CHARLESTON, W. Va. - Conservationists are worried about plans to run a huge gas pipeline through national forests in West Virginia and Virginia. It's still in the early stages, but Dominion Transmission, Inc., a provider of gas transportation and storage services, wants to put the 42-inch Atlantic Coast Pipeline through the Monongahela and George Washington Forests. Beth Little of Pocahontas County, is a member of the West Virginia Chapter of the Sierra Club. She says it could damage some of the most important national forest land in the eastern U.S. a huge construction project leaving a bare right of way.

"Through an area of sensitive rivers and red spruce and habitat for endangered species," says Little. "The amount of disturbance for a pipeline of that magnitude just seems massive."

Dominion has not surveyed the precise route yet. The company says the pipeline is needed to bring Marcellus gas to Virginia and North Carolina. Little says people who are concerned about the project should get in touch with the Forest Service.

Ernie Reed, president and conservation director Wild Virginia, says the proposed paths would cut across the southern part of Shenandoah Mountain. He describes that as one of the most important roadless areas in the East. Reed says the pipeline could damage the only known habitat of an endangered salamander and one of the two paths could go through a chunk of old growth that survived the clear-cutting at the turn of the last century by mistake.

"Because of a surveying error at the turn of the century, an old-growth red spruce forest. It looks like one of these corridors goes right by the edge of it, and may go actually right through it," Reed says.

In all, the pipeline would cross five separate watersheds, and Reed says they're concerned about its potential impact on water quality. Wild Virginia estimates the George Washington National Forest provides drinking water to more than four million people.

In theory, according to Reed, the national forest supervisors have the ability to stop the pipeline from going through their lands. But he says it's more likely the decision would be made by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the national forests.

"Those agencies all have an ability to virtually say no to this. Unfortunately, the decision is likely to be made at a higher level."



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Conservation groups, tribes and community organizers are praising President Joe Biden's decision Thursday to expand two national monuments in California.

Together, the monuments will gain about 120,000 acres. The Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument is 90 minutes northwest of Sacramento and the San Gabriel Mountains National Monument lies just east of Los Angeles.

Brenda Gallegos, public lands manager for the nonprofit Hispanic Access Foundation, said millions of urban families live close to the San Gabriel Mountains.

"A lot of our Latino communities don't have access to nature, prominently, like 67% of Latino communities don't have access to green spaces or blue spaces," Gallegos pointed out. "Having these expansions designated today brings us closer to closing that nature gap."

The president used his powers under the Antiquities Act to expand the monuments in order to increase public access and protect the watershed and wildlife habitat. The move also makes progress toward Biden's goal of protecting 30% of the country's public lands by 2030.

Gallegos said Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument in Lake County will include an area previously known as Walker Ridge, now renamed Moluk Loyuk, which means Condor Ridge in the Patwin tribal language.

"This is important because it establishes a co-stewardship with federally recognized tribes and will return the indigenous names of these lands to them," Gallegos explained. "This continues to build that great relationship with tribes."

Land managers will now create a new management plan for the area, which could include new campsites, hiking and mountain biking trails, and even off-highway vehicle-designated routes.

The Bureau of Land Management recently released its final Public Lands Rule, which is set to put conservation on equal footing with other multiple uses taking place on public lands.

The state of Utah has come out in opposition, pointing to the impact it could have on the almost 23 million acres of BLM land in Utah.

Redge Johnson, director of the Utah Public Lands Policy Coordinating Office, said the state supports conservation efforts but called the rule a "solution looking for a problem."

"What we have already put into conservation designations and then what you have for the acts that promote the conservation of the lands, why do you need to level that playing field?" Johnson questioned. "The playing field has more than leveled over the past 40, 50 years with the passage of all these acts."

Johnson contended Utah's lands and wildlife will suffer as a result of the rule and added it'll make mining critical metals used for batteries even more difficult. He and others, like Gov. Spencer Cox, called on the BLM to immediately withdraw the rule and work with stakeholders on more practical solutions.

Conservationists see the rule as a big win for restoring and sustaining public lands for future generations.

Johnson described Utah's public lands a "fire dependent ecosystem," adding fuel loads have accumulated drastically due to over a century's worth of fire suppression. He argued the rule will make executing and continuing vegetation management projects more difficult, including reducing the threats posed by fuel loads.

"One of the biggest contributors we have to carbon dioxide right now are wildfires, at least in the West," Johnson asserted. "Transportation, all the others, yes absolutely. But wildfires are a huge contributing factor to that. One of the best things we could do is reduce the fuel loads on some of these areas to reduce the fire risk and this rule puts that at risk."

The rule also creates the frameworks for "restoration and mitigation leases," which will allow groups to restore public lands or to offset the effects of a particular use. Johnson argued the leases will leave too many loopholes but the BLM said they will not "disturb existing authorizations."


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Conservation groups are rejoicing over the decision Friday by the Biden administration to reject a proposed mining road in Alaska.

The 211-mile Ambler Road would have sliced through the Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, severing the migration route for a Western Arctic Caribou herd.

Alex Johnson, interior Alaska director for the National Parks Conservation Association, said it was important for the feds to take a stand in Alaska so mining interests do not start eyeing other national parks.

"This is a very expensive, destructive and just highly speculative project that does not in any way support our clean energy goals as a country," Johnson contended. "And ultimately would permanently threaten the health and well-being of local communities and the tribes."

Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski slammed the decision, warning it could limit jobs and tax revenues for Alaska by preventing exploration for minerals she said are important to national security, like copper, cobalt, gallium and germanium.

Jayme Dittmar, a photographer and filmmaker from Fairbanks, said the road would have been very disruptive to the 66 Native American villages along the proposed route.

"That'd be 168 trucks passing through close vicinity to the villages," Dittmar pointed out. "There would be hundreds of bridges built. It would dismantle a subsistence livelihood that's been in place for thousands and thousands of years."

The road was seen as a negative for tourism to the Brooks Range area. According to the Alaska Travel Industry Association, Californians make up 9% of visitors to Alaska.