Skip Navigation

Keystone Light

RI_Chen&Culver_3
Art by Katrina Machado.

From the Canadian border to the Gulf of Mexico, the notorious Keystone XL pipeline has divided the United States perhaps more than any other environmental issue in the past decade. But a thousand miles away, a similar, lesser-known controversy is becoming painfully local for the citizens of Burrillville, Rhode Island. A town of roughly 16,000 in the far northwest corner of the Ocean State, Burrillville houses a compressor station that pumps pressurized natural gas along a pipeline owned by Spectra Energy, a Texas-based corporation. In April 2012, Spectra unveiled plans to increase the capacity of its New England line, the Algonquin Gas Transmission pipeline, by 14 percent. Despite the fact that the pipeline’s actual length would only increase by about 40 miles, the expansion, known as the (AIM) project, has generated outcry all along its route. The controversy is taking place in New England’s intimate town halls, and it raises serious questions about the ability of a tiny state like Rhode Island to influence the outcome of a major interstate energy project.

The arguments for and against the AIM are nothing new. Those in favor of the expansion tout natural gas as a transition fuel that will bring economic stimulus to towns along the route, with potential savings of $651 million a year in energy costs for New England customers. Supporters also present an environmental argument: Natural gas production means decreased air pollution as compared to oil or coal use. On the other hand, opponents point out that New England’s current natural gas infrastructure is adequate and that much of the additional natural gas would be destined for export. Consequently, they argue, the expansion would do little to improve the domestic energy situation and even less to create permanent jobs. Those challenging the pipeline also have grave environmental and safety concerns, particularly regarding possible negative health effects like asthma and nausea related to emissions from natural gas compression stations.

But even if the general debate seems familiar, Rhode Island’s opposition has taken on a distinctly small-town flavor. Throughout the Northeast, grassroots groups like Stop the Algonquin Pipeline Expansion (SAPE) and Fighting Against Natural Gas (FANG) are working to oppose Spectra Energy’s proposal. These groups advocate nonviolent protest as a way of combatting the Algonquin expansion, and they have had some success rallying New Englanders. Several members of Providence’s chapter of FANG were arrested during a sit-in at the office of Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) — the protestors vowed to stay until he promised to oppose fracking. Locally, Burrillville Against Spectra Expansion has mobilized Rhode Islanders to canvas Burrillville neighborhoods and has organized an anti-natural gas march featuring signs with slogans like “People over profit” and “We don’t need no compressor station.”

Federal representation hasn’t been much help to the local movements. Even Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), one of Congress’s token environmentalists, supports natural gas as a transition fuel. In April of this year, Whitehouse and Reed co-signed a letter with several other New England senators imploring the Department of Energy’s Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to consider the pipeline expansion in order to stabilize New England’s energy market. Furthermore, state action does not seem capable of preventing the compressor station expansion. When Nebraska attempted to stop a similar expansion of the Keystone pipeline, it faced opposition from the courts. In February 2014, a judge struck down the 2012 law that gave the governor and state legislature the right to determine the Keystone XL route and returned jurisdiction over routing to the Nebraska Public Service Commission. And despite the grassroots efforts, local governance can’t help either. Cities like Burrillville are relatively constrained in their legal ability to influence pipeline expansions. FERC has primary oversight over regulating and permitting interstate pipeline projects and has a strong history of supporting the natural gas industry — it has yet to turn down a project comparable to the AIM expansion anywhere in the United States. While citizens have been invited to provide feedback through a number of public hearings and a “notice and comment” process, FERC’s track record indicates that it is likely to approve the proposal after the completion of its final environmental impact statement at the end of the year.

Fortunately, the Keystone XL debate halfway across the country may offer a glimmer of hope for frustrated Rhode Islanders. Keystone would run through right-wing states with a stronger pro-natural gas bend than Rhode Island. Nevertheless, the project has been sidelined for six years, thanks, in large part, to grassroots advocacy that has drawn national media attention and a string of lawsuits brought forth by concerned locals. With this in mind, it seems possible that continued pressure from liberal northeastern groups like SAPE and FANG could at least postpone a final decision. If a handful of farmers and ranchers in deep-red Nebraska can keep a transnational energy project worth billions on hold, there may yet be reason to believe that protesters stranded without government support in a small Rhode Island town can do the same.

SUGGESTED ARTICLES