The Montgomery County Board of Supervisors is joining a growing chorus of concerns about the Mountain Valley Pipeline’s request to begin operations by June 1.
Construction is continuing along the slopes of Poor Mountain, according to board Chairwoman Mary Biggs, and questions remain about whether the company has completed all of the required safety testing and repairs to the pipe.
“The safety of all of our residents is of the utmost importance to us,” Biggs wrote Monday on behalf of the board in a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
Mountain Valley has asked FERC for an order that would allow the natural gas pipeline to begin operating in about 15 days. The April 22 request was made even as the company worked to complete requirements of a consent order issued by the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, which has expressed concerns about the steel pipe’s integrity.
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“We believe placing the project in operation is premature before all safety standards for the Mountain Valley Pipeline have been met,” Biggs wrote.
Similar concerns have been voiced in recent weeks by 18 members of the General Assembly, the Pipeline Safety Trust watchdog group and other organizations, and in written comments from more than 50 individuals.
Mountain Valley spokesperson Natalie Cox said Tuesday that many of the comments “misinterpret or misrepresent” the company’s April 22 request.
The submission was made to begin a regulatory review and “to provide transparency to landowners and other stakeholders regarding the project’s construction status and ongoing and future restoration and monitoring activities,” Cox wrote in an email.
“Mountain Valley acknowledged in its request that work remained and progress updates for this work would be provided,” the email stated. “Furthermore, Mountain Valley will comply with all provisions of its Consent Agreement with PHMSA that are necessary to begin operations and will provide status updates on that topic.”
Some of the consent order’s provisions apply to post-construction monitoring and work, Cox said, and will remain in effect after the pipeline begins transporting natural gas.
Last October, PHMSA took action to deal with concerns that sections of the pipe, which sat outside for years as construction was delayed by legal fights, may have been weakened by exposure to the elements. Sunlight can wear down a protective coating designed to guard against corrosion once the pipe is buried. The fear is that the pipe, which runs along steep mountain slopes susceptible to landslides, could fail and trigger a fiery explosion.
Although the consent order outlined a series of tests – and ordered repairs to the pipe when necessary – both PHMSA and Mountain Valley have not commented in detail about what the monitoring revealed.
A report obtained by The Roanoke Times under open record laws showed about 70 “indications,” or signs of possible flaws with the pipe, that were detected during inspections late last year.
Further review found a need for about 15 “cutouts,” or the removal and replacement of part of the pipe. Other repairs included reapplying the coating on the pipe’s exterior.
Most of the tests detailed in the report were conducted in West Virginia, where the pipeline begins a 303-mile route that takes it through the New River and Roanoke valleys. Details of more recent tests conducted in Virginia have not been made available.
The Pipeline Safety Trust, which monitors the industry and its regulators, says more information should be shared with the public.
“We have serious concerns about the recent request made by Mountain Valley Pipeline LLC, given the lack of transparency about whether the operator is in full compliance with the consent agreement,” the organization wrote in a May 10 letter to FERC.
On May 1, a section of the pipe on Bent Mountain ruptured during hydrostatic testing, a process of running water at high pressure through the line to test for leaks or flaws before the gas is turned on.
“It is too early to tell if this is a sign of a larger problem on the pipeline or an isolated point of weakness,” Erin Sutherland, an attorney for the group, wrote in the letter. “However, Pipeline Safety Trust believes that FERC should be on notice about this failure.”