Panel to take closely watched vote on pipeline station

A normally low profile citizen panel that votes on air pollution permits is set to take a closely watched vote Monday on whether Virginia’s most powerful corporation can build a natural gas compressor station in a historical African-American community.

Dominion Energy needs the State Air Pollution Control Board to sign off on a permit to build a station in Buckingham County to pump gas through the planned Atlantic Coast Pipeline.

The board’s vote has become a flashpoint in the yearslong fight over the pipeline and a political imbroglio for Gov. Ralph Northam, who has come under intense criticism for his recent removal of two board members ahead of the vote.

The proposed site is about an hour west of Richmond in Union Hill, a community founded by freed slaves.

Dominion, the lead developer of the pipeline and dominant force in Virginia politics, said it chose the location because it had sufficient acreage for sale and intersects with an existing pipeline.

The proposed 600-mile (966-kilometre) Atlantic Coast Pipeline would carry fracked natural gas from West Virginia into Virginia and North Carolina.

Both Dominion and the Northam administration have said they’ve worked carefully to ensure the station will be as environmentally friendly as possible and won’t harm nearby residents.