We’ve Stopped Pipelines Before, Let’s Do It Again: Join the Fight Against the Dangerous MVP Southgate Extension

A blog by Kidest, CCAN’s Virginia Communications Manager

Kidest at MVP Rally in 2021 (second row, third person from right), photo courtesy of Will Kerner Photography

My journey as a Virginia climate activist began as a college intern in the fight against the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, a battle we won, proving that community power can defeat even the most well-funded fossil fuel interests. That victory taught me that Virginians can defeat giant corporations that seek to pollute our communities, and I’ve found my people.

Since then, I’ve witnessed the defeat of the polluting Chickahominy gas plant and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with neighbors as we organized against the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) Southgate extension. When the first permit for Southgate was denied in 2021, it felt like another victory for the people and the planet. But with new natural gas pipelines being proposed across Virginia, the pressure on our communities and environment is only increasing. The fight is far from over, we need to act now – together!

A Dangerous Pipeline, A Bad Deal Repackaged

The MVP Southgate extension is a proposed 31-mile natural gas pipeline that would snake from Pittsylvania County, Virginia, into Rockingham County, North Carolina. The developers claim it’s necessary to meet “growing public need” for natural gas, touting contracts with Duke Energy and PSNC Energy. But as someone who’s seen these justifications before, I know this is not about meeting real community needs, but about locking our region into decades of fossil fuel dependence.

Community Resistance to the MVP on the Pipeline Route, photo courtesy of Appalachians Against Pipelines

Right now, the Southgate extension is undergoing a crucial permit application review, and your voice is needed! The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has opened a 30-day public comment period, ending May 30, 2025, for MVP Southgate’s request for a Clean Water Act permit. This permit would allow the pipeline to negatively affect our streams and wetlands, which our communities depend on in both Virginia and North Carolina.

Join us in advocating against this dangerous pipeline and submit comments to the US Army Corps of Engineers in opposition to the project using the how to guide here. 

The pipeline’s original plan was even more destructive, spanning 75 miles and requiring a massive compressor station in a predominantly Black community near Chatham, Virginia. In 2021, the Chatham community stood up to oppose the toxic pollutants that would have come from the then-proposed Lambert Compressor Station, leading the Virginia Air Pollution Board to reject an air permit based on environmental justice concerns. This win, however, was sadly short-lived. In 2023, MVP submitted a new project plan that doesn’t include the Lambert Compressor Station. The new plan now has a shorter route and a wider pipe, but these tweaks do not reduce the threat to our communities and our environment. 

MVP’s Track record: Community Harm and Environmental Destruction

MVP’s track record is a warning. Construction of the main pipeline has already destroyed forests, seized private property, and violated water regulations hundreds of times. The MVP Southgate extension brings more concerns about the possibility of repeated environmental violations. Erosion from construction threatens groundwater and private wells, which are vital in our rural communities. Even worse, the risk of pipeline toxic leaks and explosions puts homes and lives in danger within a half-mile of the pipeline route. 

These are not just hypothetical risks. MVP’s mainline has racked up over 350 water quality violations, many affecting rivers and streams that supply drinking water. The pipeline also turns communities, often Black, Indigenous, and low-income, into “sacrifice zones”, bearing the brunt of pollution and health risks from fossil fuel infrastructure. 

People-Powered Organizing & Community Resistance Defeated Southgate Before

Rally in Richmond to Stop MVP and Manchin’s Dirty Deal June 2023

The denial of the first MVP Southgate extension air permit in 2021 was no accident, it was the result of relentless organizing by Pittsylvania residents and Virginians advocating for healthier communities. Just last month, thousands of Virginians submitted comments to our Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) opposing the project. In fact, our lawmakers have also recognized MVP’s history of violations and safety issues. 

I’ve seen what’s possible when we come together, we’ve stopped pipelines before, and we can do it again! We have the opportunity to speak out and refuse to let our state become a dumping ground for fossil fuel interests. Your comments will help determine if a public hearing is needed and whether this project serves our communities and the public interest.

Join us and submit a comment to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, urging them to deny the Section 404 permit for the MVP Southgate extension. You can access our comment guide here. 

Click Here for Instructions on How to Submit a Comment!

About the author: Kidest is a communications strategist, storyteller, and environmental justice advocate who brings over six years of experience at the intersection of organizing, narrative change, and digital advocacy. She believes creative storytelling is a powerful tool for advancing grassroots movements, shifting public narratives, and influencing policy decisions.

Based in Richmond, Virginia, Kidest has worked alongside local organizations to amplify marginalized voices and advocate for policies that center the needs of Black communities and other historically excluded groups.

