delawarewatergap2

The Delaware Water Gap is one of the few National Park Service Wild and Scenic Rivers, and it’s in a struggle to stay that way.  I represented Stop the Lines before the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities administrative proceeding, which ended with a permit issued to PSEG.  Boooo-hisssss.

TODAY, a lawsuit was filed by National Parks Conservation Assoc.,  Appalachian Mountain Club, Appalachian Trail Conservancy, Association of New Jersey Environmental Commissions, Delaware Riverkeeper Network, New Jersey Highlands Coalition, New York-New Jersey Trail Conference, Rock the Earth, Sierra Club, Stop the Lines versus Ken Salazar as Secretary of the Interior and head of National Park Service, and Dennis Reidenbach as Northeast Regional Director of National Park Service:

Complaint – National Parks Conservation Assoc., et al. v. Salazar & Reidenbach

GOOD!  Serves them right, after caving to Obama’s transmission fast-tracking!

So what’s the scoop?  PSEG and PPL have targeted the Delaware Water Gap for a crossing of its Susquehanna-Roseland transmission line.  Here’s the NATIONAL PARK SERVICE PAGE for the project.

Here’s the full map:

susquehanna-roseland

Which is a small part of the bigger picture, part of line #1 on this Project Mountaineer, the transmission for coal scenario hatched at a top secret FERC meeting in 2005:

projectmountaineermap

The alternatives evaluated by the National Park Service’s Delaware Water Gap in their EIS looks like this (click on map for larger version):

dewa_newsletter2_15july2010-1_page_4

Here’s the link to the National Park Service’s Final EIS.  Inexplicably, National Park Service went from identifying the “no action alternative” as the Environmentally Preferred Alternative,  to a (rolling over) “STICK IT HERE!”  Oh, and a payoff of $30-40 million.  And then there’s “pre-approval” of the project by NPS…

Stay tuned!

delawarewatergap