On Monday night a small methane leak was detected at a pipeline facility on the Mariner East line. As required by the pipeline operator’s emergency response plans, when the leak was detected, the proper authorities were notified, and responded.
Isn’t that the way a situation like this is supposed to be handled? If you ask the anti-pipeliners, they would say no. To them there is no emergency response plan, which is clearly false.
Jim Willis, author of Marcellus Drilling News might have said it best:
It’s interesting to observe how antis twist and turn *any* situation, no matter how obscure and inconsequential, into propaganda that supports their aim to end the use of all fossil fuels. For example, there was a minor, we’d call it routine, incident at a Mariner East 2 pipeline pumping station in Chester County on Monday night. A small leak of methane (natural gas) was detected in the pumping station. The leak was tiny and the gas didn’t even escape the pumping station. Yet antis are attempting to turn this molehill into Mount Everest.
Because the leak triggered an alarm, Energy Transfer (the builder and maintainer of ME2) called local first responders “out of an abundance of caution.” That’s all it took. Everybody showed up: police, fire departments, ambulance squads, the whole works.
There was no threat to the public, so the public was not alerted to the minor leak. That, dear readers, was a cardinal sin. Now that the incident has become known, antis are pitching a royal fit that they weren’t first on the robocall list.
The naysayers are never satisfied.
Many have been critical of emergency response plans and this incident proved that the plans in place are in fact adequate. The leak was detected, it never left the facility, the emergency responders were notified, and the issue was resolved.