Blockade of Seneca Lake Crestwood Gas Storage Facility Continues

Human blockade peacefully opposes recent FERC decision allowing expansion of CNG storage in geologically unstable salt caverns.

News provided by

We Are Seneca Lake

Oct 28, 2014, 07:07 ET

ITHACA, N.Y., Oct. 28, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- We Are Seneca Lake, comprised of residents of the Finger Lakes, peacefully demonstrate their determined opposition by continuing to blockade the gates of the Crestwood compressor station on the shore of Seneca Lake, the largest of New York's Finger Lakes. The methane gas storage expansion project is advancing in the face of unparalleled public opposition and unresolved questions about geological instabilities, fault lines, and possible salinization of the lake, which serves as a source of drinking water for 100,000 people. Inexplicably, a Capital New York investigation just revealed that Governor Cuomo's DEC excised references to the risks of underground gas storage from a 2011 federal report on methane contamination of drinking water, and has allowed key data to remain hidden.

Over four hundred members of "We Are Seneca Lake" blockade the gates of Crestwood Midstream and stand up to the expansion of dangerous gas storage in the crumbling salt caverns next to Seneca Lake and under the beautiful wine country of the Finger Lakes. Lead by renown biologist, author, Sandra Steingraber. Pictured; Yvonne Taylor, Gas Free Seneca, Doug Couchon, People for a Healthy Environment, Members of Finger Lakes CleanWaters Initiative, Seneca Lake Pure Waters, ShaleShock, DJ Astro Hawk.

"Dangerous gas storage in the Crestwood salt caverns is incompatible with the rapid growth of our wine and tourism industries." Lou Damiani, Damiani Vineyards

"Seneca Lake is a source of economic prosperity for the entire region, not a gas station for fracking operations. It's a place for tourists, wineries, farms and families. Speaking with our bodies in an act of civil disobedience is a measure of last recourse to protect our home, our water, and our local economy – with our bodies and our voices, telling Texas-based Crestwood to go home!" Sandra Steingraber, PhD, Heinz Award Recipient, biologist, author.

"Crestwood's business model for this region is flawed. A billion dollar wine and tourism industry fuels thousands of sustainable jobs here in the Finger Lakes. This dangerous operation threatens all of that and more." Chris Tate, BME, Finger Lakes CleanWaters Initiative.

The D C Bureau's Peter Mantius has published a series of articles documenting the dangers of salt cavern gas storage facilities including the deadly explosions in Hutchinson Kansas in 2001. "Several explosions at seemingly random sites occurred as far as seven miles from a ruptured cavern. The blasts caused fireballs in downtown Hutchinson." Two deaths were attributed to this catastrophe and hundreds had to be relocated.

The Crestwood facility is just two miles from the Village of Watkins Glen and five miles from the Watkins Glen International Speedway that regularly hosts over 90,000 spectators.

http://www.WeAreSenecaLake.com: Live stream, press kit, background.

Blockade Photo Set

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20141028/154765

SOURCE We Are Seneca Lake