Atlantic Coast Pipeline Faces Native American Resistance

Monday, March 05, 2018 By Sue Sturgis, Facing South | News Analysis

Two Native American tribes in North Carolina are among the groups seeking to join a court challenge to federal regulators' decision to approve the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, a $5 billion project proposed by utility giants Dominion and Duke Energy. The 600-mile pipeline would carry fracked gas from West Virginia through Virginia to eastern North Carolina, which is home to many Native Americans.

On Feb. 23, the state-recognized Haliwa-Saponi and Lumbee tribes along with 17 public-interest groups led by climate watchdog NC WARN formally asked to join an appeal of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's (FERC) approval of the pipeline issued last fall. The appeal was originally filed in January with the 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia, by the Southern Environmental Law Center and Appalachian Mountain Advocates on behalf of 11 conservation nonprofits.

The tribes' move came one day after the Lumbee Tribal Council held an emergency meeting where it unanimously passed a resolution calling on FERC to formally consult with it about the pipeline's impacts.

"North Carolina tribes have been left out of the Environmental Impact Study," said Jan Lowery, chair of the Lumbee Tribe's Health Committee. "The study did not include the concerns of tribes, and the goal is to get a structured consultation."

The Lumbees' resolution noted the tribe's concerns about how the pipeline could affect unmarked ancestral burial grounds, sacred places, and the environment. It also pointed out that the National Congress of American Indians -- the oldest and largest national organization of American Indian and Alaskan Native tribal governments -- passed a resolution calling on all regulatory agencies to engage in meaningful consultation with the Indian tribal nations that would be affected by the proposed pipeline's construction and operation.

The Atlantic Coast Pipeline would pass through the territories of four tribes in North Carolina. In addition to the Lumbee and Haliwa-Saponi, Coharie and Meherrin communities would also be affected. In a letter that appeared last year in Science magazine, NC State University professor Ryan Emanuel documented the flaws in FERC's environmental justice analysis that obscured the disproportionate impact the project would have on Native Americans:

The nearly 30,000 Native Americans who live within [1 mile] of the proposed pipeline make up 13.2% of the impacted population in North Carolina, where only 1.2% of the people is Native American. Yet, the [draft environmental impact statement] reported that fewer than half of the areas along the proposed route had minority populations higher than county-level baseline proportions. The discrepancy stems from the DEIS's failure to account for large differences in population size in the studied areas; large minority populations in some places were masked by much smaller nonminority populations elsewhere. The analysis also failed to account for large differences in baseline demographics among counties, where minority populations range from less than 1% to nearly 70%. These large differences prevented meaningful comparisons among areas in different counties. Together, these flaws rendered FERC's analysis incapable of detecting large Native American populations along the route, leading to false conclusions about the project's impacts.

"We Want to Be Heard"

Similar concerns that FERC's environmental assessment ignored Native Americans were raised in recent years over the Dakota Access Pipeline, a project of Texas-based Energy Transfer Partners that carries crude shale oil from North Dakota to Illinois, and sparked mass protests near the Standing Rock Indian Reservation. While the Obama administration halted construction in order to prepare a more comprehensive environmental assessment, the Trump administration reversed that decision. The pipeline began operating commercially last June.

Atlantic Coast Pipeline opponents are shifting their focus back to the federal government following North Carolina's January decision to grant a water quality permit to the project. That decision is mired in controversy because a $58 million mitigation fund financed by the pipeline's developers was announced the same day the permit was granted. Republicans state lawmakers and some pipeline opponents have accused Gov. Roy Cooper (D) -- who recently hired as his legislative director a former lobbyist for Dominion and the American Petroleum Institute -- of engaging in quid-pro-quo politics with the fund's creation.

Many of the groups seeking to join the lawsuit at the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals are part of an alliance that filed a rehearing request with FERC following the agency's October approval of the project. The request said FERC made a mockery of the legal process by allowing Dominion and Duke to supplement their application numerous times after the comment period ended, leaving the public with no avenue to respond to the companies' claims.

In addition, the groups' request charged FERC with cutting corners on assessing the need for the pipeline, its cumulative health impacts, and environmental justice implications. The pipeline will also have a disproportionate effect on African-American communities in eastern North Carolina, as was documented in a 2017 report by the NAACP and Clean Air Task Force.

