The northern part of the Header Improvement Project. Source: VNG Application at SCC. You can see the full project map here.
By Steve Haner
First published this morning in the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star.
To the modern environmental movement, natural gas is the Devil’s own breath. It must be opposed in every form on every front.
This explains the existential battle being fought over what would otherwise be considered fairly minor capital enhancements to an existing gas pipeline connecting Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads. Virginia Natural Gas is seeking to increase the capacity of that line with a 6-mile extension to connect to the Transco pipeline near Quantico.
Those six miles are the only new section of pipeline in the Header Improvement Project. Elsewhere, the existing pipeline will see three miles of parallel pipe added to increase capacity in Fauquier County and 14 miles more north and east of Richmond. Three compressor stations are also proposed, one each at the northern and southern ends and one in the middle of the route near Ladysmith. The whole project is priced in at about $345 million.
The objections display hypocrisy. Opponents of the proposed multi-billion dollar Atlantic Coast and Mountain Valley natural gas pipelines have often pointed to the actual or potential capacity of the state’s existing lines. Those are sufficient for Virginia’s needs, they say. The minor proposed improvements strengthen that argument, and logically should be embraced by those opposed to the mega-projects to the south.
Yet VNG’s proposal is drawing the same level of heated opposition as the major projects, with their hundreds of miles of new construction. Even a six-mile extension of an old pipeline is a path to perdition. Continue reading
Construction: Virginia’s Quiet, Strong Man
Scene from Micron’s $3 billion construction project in Manassas. Photo credit: Inside NoVa
By Peter Galuszka
For all the complaints about the COVID-19 pandemic in Virginia – the shut-down restaurants and (temporarily) closed beaches – one industry has been working steadily and quietly all along – the state’s construction sector.
Builders haven’t missed much of a beat since the “state at home” orders started going out a couple of months ago.
In Pentagon City, works still progresses on the two, 22-story towers for Amazon’s new eastern headquarters. In suburban Chesterfield County near Richmond, workers toil adding new drain pipes and four-laning once- rural roads. Four-story apartments overlooking Swift Creek Reservoir are taking shape for the over-55 crowd.
At a loud and garish protest next to the State Capitol against Gov. Ralph Norham’s work-stoppage plans last month, Mark Carter, a contractor from Hanover County, made his views known. “We‘re still working,” he told me. “I’m not for Trump and I’m not a Democrat. People need to work.”
In Virginia, some are. After all, New York state and Boston stopped construction work due to the pandemic. Continue reading →
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