning with an insanely dangerous route that ignores the multiple red flags of karst, steep slopes, seismic areas and erode-able soils that another pipeline company is rumored to have labeled ‘unbuildable.’ The integrity of the pipe metal itself is in question.
The truth is that pipelines aren’t what they used to be, and are blowing up with increasing frequency. Last week, Pipeline Safety Trust executive director Bill Caram stated in a hearing for the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure that ‘2023 was the deadliest year for pipeline safety in America in at least a decade.’
Nor is violation reporting what it used to be. In its FERC Compliance Report from April 14-20, MVP’s 12 ‘issues’ are considered ‘communications’ but not a ‘problem area’ or ‘noncompliance’ or ‘serious violation.’ But the descriptions tell a different story. (Note: a ‘slip’ is a MVP-speak for ‘landslide.’)
In WV, sedimentation incidents are often self-reported by MVP as ‘upset events,’ which allows MVP to avoid the requirement for a DEP inspection, and avoiding a citation. No locations are noted. In VA, waterways are noted in code, obfuscating scrutiny.
Affected communities have mobilized to monitor construction here because MVP isn’t forthcoming with information. The MVP gives no information about its activities that would help inform concerned communities. Pipe buried early in construction, like that at Adney Gap and the Blue Ridge Parkway, is suspected to have no cathodic beds to help prevent corrosion. Some of those pipes were observed in trenches full of water for weeks before being buried. Eight years and a pipe rupture later, communities still have no definite answers from the MVP. Their website however, is full of glowing promises and feel-good statements.
But this is Appalachia, where communities are used to being forgotten and sacrificed, and dirty politics are the norm. The once-canceled Southgate Extension, planned to extend from the MVP’s terminus in Pittsylvania County, VA has been redesigned with a new route, new customers, new size pipe… but still retains its original permit despite its total transformation.
MVP Senior VP Robert Cooper, in his testimony before the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals asked for the MVP to be allowed a quick-take/eminent domain process, and pleaded for MVP to begin construction in 2018 to forestall ‘irreparable harm’ should the company not complete construction by end of 2018. An impacted community member and a statistician/mathematician by occupation found Cooper’s calculations, charts and tables to be rife with errors, as were his misleading statements, omissions, and use of outdated maps. Sloppy seems to be the MVP’s way of doing business.
The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), under the Department of Transportation (DOT), has been silent about the past, present and future real threats here. Elected officials Sen Tim Kaine and Sen Mark Warner have also been mum. Only VA Delegate Sam Rasoul, who along with 17 other legislators, have condemned the MVP’s rush to put the pipeline in service while its safety is ever more in question.
These rural communities have everything on the line. No rural rescue squad has been trained, or is capable of dealing with an immense fireball, or ‘blast zone’ in which everything is instantly incinerated. Neighborhoods are boxed in with no escape route. Direct actions have delayed construction, although $4.3million SLAPP suits against 40+ individuals opposing the project have been brought. People have lost everything fighting this nightmare.
Work continues on Poor Mountain in VA, where the slope is so steep workers use ladders to ascend the mountain, and excavators are tethered to multiple anchors to operate. Blasting continues on the mountain, in close proximity to welded and buried pipe. Landslides on this extremely steep slope feel imminent. MVP cannot make this debacle right after 10 years of lies, obfuscation and inferior work. Communities are traumatized. The pipe rupture was a bridge too far. There is no end to what harms the MVP will inflict.
Pertinent contacts:
@phmsa.dot.gov; phmsa.publicaffairs@dot.gov; (202) 366-4831
@PeteButtigieg; @SecretaryPete, Secretary of Transportation
VA Rep Morgan Griffith - Christiansburg office: (540) 381-5671; @RepMGriffith
VA Sen Tim Kaine - Roanoke office: (540) 682-5693; @timkaine
VA Sen Mark Warner - Roanoke office: (540) 857-2676; @SenatorWarner
Please donate to the legal defense fund for pipeline fighters: bit.ly/AppLegalDefense. Protectors face ever-increasing and expensive intimidation tactics and legal charges, but remain undaunted.
These worthy on-the-ground groups fight the MVP disaster:
https://www.aapsolidarity.org/
https://powhr.org/
https://7directionsofservice.com/