Sunoco Logistics takes heat over 'open houses' on pipeline project

Sunoco Logistics Partners L.P., which has irked a number of community groups with its cross-state pipeline plans, has done it again by holding community events that appear to be open only to a select audience.

Environmental groups on Wednesday expressed outrage over a series of "open houses" Sunoco is conducting to explain its Mariner East 2 pipeline project, which would deliver natural gas liquids from the Marcellus Shale to Marcus Hook.

Sunoco sent out invitations to its latest "community open house," set for Wednesday night at a fire hall in Mechanicsburg, Pa.

"Please note this invitation is for landowners and local officials directly impacted by the project on their property and is not transferable," the letter states.

The Clean Air Council, the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, and Cumberland and Perry Pipeline Awareness issued a news release denouncing Sunoco as holding a "closed-door open house."

"This is an insult to community members that want accurate and unbiased information about Mariner East 2," Joseph Otis Minott, the Clean Air Council's executive director, said in a statement.

Sunoco says it's a misunderstanding and nobody will be excluded from the events.

"It doesn't say they're invitation only," said Jeffrey Shields, the company's spokesman. "We won't keep anyone out."

With the proliferation of proposed pipelines, activists have increasingly used the public pipeline meetings as forums to protest shale gas development.

The proposed Mariner East 2 pipeline would run next to Sunoco's Mariner East project, which is designed to deliver Marcellus propane, ethane, and butane to a terminal south of Philadelphia.