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Environmentalists Say Gas Pipeline Could Cost Twice Initial Projection

Courtesy of Pixabay

Environmental advocates say a planned natural gas pipeline in New England could cost ratepayers more than twice what’s currently projected. And they point to a study that says the pipeline could be unnecessary by as early as 2023.

The Access Northeast pipeline would run through New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Kathryn Eiseman, with one of the environmental groups who sponsored the study, says once you factor in costs like operations and maintenance, the pipeline wouldn’t save ratepayers money at all.

“When you take into [account] all of the costs over the lifetime of the project, the net costs for consumers would be higher, rather than lower, as the pipeline proponents have said.”

The study says natural gas use in New England is expected to decrease sharply over the next five years because of state regulations that call for things like carbon dioxide caps and renewable energy increases.

A spokesperson for Spectra, one of the companies behind the pipeline, says the study overstates the cost of the project, and that the pipeline will give consumers reliable energy for heat and light.

Copyright 2017 WSHU

Davis Dunavin loves telling stories, whether on the radio or around the campfire. He fell in love with sound-rich radio storytelling while working as an assistant reporter at KBIA public radio in Columbia, Missouri. Before coming back to radio, he worked in digital journalism as the editor of Newtown Patch. As a freelance reporter, his work for WSHU aired nationally on NPR. Davis is a proud graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism; he started in Missouri and ended up in Connecticut, which, he'd like to point out, is the same geographic trajectory taken by Mark Twain.

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