The scale of damage to mountain ridges in the path of the proposed Atlantic Coast Pipeline remains open for debate, but Bill and Lynn Limpert say they have no doubt what the project would do to an old-growth forest along the mountain ridge facing their retirement home in Bath County.
“If the Atlantic Coast Pipeline comes through our property, all these trees will be gone,” Bill Limpert said at a midday protest Thursday outside the office of Gov. Terry McAuliffe in downtown Richmond.
As an early and vocal supporter of the $5.1 billion project, McAuliffe has become the target of environmental groups that say the 600-mile natural gas pipeline would remove a 38-mile swath of mountain ridges in Virginia and West Virginia.
They contend construction of the 42-inch-diameter pipeline would result in “mountaintop removal,” with a 10- to 60-foot layer of rock and debris blasted from ridges in the Blue Ridge and Allegheny ranges.
“How do you remove the tops of mountains in an environmentally friendly way?” asked Mike Tidwell, executive director of Chesapeake Climate Action Network, one of the organizations that released the analysis last week and organized the protest outside of the Patrick Henry Building on East Broad Street.
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