East Tennesseans have a chance to comment Tuesday night about plans to build a natural gas pipeline that would provide the fuel one day to TVA's Kingston energy plant.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC, will take comment 6-8 p.m. Tuesday at the Kingston Community Center in Kingston. Staff has prepared a draft environment impact statement; the public can address that.
Another such comment session will be 6-8 p.m. local time Wednesday, June 12, at Cookeville High School in Cookeville.
Staff will not make a presentation. Instead, the public will be welcome to speak, and staff will hand out each commenter a number, taking comments in the order numbers are handed out.
Oral comments will be recorded.
East Tennessee Natural Gas LLC, owned by Enbridge and based in Houston, Texas, wants to build the 30-inch-diameter pipeline stretching from Trousdale to Roane counties, documents state. It's called the "Ridgeline Expansion Project".
The project as requested consists of 122 miles of pipeline including 4 miles of "header" pipeline and 118 miles of mainline pipeline. It would carry gas from lines in Middle Tennessee.
The project has an estimated cost of about $1.1 billion, according to a notice in the Federal Register.
Some critics including the Sierra Club oppose it, arguing it's a waste of money, an environmental hazard and does little to reduce TVA's carbon footprint. The project will also run across privately held property including farmland, critics say.
TVA plans to shut down coal-burning operations at Kingston and switch to a wider variety of energy sources at the plant, including gas-fired energy production and renewable energy.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the National Park Service have offered input to FERC on the project.
According to FERC, "the construction and operation of the Project would result in limited adverse environmental impacts. Most adverse environmental impacts would be temporary or short-term during construction, but some long-term and permanent environmental impacts would occur on some forested lands, including forested wetlands. This determination is based on our review of the information provided by East Tennessee and further developed from environmental information requests; scoping; literature research; a consideration of potential alternatives; and contacts with federal, state, and local agencies, and other stakeholders.
"We conclude that impacts would be less than significant with implementation of East Tennessee’s proposed avoidance, minimization, and mitigation measures as well as the environmental conditions we recommend the Commission include in any Project authorization it may issue to East Tennessee."
At the 800-acre Kingston plant, TVA envisions installation of solar, battery energy storage and aeroderivative gas turbines as well as a natural gas-fired "combined cycle plant". TVA already operates such gas-fired plants including in Kentucky.
The utility estimates some 1,000 to 1,500 construction jobs will be created over the anticipated three years it takes to build the park. The goal is to finish by the end of 2027.
According to FERC, while there won't be a formal staff presentation, the staff will be available to answer questions about the environmental review process for the pipeline project.
