Fossil fuel ‘superhighway’ threatens dozens of counties across Georgia

Aug 6

WASHINGTON – Yesterday evening, a group of community and clean energy organizations, including Georgia Interfaith Power and Light (GIPL), and an impacted landowner told federal regulators we oppose a harmful plan to expand a methane gas pipeline across Georgia, Alabama, and part of Mississippi that would deepen our reliance on dirty, expensive fossil fuels for decades.

Represented by the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC), GIPL is intervening in Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) proceedings alongside Alabama Rivers Alliance, Black Belt Women Rising, Energy Alabama, the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, and a local landowner. The South System Expansion 4 (SSE4) project would expand an existing methane gas pipeline into a fossil fuel superhighway. Impacts would include:

Pipe construction and infrastructure upgrades in 32 counties across Alabama and Georgia.
Nearly 300 miles of new pipe in the ground, over 14 new segments.
Horsepower upgrades and/or modification to 14 existing compressor stations, increasing emissions of health threatening pollutants.
New pipes crossing 11 rivers and more than 100 sub watersheds.
An estimated $3.5 billion price tag.
Paid for by customers of Dominion Energy, Southern Company, Oglethorpe Power, and Atlanta Gas Light.

Southern Natural Gas Company, owned by Southern Company and Kinder Morgan, and Elba Express Company, are behind the development. The companies are asking FERC for approval to move forward with the project.

SSE4 is part of a bigger proposed methane gas buildout happening in the South. Across SELC’s six-state region, utilities are planning nearly 44,000 megawatts of new gas-fired capacity by 2038—enough to power over 25 million homes. Utilities are doubling down on dirty fossil fuels for an unprecedented amount of energy they say is needed to serve hungry data centers swarming to the South. This generational investment in climate-warming fossil fuels, including methane gas, leaves utility bill payers across the South open to enormous, painful spikes in utility bills.

“This pipeline expansion will harm communities and landscapes across the South,” said Christina Tidwell, a senior attorney in SELC’s Alabama office. “Southern Natural Gas and the utilities this pipeline would serve have not clearly demonstrated this substantial amount of additional capacity is necessary or that cleaner, more affordable alternatives were fully considered.”

"A pipeline to the past is not the clean energy future faithful Georgians deserve," said Codi Norred, executive director of Georgia Interfaith Power & Light (GIPL). "Not only does this proposed expansion endanger critical ecosystems and pose serious safety risks to communities along its path, it also locks residents into a costly, polluting system that will affect southern states like Georgia for decades to come."

“The expansion of this pipeline stands to negatively impact water resources, communities and landowners' property along its route, while providing energy for increased projected demand primarily in other states,” said Cindy Lowry, executive director of Alabama Rivers Alliance. “In a state like Alabama, where more than 80% of water is used for electricity generation from coal, gas and nuclear, any increase in the use of fossil fuels is a step backwards for the health of our waterways and communities.”

"This $3 billion pipeline sends profits to Southern Company and Kinder Morgan at the expense of regular people. Alabamians will be stuck with the bill for decades while utilities invest in fossil fuels instead of cheaper, cleaner alternatives,” said Daniel Tait, executive director of Energy Alabama. “This is the wrong direction at the wrong time."

“The $3 billion price tag for this project will be routed straight to utility ratepayer bills at a time when energy burden is already too high,” said Shelley Robbins, senior decarbonization manager for the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. “Kinder Morgan and Southern Company/Southern Natural Gas have an incentive to overestimate load growth, power needs, and pipeline needs because they can pass these costs on with no risk.”

“Gas pipelines pose serious risks to the communities they cut through. Here in Alabama’s Blackbelt, we’ve seen firsthand the disruption and harm they can cause our community through explosion risks and other public health concerns,” said Portia Shepherd, executive director of Blackbelt Women Rising. “We want to ensure that community members are not only heard, but protected, with their safety and wellbeing prioritized. Their voices must be at the center of this process.”

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Georgia Interfaith Power and Light (GIPL) is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization that inspires and equips communities of faith to organize, implement practical climate solutions, and advocate across Georgia on issues of climate change, environmental justice, and community resilience. Born out of the national Interfaith Power and Light movement, GIPL envisions a Georgia where all people can flourish in a healthy environment, a stable climate, and resilient communities.

The Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) is one of the nation’s most powerful defenders of the environment, rooted in the South. With a long track record, SELC takes on the toughest environmental challenges in court, in government, and in our communities to protect our region’s air, water, climate, wildlife, lands, and people. Nonprofit and nonpartisan, the organization has a staff of 200, including more than 130 legal and policy experts, and is headquartered in Charlottesville, Va., with offices in Asheville, Atlanta, Birmingham, Chapel Hill, Charleston, Nashville, Richmond, and Washington, D.C. Learn more at selc.org.