After all the hullabaloo over D.C. developer (and Rapp weekender) Jim Abdo’s plans for revitalizing Little Washington in recent weeks, it was good to see REAL news in the top strip of this week’s Rappahannock News. Our local board of supervisors approved a resolution opposing Spectra Energy’s proposal to run a natural gas pipeline through Rappahannock County on its befouling trek from the Marcellus Shale fields of Pennsylvania to the Virginia ports.
That fact that as many as five Virginia-crossing pipelines are in the consideration/planning phase is but the latest cold slap of fracking reality to hit us here in the jewel of Virginia.
Nelson County supervisors took the same step the same week to block a another pipeline from West Virginia proposed by Dominion.
So the jockeying begins. Should be a good donnybrook. Whoever lies in the path, or paths, of these pipelines will be the losers.
But these elected officials have done the right thing. They understand the threats to the environment others face elsewhere with fracking, whether it’s related to drilling, unloading the chemical-laced water from the wells or routing pipelines through private properties and conservation easements in the Piedmont. Rappahannock officials cited the county’s dependence on the natural, unspoiled beauty for its agricultural base and for tourism that such beauty generates.