ACP Archives
The Friends of Buckingham have worked for more than seven years to protect our lands from the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. Our efforts were successful!
An archive of what went into this remarkable environmental accomplishment follows.
Pipelines & Compressor Stations
The fight against the ACP
Other Environmental Issues
Climate change and more
Environmental Justice
Courts and regulatory agencies managing environmental issues
Media Center
Videos of our hearings and celebrations
Pipelines & Compressor Stations
After The Deluge: Court Cases Go from Bad to Worse for Mountain Valley Pipeline
On April 7, Mountain Valley Pipeline, a 303-mile partly constructed pipeline that would carry highly pressurized fracked natural gas from West Virginia to Virginia, was in federal court again, this time in the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. After losing a...
Virginia regulatory board denies Mountain Valley Pipeline compressor station permit
Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, State Air Pollution Control Board, Decision Minor New Source Review Permit for Mountain Valley Pipeline, LLC, Lambert Compressor Station (MVP) Registration No. 21652: Excerpt: The Board...3) determined that the site is not...
Join the MVP ‘Violation Vigil’ Project Saturday December 11, 2 pm Richmond, VA
The Violation Vigil is a collaborative art project that gives poignant, visual and aural representation to the hundreds of water violations at the hands of Mountain Valley Pipeline. It is an invitation to stand in solidarity with the communities facing the MVP, and is...
3 Op Ed’s about the Mountain Valley Pipeline: Karenna Gore, Senator Ghazala Hashmi & Karen Campblin and Dr Samantha Ahdoot
Four Stellar Women speak out against the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP). Give a listen. OpEd from Karenna Gore regarding denial of MVP's VA 401 permit, and the anniversary of the Clean Water Act: The common wealth of water In the final months of 2021, a decision is...
A historically Black town stood in the way of a pipeline – so developers claimed it was mostly white
When residents in Union Hill, Virginia, decried the pipeline as a form of environmental racism, the energy company insisted it wasn’t As fracked gas fields in West Virginia boomed over the past decade, energy companies jumped at the chance to build massive new...
Updates in the fight against MVP and MVP Southgate – Front Porch Blog
Catch up on updates about the proposed Mountain Valley Pipeline and its Southgate extension with upcoming events, regulatory developments and the latest news that affects the construction of these projects and the communities fighting back against them. MVP Southgate...
‘Keystone XL is dead!’ Ding Dong!
The Keystone XL pipeline project is officially terminated, the sponsor company announced Wednesday. Calgary-based TC Energy is pulling the plug on the project after Canadian officials failed to persuade President Joe Biden to reverse his cancellation of its permit on...
Glick Names Montina Cole to Top Environmental Justice Post at FERC
Our very own Montina!!! Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Chairman Richard Glick today announced the appointment of Montina Cole to serve as Senior Counsel for Environmental Justice and Equity, effective June 1, 2021. Cole, a seasoned executive and attorney...
Determining Disparate Impacts in Environmental Justice Communities: Does Friends of Buckingham v. State Air Pollution Control Board Provide the Roadmap?
It has long been recognized that minority and disadvantaged communities are subject to higher levels of pollution than more affluent non-minority areas. This fact is the basis of the need for Environmental Justice to ensure that the past disparate impacts to these...
Atlantic Coast Pipeline easement injustices continue/ Remembering Feb 19, 2019
The Farmville Herald editor thinks the $3.5 that Dominion is giving to Buckingham is the right thing to do, that it is benevolent. Huh. Why would you have to say that - is there doubt that it is benevolent? See the article of Wednesday February 17. We think it isn't -...
Other Environmental Issues
CAN WE GET CLEAN ENERGY WITHOUT DIRTY MINES?
In 2021, global sales of electric vehicles more than doubled. This year, automakers are projected to make another huge gain, driven by soaring gas prices and new models with increased range. Getting away from gas-powered vehicles is essential to transition to a clean...
Utility Solar Vs. Community Solar
What are the pros and cons to Utility Scale Solar versus Community Solar? Many communities are facing these challenges as we move to decarbonize our energy sources. There have been a couple of community scale solar permits passed in Buckingham recently. The large,...
Several articles on extraction: gold, lithium; the dirty side of ‘clean’ energy
A tiny Alaska town is split over a goldmine. At stake is a way of life In Haines, where the salmon once leaped under snow-capped mountains, a massive mining project promises well-paid jobs – and threatens a fragile ecosystem by Dominic Rushe in Haines, Alaska, for The...
Making Clean Energy Clean, Just and Equitable
Clean Energy, Not Dirty Mining Earthworks supports the transition to a 100% renewable energy economy—one that no longer depends on fossil fuels—an essential shift, if we are to avert catastrophic climate change. Solar, wind power and battery technologies are...
