An event billed as an “anti-fracking rally” was held Sunday, July 13 in Washington, DC. Organizers of the protest stated that hundreds of people from the Mid-Atlantic region came to the Nation’s Capital to voice opposition to the gas industry’s push to export liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the United States.
A prominent pending project in Calvert County was the focus of the protest. The Dominion Cove Point LNG Export project is nearing the completion of the approval process. The entity that will make a final decision on the $3.8 billion project’s fate found itself in the crosshairs of the protestors.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has already given the project a favorable environmental assessment and its final approval is expected late next month. The Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC) has given its approval of the liquefaction facility to be built within the confines of the 40-year old facility.
A press release from the Chesapeake Climate Action Network stated that protesters are calling on the Obama Administration to halt approval of all LNG export projects.
The Sunday rally started at the Capitol Building and ended approximately one mile later at FERC headquarters. The protestors traversed the DC streets with the familiar 100-foot pipeline prop while many other marchers carried banners.
“We’re here today to deliver a ‘people’s environmental impact statement’ to President Obama and FERC,” stated the Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jr. of the Hip Hop Caucus. “Any project that makes climate change significantly worse has no place on a livable planet, from Cove Point to Keystone XL. No matter what FERC decides in the near-term, the people will triumph in the long-term. We’ll keep fighting until wind turbines and solar panels crisscross our coastlines and LNG facilities like Cove Point are defunct monuments to a dinosaur industry.”
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