Solar Investing – Making a Concrete Difference

A blog by Ruth Amundsen, CCAN supporter from Hampton Roads

In these days of political maelstrom and uncertainty, I love doing something that makes a concrete difference for our climate. Climate change is an imminent and serious threat to human society, both in our country and on our planet. I invest in solar because it is something I can do that creates more clean energy in the world and makes a tangible difference in people’s lives. 

One of the Hampton Roads homes that received financing for solar panels.

My solar investing is done through Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs), a way of putting solar on sites without the site paying upfront costs. I purchase the solar panels and take the tax credits, while the solar site benefits from lower utility bills and repays me from the savings generated by solar. After a term of 7-11 years, I am repaid for the solar investment, and ownership transfers to the site, which then enjoys all the savings going forward. 

I finance solar in Virginia on homes, small businesses, and non-profits like churches and schools. It is incredibly heart-warming and impactful to stand on a roof with solar because you helped that homeowner or business install it. There is an immense pleasure in direct investment in installing solar that I have never felt with charitable donations to green funds, though I continue to support those as well.

 

Since starting this journey in 2018 in Hampton Roads, where I live, I have 14 active solar sites, including the first home in Virginia ever financed with a PPA! 

From Hampton Roads to Charlottesville: The Community Benefits of Solar Energy for Churches, Schools, and Businesses 

Recently, I have expanded to the Charlottesville region. Tiger Solar has been an amazing ally in finding unique and socially or environmentally beneficial sites. I currently have seven contracted sites in progress in the Charlotteville region, and I have never met any of the customers there. So I decided to take a trip out to Charlottesville to meet all my new solar installs. It was a fascinating and heart-warming trip!

Christ Community Church solar rooftop

I visited two churches with solar, Christ Community Church and Church of Our Saviour, both warm and inclusive, with wonderful community programs.  Even on a weekday, the Christ Community Church was busy and bustling with people from the area.

I was proud to see the solar on their roof, knowing it would save them money on their utility bill by providing over 80% of their annual electricity consumption, as well as making the air in Charlottesville a little cleaner by reducing the need for fossil-fuel-generated electricity. Church of Our Saviour will be putting solar on their Mission Building, which provides many supportive services for the community, and the solar will cover nearly 100% of that building’s energy needs.

I also gave a seminar to 8th graders at Peabody School, an environmentally conscious school that already has solar on three of its four buildings. The solar for the fourth building will be installed at the end of this school year. The students are bright, interactive, and motivated to do something about climate change.

International School of Charlottesville

I visited the International School of Charlottesville, a language immersion school, with its large flat roof, which will cover 100% of its electricity needs with solar panels. They are excited to have solar panels on their roof and be able to show that energy production to the students. 

Other impactful sites include Project Grows, a local organic farm using regenerative practices to produce over 200,000 servings of nutrient-dense food annually for markets, schools, and food pantries. They strive to be an example of more sustainable farming methods and will now also be an example of sustainable energy production.

I also travelled to Aquaphalt,  a family-owned business manufacturing environmentally-friendly road repair material, a greener way to do patching of roads and potholes, using water and rapeseed oil, without the toxic petroleum-based solvents.  Their flat roof is ideal for solar panels, allowing them to generate over 95% of their energy from solar power.

Another family-owned business I loved seeing was King Family Vineyards, a winery with gorgeous grounds, a wedding venue, and polo in the summer.  They now have solar to cover nearly all of the electrical energy needs of their large wine-making operation.

Policy Challenges and Opportunities: Navigating Virginia’s Solar Landscape

This trip to the Charlottesville region was a great honor, meeting so many worthy organizations and helping them install solar. Solar installers value investors who fund small- to mid-size commercial projects, as these are often unattractive to large national financiers. However, while there was hope that Virginia would make it easier to install solar and use PPAs through new laws in 2025, one important bill, HB 1883, was vetoed by our Governor.

King Family Vineyards

HB 1883 would have removed an outdated rule that required solar projects to be at least 50 kilowatts in size to qualify for PPA programs, except non-profit buildings and low-income homes.

This change would allow much smaller solar projects to participate in PPAs, making it easier for homeowners, small businesses, and community projects to install solar without upfront costs. HB 1883 would have increased the maximum size of solar projects eligible from 1 megawatt to 3 megawatts, enabling larger rooftop and small commercial solar systems to use PPAs.

Installing solar panels on homes, businesses, churches, and schools makes our energy mix cleaner, reduces air pollution and carbon footprint, and lowers utility bills. As we use more small to mid-size scale solar, it eases the transmission grid load since buildings generate their peak energy. It also shields us from utility rate increases and cuts costs for everyone as utilities avoid using expensive peaker plants, such as the $4.5 billion Chesterfield power plant.

