The Northern Westchester Examiner

Indian Pt., Pipeline Protestors Gather Outside Governor’s Home

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Advocates of renewable energy held an early Sunday evening vigil outside of the New Castle residence of Gov. Andrew Cuomo. They called for the construction to cease on the Spectra AIM Pipeline and for Indian Point nuclear power plant to be closed.
Advocates of renewable energy held an early Sunday evening vigil outside of the New Castle residence of Gov. Andrew Cuomo. They called for the construction to cease on the Spectra AIM Pipeline and for Indian Point nuclear power plant to be closed.

About 100 renewable energy advocates held a vigil outside Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s home early Sunday evening urging the governor to take immediate steps to shut down three projects and facilities they argue accelerate climate change.

The roughly hour-long interfaith vigil attracted opponents of Indian Point nuclear power plant in Buchanan, the Spectra AIM Pipeline being built through northern Westchester that would transport natural gas derived from hydraulic fracturing and the CPV power plant in Orange County that is under construction.

The CPV plant would use fracked gas from Pennsylvania to provide power but emit millions of tons of greenhouse gases further endangering, opponents said.

Holding signs, singing songs and delivering short comments and prayers, the demonstrators made the five-minute walk from the parking lot of the Presbyterian Church of Mount Kisco to near Cuomo’s Bittersweet Lane house in New Castle under a heavy police presence.

“Gov. Cuomo has a choice – either to protect the health and safety of the people of New York and the environment our children will inherit or capitulate to the interests of an industry whose only motive is profit,” said James Cromwell, an environmental activist and member of Protect Orange County.

“If we allow fracked gas to be transported and consumed in this state, then the governor’s moratorium was a meaningless self-serving hoax and New York City is condemned to sink beneath the waves,” he added.

Some who participated in the vigil pointed to the governor’s public opposition to the Spectra AIM Pipeline last winter; however, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved the project. The pipeline, 42 inches in diameter, would pass a little more than 100 feet from Indian Point at its closest point.

Some of the demonstrators want Cuomo to appeal to President Obama to order FERC to stop construction. U.S. Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand came out in favor of halting construction in May.

There was also a call for Cuomo to order the state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) to pull the permit for the work.

Susan Van Dolsen of Stop the Algonquin Pipeline Expansion said that on Sunday afternoon a member of Cuomo’s staff contacted the group to inform them that the governor may be willing to go to bat for them in Washington.

Van Dolsen said she was hopeful that action would be taken.

“I’m pretty optimistic because he responds when he sees enough people are concerned,” she said. “He knows Indian Point is a problem. I don’t think they would have reached out to us if they had no interest of helping us in some way.”

Gary Shaw, a member of the leadership council of the Indian Point Safe Energy Coalition, said keeping Indian Point open after more than 40 years in operation is a gamble that puts millions of people at risk.

Furthermore, using natural gas instead of nuclear energy would do nothing to protect residents or the environment.

“There are the rods (containing) high level radioactive waste just a few miles from here,” Shaw said. “This is not a tradeoff. All extracted energy must be stopped. We have to move to renewables.”

Part of the message delivered by protestors was for New York State policymakers to devise an energy plan with the goal of being free of fossil fuel consumption by 2030. Father David Stump, who came from Jersey City, N.J. to join the vigil, said the money being spent on the pipeline should be used to develop renewable energy sources.

“Put it into wind and solar and it would be much more respectful of this beautiful planet God gave us and you might even have an investment that will last,” Stump said.

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