CLEARVILLE - A Texas-based company looking to build an underground natural gas storage facility is asking a federal court for permission to take land for the project through eminent domain.
Steckman Ridge Storage Co., a joint venture between Spectra Energy Corp. and New Jersey Resources, wants to create an underground storage facility capable of holding 12 billion cubic feet of gas in the Clearville area.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has issued Steckman Ridge a certificate of public convenience and necessity for a natural gas storage facility in the area.
Now the company has asked the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania for permission to take the needed land through eminent domain.
Notices of the request have been filed for several properties.
In response to the planned project, more than 50 landowners in this Bedford County town formed the Clearville Landowners Property Group and are petitioning for the right to drill for natural gas in shale deposits, which would not be possible if the storage field is created.
''Drilling near a natural gas storage field could result in subterranean explosions, slips and other dangerous unknowns,'' group member Sandra K. McDaniel wrote in a letter to the Mirror.
McDaniel said Pennsylvania General Energy started drilling gas wells in the area around 2002, with most wells lasting about two years. PGE sold the wells to Spectra Energy in 2007, which created the Steckman Ridge storage-facility plan.
The fight to stop the natural gas storage area began more than a year ago, McDaniel said.
''They told us we had no choice,'' she said. ''They said this was a federal-backed project. You either do it or else, really.''
McDaniel and her husband, Joe, are retired and trying to live their lifelong dream of a place in the country.
''We chose Clearville to fulfill that dream and share our land with others,'' she said.
Although Spectra Energy does not have the final certificate to begin work on the storage project, McDaniel said it has begun construction, choosing not to wait out the results of a re-hearing with the FERC.
''We're still on the edge,'' McDaniel said of the more than 50 upset landowners. ''It's just been a nightmare, just a total nightmare. They just want to steal your land, so to speak.''
McDaniel fears the project will be a devastating blow to the rural town.
''Our properties will never be the same,'' she said.
Officials at Spectra Energy said the company will comment on the project in the future.