Despite some setbacks, there is growing momentum for small- to mid-size solar in Virginia. I’m proud to be part of this clean energy movement, helping communities save money and protect our environment. I would love to have companions in my quest for more solar, so please reach out if this kind of investing appeals to you. 

About the author: Ruth received her bachelor’s in physics from Stanford, and has dual engineering masters degrees from University of Michigan. She led a group of parents in installing 700 kW of solar on their children’s school.

She runs several LLCs for financing and installing solar on businesses and non-profits in low-income neighborhoods at no cost to the owners. These funds also trained and employed residents of those neighborhoods on the installation jobs.
She is on the boards of Virginia Distributed Solar Alliance, Solar United Neighbors and Solar Village Project, and on the advisory board for GiveSolar.

NorfolkSolar_headshot

From Hurricane Anxiety to Climate Action: A Journey of Hope

Facing the Fury of Nature, One Floridian Now Living in Norfolk Finds Purpose in the Fight Against Climate Change with CCAN

A blog by Britt Flanagan, member of CCAN’S Hampton Roads 757 Climate Action Team (CAT)

Growing up on the Space Coast of Florida, I was no stranger to hurricanes, but this one was different.

Hurricane Milton landfall on radar by the National Weather Service/NOAA

I knew 2024 would be a record season. Weather forecasters were chattering about the potential danger well before it started. Still, I wasn’t prepared. I was caught off guard by the sheer devastation of Hurricane Helene in September 2024. Our region suffered $200 billion in infrastructure damages…230 deaths, leaving the unhealable wound of grief in its wake. So when the next storm – Hurricane Milton – reared its head just two weeks later, growing in strength and generating a path directly at my family back home, a special kind of desperate anxiety seized my heart.

Are they prepared? Will they know when to leave? What about my family members who can’t evacuate? How do you grapple with a deadly, uncontrollable force barreling its way to your hometown filled with those you love? Hours dragged on as we waited for impact, flashbacks of Hurricane Helene’s destruction on our minds. How can this season be so severe? What do we have to look forward to in the future? Will things only get worse?

After hours of checking the weather for updates and sending messages to my family to check up on their preparations, the storm finally hit. I remember being glued to my laptop at work, refreshing the weather page as it approached Tampa where it would cross the state and hit the East Coast.

By the time it reached my family, it was a Category 1 hurricane: something they were capable of handling. An exhausted relief washed over me when I heard that everyone was okay the following morning. Still, I was left grappling with that sense of anxiety.

This was a special kind of anxiety that came from a total lack of control. My family either wouldn’t or couldn’t evacuate. A huge devastating storm caused by a force I didn’t know how to grapple with: Climate Change. With climate change’s current trajectory, I’ll likely have to face this same situation again. What does someone do with that? Do they give in? Resign to fear? Hope the next storm downgrades just before it hits like Milton did? How can someone fight a force as big as climate change?

CCAN 757 CAT Action Team Beach Clean-up Event

My answer came at a concert of all places. There, in the lobby, I stumbled across something I was not expecting. Two bright-eyed, inviting individuals stood behind a table draped in blue cloth proudly sporting a logo for CCAN: Chesapeake Climate Action Network. I remember standing off to the side, tapping on my sibling’s shoulder, and pointing eagerly at the table. A flurry of excitement (and admittedly a surge of social anxiety) hit me. Could this be it? Could it finally be a chance to chip away at the ever-present feeling of hopelessness? Leianis, the Hampton Roads Organizer for CCAN, greeted us warmly and, seeing the enthusiasm in our eyes, showed us how we could sign up for updates.

Before we knew it, we were seated beneath a gazebo in Virginia Beach, with dirt on our hands as we built “seed bombs,” small, packed balls (or, in my case, stars) of fertilizer filled with seeds of native Virginian flowers. There I learned that CCAN’s Hampton Roads team was just getting its feet under them and were on their way to an official team launch. Something I had the honor and impeccable timing to be a part of! For the first time, I was surrounded by like-minded people who wanted to fight for the environment and now we had something to pour that energy into.

757 CAT Meeting

A few months later, we were in Norfolk. Many now-familiar faces surrounded my sibling and me. This was the official team launch: something new and exciting that can do so much good for our region! It was a truly collaborative experience. Leianis expertly led our group through discussions, ensuring everyone had their chance to speak. There was much deliberation as we all worked to find common ground. We each drafted a statement we thought would best reflect the team’s unique ideas in a cohesive way. Then, under the guidance of Leianis and Zander, we crafted a shared purpose statement, (or as I tend to call it, a mission statement). There was surprising power and pride in that little statement. It made this team and its potential finally start to feel real. Now we had something shared, something we crafted together, something we could rally behind. I remember leaving that meeting, feeling an exciting buzz in the air.