Furthermore, the request pointed to FERC's failure to consider the pipeline's climate effects. Pipelines are a major source of methane, a potent greenhouse gas pollutant. The agency's neglect to consider the climate when evaluating pipeline proposals is in the spotlight following a federal court's ruling last year that has put construction of the Sabal Trail Pipeline in Florida -- another project involving Duke Energy -- in question.

But rather than grant or deny the request for a rehearing within the allotted 30 days, FERC issued what's known as a "tolling order," which allows it to delay the decision indefinitely while construction is allowed to proceed.

"FERC has this habit of just delaying stuff," said John Runkle, an attorney for NC WARN who filed the rehearing request as well as the motion to intervene in the federal lawsuit. "We want to make sure we will be heard."

This piece was reprinted by Truthout with permission or license. It may not be reproduced in any form without permission or license from the source.

Sue Sturgis

Sue is editorial director at the Institute for Southern Studies, which she joined in November 2005 as director of the Institute's Gulf Coast Reconstruction Watch, a project to document and investigate the post-Katrina recovery. A former staff writer for the Raleigh News & Observer and Independent Weekly (Durham, North Carolina), Sue directs and regularly contributes to the Institute's online magazine, Facing South, with a focus on energy and environmental issues. Sue is the author or coauthor of five Institute reports, including "Faith in the Gulf" (August/September 2008), "Hurricane Katrina and the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement" (January 2008) and "Blueprint for Gulf Renewal" (August/September 2007). Sue holds a master's degree in journalism from New York University.

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Viji Sundaram, New America Media: The pesticide endosulfan, known as "DDT's cousin," is still being used in the United States, despite evidence of its toxic effects. Just how many farmworkers suffer from pesticide exposure is hard to know because there is no nationwide mandatory pesticide poisoning reporting system.

Annie Waldman, ProPublica: Accreditation agencies are supposed to make sure that colleges are putting students in a position to succeed. That’s not happening at schools overseen by one accreditor in particular: The Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools. It oversees hundreds of mainly for-profit schools where students struggle at remarkably high rates.

Mary Hansen, YES! Magazine: West Virginia's politicians are pushing back against President Obama's Clean Power Plan, saying fossil fuels are essential to the state's economy. However, residents are not waiting for the state to step up, and instead are initiating investments in renewable energy, moving the state closer to a transition away from fossil-fuel dependence.

Jonah Newman, The Chicago Reporter: A new report says US Immigration and Customs Enforcement inspections of immigration detention centers overlook serious deficiencies, from sexual assaults to lack of medical care, and appear designed to give the detention facilities a pass.

Sue Sturgis, Facing South: Duke Energy is seeking a $120,000 fine against a nonprofit organization for trying to undermine the company's solar power sales monopoly in North Carolina. The state is one of only four in the US that do not allow third-party sales of solar power, requiring instead that electricity be sold through a handful of regulated utilities granted monopoly status.

Pushpa Achanta, Waging Nonviolence: Indian government policies are implemented without the knowledge of indigenous communities whose lives, livelihoods and ecosystems will be worsened by such decisions. However, indigenous groups are organizing to protect their communities from "development" that would displace thousands of local residents and destroy the environment.

William Rivers Pitt, Truthout: When the announcement came that the Republican National Committee intends to charge the media a $150 fee for the privilege of covering the GOP convention in Cleveland, I was frankly astonished. News services have never before been required to pay for access to a convention.

Mark Karlin, Truthout: Author Lillian Rosengarten discusses her personal history as a Jewish woman whose family escaped Nazi Germany, how her political consciousness developed in the US, and what brought her to sail on the Jewish Boat to Gaza in an effort to break the Israeli siege.

"We Cannot Remain Silent" on Palestine, Says Activist From Jewish Boat to Gaza

Young men watch the sunset from a destroyed building situated near the Mediterranean Sea in the Gaza Strip, May 29, 2015. (Photo: Wissam Nassar / The New York Times)

In Survival and Conscience, Lillian Rosengarten tells her story, and it's a remarkable one: escaping Nazi Germany and fleeing to the United States in 1936, overcoming the toll which the legacy of Nazi oppression took on her family's health, and becoming a strong advocate of Palestinian rights. Philip Weiss of Mondoweiss calls this book "a brave and wrenching account that is also deeply necessary."

Truthout recently interviewed Lillian Rosengarten about what brought her to sail on the Jewish Boat to Gaza in an effort to break the Israeli siege.

