Environment
July 27, 2020 -
Developers of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline and other pipeline projects are improperly storing massive quantities of pipe outside, uncovered, for years at a time. A new report filed with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission details how this causes a coating on the pipe to break down and release toxic substances into the environment, creating a public health risk.
July 14, 2020 -
Facing mounting costs and legal challenges, the Southern energy giants have canceled the $8 billion Atlantic Coast Pipeline planned to carry fracked gas from West Virginia to Virginia and North Carolina. The move came after intense opposition to the project from environmentalists, racial justice advocates, and local communities, and it will allow the companies to focus on meeting state renewable mandates.
May 22, 2020 -
Dominion Energy's and Duke Energy's need for gas was in decline even before the COVID-19 outbreak, which has further cut energy demand. But the companies are still pressing ahead with what critics warn could turn out to be an $8 billion-plus stranded fossil-fuel asset, even while the urgency of addressing climate change becomes clearer.
April 24, 2020 -
A decade after the BP oil spill set off an environmental health disaster in communities across the Gulf Coast, the company and the rest of the U.S. oil and gas industry continue to inflict pain on vulnerable populations across the South — and they're now implicated in raising the death rate from the novel coronavirus in African-American communities across Louisiana.
April 17, 2020 -
Severe weather devastated communities across the South over Easter weekend. Now they're trying to figure out how to recover from a natural disaster in the middle of a pandemic — and how to prepare for future storms.
February 14, 2020 -
WUNC, a National Public Radio member station serving North Carolina's Research Triangle region, regularly airs promotional spots underwritten by Duke Energy. NC WARN has filed a complaint about them, saying they cross the line into ads, which are banned from noncommercial radio. The University of Arkansas recently settled a similar complaint against two stations it operates.
January 28, 2020 -
With Southern states' monopoly electric utilities clinging to a business model that's worsening the climate crisis, polluting the environment, and costing consumers dearly, there's growing interest in opening markets to competition. While a ballot initiative to end Florida's electricity monopoly was recently rejected by the state Supreme Court, there are efforts underway to end Virginia's monopoly system and to study the question in the Carolinas.
