Nearly 200 Harford County residents, elected officials and candidates for local offices came to Harford Community College to oppose a gas pipeline that would run from a proposed terminal in Baltimore through Harford to existing lines in Pennsylvania.
Most of the 30-plus speakers at the Federal Energy Regulation Commission?s hearing Wednesday night said they were concerned about the safety and security of Virginia-based AES Corp.?s liquefied natural gas terminal at Sparrows Point and the accompanying 85-mile pipeline, especially where the line would pass close to schools, cross waterways or run through densely developed areas.
“The level of risk is well above what we should be expected to live with,” said Fallston resident David Conover. “We don?t need an explosion to have a problem. All we?d need is a leak, and half the county would have to be evacuated.”
Pamela May, of Little Britain Township, Pa., said the pipeline would cross her 11-acre farm with no benefit to her or her husband, who worked himself into a furor condemning the project.
Many were concerned that part of the proposed route would pass close to the campus shared by Fallston Middle School and Fallston High School, with just a single, rural access road, should a problem with the pipe require an evacuation, said Middle School PTA member DeLane Lewis.
While the meeting lacked the big names and attendance of the first hearing on Monday in Edgemere, several of the county?s representatives in the statehouse and local candidates came to oppose the plant and the pipeline.
Del. Joanne Parrott, R-District 35A, said she opposed the pipeline and pressed residents to try to hinder it by denying AES surveyors access to the private property crossed by the line.