Mark Karlin: What is the central issue of justice for you that, ironically, draws a line from the Nazi attempt to annihilate the Jews of Europe to the brutality of the Israeli government toward the Palestinians?

Lillian Rosengarten: First, it is vitally important to make a distinction between traditional Judaism and political Zionism. Although Zionism began as a liberation movement, it is now a racist, nationalistic and criminal state that operates in the name of Jews. This is a catastrophe. Israel's Zionist goal is a Judaization of Israel that denies the existence of Palestinians. I am opposed to all nationalistic racist regimes that occupy and disenfranchise another people.

My father saw the handwriting on the wall after he was beaten by the "brownshirts." In the early years of Hitler's rule, when some Jews were still allowed to leave, he attempted twice to get a visa for his family from the US. The visa was difficult to get because there was a strict quota system in the US. One was required to have a "sponsor," a secure job and housing to be allowed to enter the United States. Fortunately, he finally succeeded.

Your parents, you write, spoke German to you, and you were raised in "a strict Germanic home." How did you handle the dichotomy of growing up in the US culture and being educated in US schools while living within a German-Jewish environment with your family?

It was difficult. I felt rootless and for a long time tried to identify as American while pushing my German-Jewish identity underground. I never felt I was a part of anything; I felt alone, lonely and always different. It took many decades for this to change.

Lillian Rosengarten. (Photo: Courtesy of Lillian Rosengarten)You write in chapter four of your "personal liberation" as the counterculture precipitated by the civil rights movement and anti-Vietnam War campaign grew. Can you discuss this evolution?

The women's liberation movement provided me with an identification as a woman. It also made me aware that other women were struggling with similar issues of identity, voicelessness and unhappiness - both in their marriages and unfulfilled professional goals. This was for me a personal revolution that brought me to a growing awareness of the path I wished to pursue for myself. The Vietnam War gave me tools for dissent and protest as well as the courage to stand up for human rights and against war with the support of an antiwar protest movement.

William C. Anderson, Truthout: On the one-year anniversary of Reyhaneh Jabbari's execution by the Iranian government, it's important to remember her through her own words and question a world that allows this sort of injustice.

Verónica Bayetti Flores, Feministing: A groundbreaking new report from Black & Pink gives us stark new data on the incarceration of those who are most marginalized. The findings paint a grim picture of criminalization of and violence towards LGBTQ people - particularly those of color.

Rebecca Pierce, The Electronic Intifada: In an attempt to crush Palestinian resistance, Israeli settlers want to see a "zero tolerance" policy pursued, under which stiff penalties would be imposed on anyone defying Israel's orders. Israel's policing techniques already bear many similarities to those of the United States.

Mark Weisbrot, Philly.com: The Cuban government says that for relations to be normalized, the United States must not only end its embargo, but pay compensation for the damage it has caused to Cuba and its people over the past 54 years. Cuban President Raúl Castro also calls for Guantánamo Bay prison and military base to be closed and the land returned to Cuba.

Anna Lau, openDemocracy: The continuance of colonial narratives hinders action on climate change. Meet the people working with diverse communities to build a movement, who highlight avenues of hope and offer the perspectives, processes and innovations making it possible to imagine the weaving of a different kind of collective story.

Annie Leonard, OtherWords: When the people of Baltimore got organized, they won a fight against an incinerator. Now they're building bridges between movements that too often are pitted against one another, particularly workers and environmentalists.

Jessica Bernstein examines how Lyme disease could be a game changer in the 2016 election; Daniel Faris looks at cyber liability and the future of US tech policy; Stephanie Van Hook reflects on the White Helmets - unarmed peacekeepers and first responders in Syria; Ann Wright analyzes a lawsuit over Gaza flotilla deaths filed in a US court against the former Israeli prime minister; David Shorter explains how academic freedom is coming under attack; and more.

Mark Karlin, Truthout: Premilla Nadasen, author of Household Workers Unite, discusses how relatively isolated Black women domestic workers organized in the 1960s and 1970s for higher wages, better labor conditions and respect and dignity in the workplace. The domestic labor movement they built offers lessons on how marginalized workers can organize today.

Claudia Garcia-Rojas and Sharmili Majmudar, Truthout: When media outlets cover the issue of sexual violence, they often produce oversimplified accounts that reinforce rape myths. These narratives minimize survivors' experiences of violence and expose them to more danger.

