$8M deal could clear way for Pinelands pipeline

South Jersey Gas would pay $8 million to a Pinelands land-conservation and education fund as part of a deal to allow a 22-mile natural gas pipeline to be built through a forest area, to renovate and power the BL England generating station site in Cape May County, under a proposed agreement revealed this week by the state Pinelands Commission staff.

The draft legal document, called a memorandum of agreement, would, in effect, exempt the project from a long-standing ban on new transmission lines in the Pinelands forest areas, the second-strictest level of conservation zoning in the nearly 1 million-acre region. Among its stated rationales, the agreement contends the proposed route — mostly along Route 49 and other roads — would have less environmental impacts than other routes the gas company considered.

If it’s built, the 24-inch diameter pipeline would allow owners of the aged BL England coal plant to renovate and rebuild the generator on the banks of the Egg Harbor River. Built in 1963, the plant would become the major local power source for the Shore region once the Oyster Creek nuclear reactor in Lacey closes as anticipated in 2019, the agreement states. Without that local generating capacity, there could be pressure to bring more power transmission lines into the region with impacts on the Pinelands, according to the agreement.

The state Department of Environmental Protection ordered the plant either be converted or closed permanently to get rid of its coal air emissions. But despite that ruling, the gas line has been opposed by a number of environmental groups, chiefly because they object to granting an exemption to the forest-area rules.

“They haven’t answered the questions that have been raised by the commissioners or the public,” said Jeff Tittel of the Sierra Club. The environmental group is planning to mount a legal challenge if the plan is approved, he said: “We’re selling out the Pinelands.”

Pinelands Commission staffers are fast-tracking the process now, with just one public hearing before the commissioners could approve the plan in January. The commission’s policy committee will discuss the agreement Tuesday , followed by a public hearing at 5 p.m. Dec. 9 in the Galloway municipal building in Atlantic County. Commission Executive Director Nancy Wittenberg will ask the full 15-member commission to vote on the agreement Jan. 10.

The proposed deal has some parallels to an agreement that allowed a new power line in southern Ocean County to be built on the west side of the Garden State Parkway — a move that eased the project for Conectiv (now Atlantic City Electric), which had been facing a battle with suburban homeowners on the east side of the highway when they saw the original routing plans there.
In a 2004 agreement negotiated by the commission, Conectiv got its Pinelands route, and paid $13 million for a land-conservation fund that has acquired and preserved several thousand acres of forest and wetlands. There was widespread anticipation among Pinelands observers that South Jersey Gas would arrive at a similar mitigation deal with the commission, but the environmental activists complain there was more public review of the process during the Conectiv talks.
The pipeline agreement would dedicate $7.25 million to buying land in the southern Pinelands adjacent to the pipeline route, with any money left over after three years past the project completion to be used for buying lands south of the Atlantic City Expressway. Another $250,000 would finance completion of a Pinelands education center at the commission’s Pemberton headquarters, and $500,000 would be used for the commission’s public education and outreach programs, the agreement states.
Other stipulations include the commission’s selecting an independent biologist and engineer to monitor the construction process, and subsequently reports every six months from the gas company on pipeline operations.

Source: Asbury Park Press