Our team continues to grow and develop structure. We’re each coming into our own: seeing how our little puzzle piece fits into the bigger picture of the team. There’s a flurry of ideas and potential as we pave our way forward, and for the first time in a long time, I’ve been struck with a new special kind of feeling: hope.

This fight will be a long one. There will be wins. There will be losses. I may have to face my fair share of scary storms along the way. The difference this time is I will be fighting back, and I won’t be alone.

A blog by Britt Flanagan, member of CCAN’S Hampton Roads 757 Climate Action Team (CAT).

Become an action team member today!

Hurricane Helene Mutual Aid Resources

Our hearts are with the people of Appalachia, who are currently suffering brutal devastation from climate change-supercharged Hurricane Helene. Those affected need support now more than ever – click the link below to find out how you can lend a hand. 

Then, take action: Tell Congress: Strengthen FEMA’s Disaster Relief Fund for Hurricane Helene recovery

If you know of more resources that we have missed, email info@chesapeakeclimate.org

Chesterfield Residents, Community, and Climate Groups Rally Amid Fresh Zoning Challenges to Dominion Gas Plant

Dozens of concerned citizens call for the Board to protect health and climate

CHESTERFIELD, VA – Today, dozens of concerned Chesterfield County residents rallied at the monthly Chesterfield Board of Supervisors meeting to protest against the tentative placement of Dominion Energy’s proposed gas power plant in their county. The boisterous gathering was organized in response to the Board of Zoning Appeals’ refusal to hear an appeal from the Friends of Chesterfield community group – which was joined at the rally by allies from the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, Mothers Out Front, Chesterfield County Branch NAACP, and other local advocates. Protesters held up signs and chanted slogans opposing the new plant and other fossil fuel infrastructure projects that endanger public health and contribute to climate change.

Just hours before the rally, Friends of Chesterfield announced it had filed a fresh challenge with the county, attempting to call Dominion’s zoning into question. A day prior, the Southern Environmental Law Center also published a report that it had commissioned, which found that constructing an alternative renewable-based energy portfolio would cost ratepayers less than half the projected cost of CERC while providing the same annual energy and peak capacity – addressing reliability concerns.

As the rally gathered momentum, speakers addressed the crowd outside of the building before entering to address the Board meeting with public comments including the following:

Statement from Melissa Thomas, Mothers Out Front: 

“Residents of Chesterfield County, who have for decades endured the harmful consequences of pollution from fossil fuel combustion in their community, are pleading with their locally elected representatives to exercise the authority entrusted to them. Their request is straightforward: Please grant us the opportunity to voice our concerns in a public hearing.”

Statement from Glen Besa, Friends of Chesterfield: 

“Why is the Board of Supervisors refusing to hold a hearing on Dominion Energy’s massive methane gas power plant that would be the county’s largest source of air pollution? That is a question that every resident of Chesterfield should be asking Chairman Holland and all the county supervisors.” 

Statement from Rachel James, Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC), speaking on behalf of her client: 

“The Chesterfield Branch of the NAACP is committed to elevating the voices of underrepresented groups to ensure their inputs inform each stage of the decision-making processes associated with Dominion’s proposed gas plant. The challenge here is that instead of stepping up to take advantage of the opportunity for local input into the air permit evaluation, the Board of Supervisors is stepping back. The Board is deferring to the Department of Environmental Quality to make a determination that the law recognizes local governing bodies, informed by their constituents, are equipped to make. Holding a public hearing on the issue of site suitability is completely within the Board’s authority to do. Refusing to hold a hearing is unacceptable. That’s why we’re here.”

Statement from Mason Manley, Central Virginia Organizer for the Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN):

“For more than a year now, Chesterfield residents have expressed their discontent at the lack of meaningful public participation in county approval processes for the so-called Chesterfield Energy Reliability Center. Now, the voices of Chesterfield residents could not be clearer: telling the Board to hold a vote on the matter of Site Suitability and Value and vote ‘No.’” 

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The Chesapeake Climate Action Network is the oldest and largest grassroots organization dedicated exclusively to raising awareness about the impacts and solutions associated with climate change in the Chesapeake Bay region. For more than 20 years, CCAN has been at the center of the fight for clean energy and wise climate policy in Maryland, Virginia, Washington, D.C. and beyond.