Crofton Black and Sam Raphael, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism: Between 2002 and 2008, at least 119 people disappeared into a worldwide detention network run by the CIA and facilitated by its foreign partners. This account fills in the gaps found in the Senate torture report.

Fran Quigley, Foreign Policy in Focus: Haiti's ongoing cholera epidemic demonstrates that the world's most powerful nation - the United States - and its most respected international organization - the United Nations - have no intention of treating the Haitian people as fully human beings, deserving of even the most basic of rights.

Sarah Tory, High Country News: Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has weakened Canada's environmental laws and global climate commitments in his quest to turn the Great White North into an energy superpower. Monday's federal election in Canada could change that.

Carrie Levine, The Center for Public Integrity: Super PACs are supposed to be both transparent and independent from the politicians they are supporting. But it's not clear that Right to Rise USA, the super PAC formed by Republican Jeb Bush prior to his presidential bid, is either.

Elena Tiralongo, Council on Hemispheric Affairs: Latin America acts in unity to help refugees. However, if the region wants to succeed in providing refugees with durable solutions, asylum seekers must have a real chance to integrate and contribute to their new countries' growth.

Eric Holt-Giménez offers a tale of two food prizes and how they convey the politics of distribution versus growth; Sue Sturgis questions whether $15 an hour is actually a living wage; Ingrid Vila summarizes the resistance being waged against a proposed incinerator in Puerto Rico; Michell McIntyre reports on the largest known settlement in California criminal prosecution history for felony workplace safety violations; Aman Banerji looks at why we are living in a historic moment for criminal legal system reforms; Bruce Fries examines why the CDC is allowing a private group to determine federal policy on Lyme disease; David Zuther analyzes how US-sponsored carnage in Yemen is continuing - and impacting civilians the most; Corporate Europe Observatory staff reveal how trade deals threaten public services; and more.

BuzzFlash

Erika L. Sánchez, Truthout: Many conservative politicians are lashing out against so-called sanctuary cities, accusing them of harboring criminals. Though anti-immigrant rhetoric is currently widespread, legal experts say it's unlikely to directly translate into more stringent local immigration policies.

Yves Smith, Naked Capitalism: A secretive consulting firm, which was previously investigated for corruption, and a local law firm are engaged in complex, high-cost bond deals to implement an asset-stripping strategy that has been called out as a private equity enrichment scheme that impairs operating businesses.

Maria Santelli, Other Worlds: Military conscientious objectors give us powerful insight into our own nature, and they can be strong and credible voices for peace, having fixed the opposition to war in their hearts through experiences most people will never have.

Adrian Edwards, New America Media: With almost 60 million people forcibly displaced globally, it is becoming increasingly common to see the terms "refugee" and "migrant" used interchangeably in media and public discourse. But is there a difference between the two, and does it matter?

Erica Gies, Ensia: Around the world - from Melbourne, Australia to coastal cities in New Jersey - urban planners are formally expanding natural stream and wetlands hydrology and ecosystems, such as dunes, mangrove forests and coral reefs, to better protect communities.

Dan Falcone, Truthout: Jared A. Ball, an author and professor of communication studies at Morgan State University, discusses "activist tourism," the mainstream press and the role of books and museums in the shaping of cultural and collective memory.

Lucia D'Ambruoso, The Conversation: It has been described as the most critical development failure of the past 30 years, and shows no sign of improving: Many countries' systems for registering major life events like births and deaths are incomplete or absent.

Jeremy Brecher, Labor Network for Sustainability: Protecting the earth's climate is in the long-term interest of everyone. Yet, efforts to cut carbon and other greenhouse gas emissions to a climate-safe level have been defeated for decades in arenas ranging from the United Nations to the US Congress.

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Atlantic Coast Pipeline Faces Native American Resistance

"We Want to Be Heard"

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"We Cannot Remain Silent" on Palestine, Says Activist From Jewish Boat to Gaza

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"People have only as much liberty as they have the intelligence to want and the courage to take.”
Emma Goldman

Atlantic Coast Pipeline Faces Native American Resistance

"We Want to Be Heard"

Sue Sturgis

Related Stories

Read the Article

BuzzFlash

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"We Cannot Remain Silent" on Palestine, Says Activist From Jewish Boat to Gaza

BuzzFlash

"People have only as much liberty as they have the intelligence to want and the courage to take.” Emma Goldman

"People have only as much liberty as they have the intelligence to want and the courage to take.”
Emma Goldman