More to pipeline plan than meets eye

Do you live in a town that will not be hosting the Kinder Morgan-Tennessee Gas Pipeline project and think it won’t affect you?
Think again.

Kinder-Morgan, a multi-billion dollar company founded by Enron executives, has petitioned to impose tariffs on electricity bills to finance its project. The fourth largest energy company in the country, already subsidized by your tax dollars, wants you to pony up more money for their profit.

New Hampshire is an exporter of energy to New England. The infrastructure in place has been running below 2008 levels for years. In order to manipulate prices, these companies pretend that there isn’t enough gas to meet demand.

The product flowing through these pipes is not the clean, green energy everyone thinks of when they hear “natural gas.” This gas will be full of toxic substances used during fracking.

The “natural” gas industry has become the primary emitter of greenhouse gases in the country. These pipelines, and the compressors needed to push gas along the pipe, leak. They spew thousands of tons of chemicals into the environment, polluting watersheds, wells, soil, animal forage and the air you breathe.

It will cause chronic health issues for thousands of people. Maybe one of those people will be someone you love. I hope not.

Kinder-Morgan employs public relations workers in New Hampshire to advise it on changing their corporate image. The company has paid out massive amounts in fines, millions of dollars, for violations of federal and state regulations, but one well-placed ad, one donation to a school, or a politician’s event and that is forgotten.

Is that why we haven’t heard the voices of our elected officials denouncing this project?

Wake up, New Hampshire. If this is approved, more will be coming. Add your voice to those fighting this corporate Goliath.

Julie Erb

Hillsboro