Gas firm seeks approval of revised Pinelands pipeline plan

TUCKAHOE, N.J. - A controversial proposal to run a natural-gas pipeline through the Pinelands, blocked in a Pinelands Commission vote last year, emerged Wednesday before the Board of Public Utilities in a move that the gas company hoped would ease opposition to the project.

At a hearing, South Jersey Gas asked the board to approve the relocation of a pipeline connection point outside the Pinelands and to restrict any new pipeline from adding natural-gas customers.

The moves, a spokesman for the company suggested, were intended to demonstrate - to the Pinelands Commission and critics - that the proposal was environmentally sensitive and not motivated by the potential to gain customers.

The 22-mile-long pipeline would transport gas from Pennsylvania's Marcellus Shale to the B.L. England power plant in Beesley's Point, in Upper Township, Cape May County.

The pipeline - about 10 miles of which would run underneath protected forests - would allow the plant to stop burning coal. The DEP has ordered the plant to convert to natural gas.

BPU Commissioner Joe Fiordaliso presided over the hearing, with several other commissioners in attendance. Fiordaliso said the commissioners would vote on the matter at a coming meeting and then send the results to the Pinelands Commission.

An initial application for the pipeline was rejected in January 2014 by the commission in a deadlocked 7-7 vote, amid opposition to the project from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, as well as environmental groups.

Since then, the composition of the commission has changed, with some of the pipeline's opponents accusing Gov. Christie of trying to pack it.

On the sidelines of Wednesday's BPU hearing, environmental activists pointed to an amended application filed by South Jersey Gas with the Pinelands Commission as calculated to circumvent another potential adverse vote.

This time, South Jersey Gas has applied for a private development rather than through the so-called memorandum-of-agreement process it went through previously. In doing so, it would need only "staff approval" from the Pinelands Commission, said Dan Lockwood, a spokesman for the company.

"They're trying to do an end run around the Pinelands Commission," said Doug O'Malley, director of Environment New Jersey. "This whole process has been extraordinary. The level of Christie administration influence is astonishing."

Lockwood said the administration has had no hand in this process. The Department of Environmental Protection has approved the proposed pipeline route as the least environmentally damaging, he said.

Public comment at the BPU's two back-to-back hearings Wednesday was divided on the merits of the project.

Charles Hill Jr., business manager for the union that represents workers at the power plant, said the pipeline was "the only hope" for about 70 employees there. The plant would close if the pipeline is not constructed, he said. Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club, said the pipeline would "put a nasty scar on the environment."