Extensive Colorado gold campaign; Gold mining 101; Planning meeting summary
This post has excellent coverage by 2 videos and Planning Commission report. A short video on the Colorado campaign to ban gold mining. And Mining 101 by Earthworks. Alexa Massey, for the Farmville Herald continues to do excellent reporting, making sense out of...
Get your comments ready for 11/10 Board of Supervisors meeting at 6 pm
Tuesday, November 10 at 6 pm. Our County officials will be discussing changing an ordinance that would allow a Canadian gold mining company to drill in an A-1 agriculturally zoned part of the county. Only the first 20 people will be admitted to the auditorium. You can...
Gold mining: videos of Haile mine, Aston Bay, 2 articles
Flying to Haile Gold Mine April 04 2020, near Kershaw SC, and a little trip back in time along the way with Brian Pittman. Brian and family, fly directly over the 4,000+ acre gold mine, reaching it at about 5 minutes, but it can be seen from the distance once the...
Mr Barlow goes to Kershaw, SC, home to the Haile open pit gold mine, to meet the neighbors
I drove to Kershaw, South Carolina, on October 28, 2020, where the Haile Gold Mine is located, and spent three days there to find out how the gold mining industry had impacted the town. The mine, owned by the Australian company OceanaGold, had been in full operation...
More resources on gold mining
Metal mining provides us with materials essential for modern life. But mining also devastates communities, clean water and the environment. Negative impacts of today’s metal mines Massive landslide at the Bingham Canyon mine in Utah. Photo: Deseret News. Destroyed...
Recent media coverage of gold mining in Buckingham
The Farmville Herald, October 21, 2020 "Buckingham - There's gold in them thar hills" Good coverage! Read here. Check out Sean Tubb's podcast Charlottesville Community Engagement - October 13, 2020: Gold mining in Buckingham; Charlottesville gets a new fire chief;...
Environmental Justice
Advocacy group calls for enslaved builders of Charlottesville to be honored
There is an Elephant in the civic living room of Charlottesville Virginia, says Honor-Slave-Block Advocacy Group. This is article is written by Freeman Allan, HSB/Slave Museum Secretary; Author; Researcher; Iconologist; Social Justice Activist This month marks twenty...
Union Hill makes history—again
It’s been a busy several years in usually quiet Buckingham County. In Virginia’s rural and mostly Black community of Union Hill, the people who—not so long ago—staved off a massive natural gas pipeline’s polluting compressor station proposed on the same land their...
Sun Sing in Place Concert Series
Join ARTivism Virginia’s SUN SiNG Collective for their sixth and final concert in this series, which was on June 18. The week’s focus was on environmental justice, the fight to protect Union Hill and the Poor People’s Campaign and featured guest speaker Reverend Dr....
A National Call for Moral Revival with the Mass Poor People’s Assembly & Moral March on Washington
Due to Covid-19 the Mass Poor People’s Assembly and Moral March on Washington was a Digital Justice Gathering to call for a revolution of values to save the soul and heart of our democracy. The political and economic systems in the U.S. are plagued by the interlocking...
Allan receives community service for removing enslaved people block marker
TYLER HAMMEL/THE DAILY PROGRESS Two supporters talk with Richard H. Allan III (right) following his hearing Thursday at Charlottesville General District Court. An Albemarle County man charged with removing a plaque that marks the spot where enslaved people were...
The Atlantic Coast Pipeline If built, the ACP will disrupt the pristine landscape & impact historic communities.
An Expedition led by Senior Fellow, Karen Kasmauski with the International League Of Conservation Photographers. For a stunning photographic essay and story of Union Hill in Buckingham County and also Nelson County please click HERE.
Virginians Rallied in Protest of Trump’s Proposed NEPA Overhaul
By Blue Virginia - February 26, 2020 From the Virginia Sierra Club: Virginians Rallied in Protest of Trump’s Proposed NEPA Overhaul Climate advocates from across Virginia called on leaders to halt the rollback of NEPA Washington D.C. – The Trump administration...
The Poor People’s Campaign March on Washington on June 20, 2020
The Poor People's Campaign March on Washington is gathering momentum. In 1968, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and many others called for a “revolution of values” in America. They sought to build a broad, fusion movement that could unite poor and impacted communities...
Opinion ‘Environmental Justice Is Not Merely a Box to Be Checked’
When concerns about a pipeline were dismissed by regulators, a rural black enclave went to court — and won. New York Times Opinion Jan. 23, 2020 By Jeff Gleason, the executive director of the Southern Environmental Law Center. How we treat the story and future of...
Bishop Goff visits Union Hill and Yogaville/Tribute to Rev Robert Dilday
On Wednesday December 11, 2019, The Rt. Rev. Susan E. Goff, Bishop Suffragan and Ecclesiastical Authority, Episcopal Diocese of Virginia came to Buckingham to see and hear for herself what social and environmental injustice looks like on the ground. Her first stop was...