DEP Will Hold Compressor Meetings Next Week

Scott Detrow

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Scott Detrow is a congressional correspondent for NPR. He also co-hosts the NPR Politics Podcast.

Detrow joined NPR in 2015 to cover the presidential election. He focused on the Republican side of the 2016 race, spending time on the campaign trail with Donald Trump, and also reported on the election's technology and data angles.

Detrow worked as a statehouse reporter for member stations WITF in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and KQED in San Francisco, California. He has also covered energy policy for NPR's StateImpact project, where his reports on Pennsylvania's hydraulic fracturing boom won a DuPont-Columbia and national Edward R. Murrow Award in 2013.

April 10, 2012 | 10:03 AM

Concerned about compressor stations, after this month’s explosion at a Susquehanna County facility? The Department of Environmental Protection is holding two public hearings on the issue next week: one in Wyoming County, the other in Susquehanna.
The accident at the Springville Township station has shed light on Pennsylvania’s regulatory mishmash. The facility resumed operations without approval from DEP, and as the Inquirer has reported, didn’t really fall under the Public Utility Commission’s jurisdiction.
More on the upcoming compressor meetings, from the Times-Tribune:

Department of Environmental Protection officials who will be hosting the events said they have not seen an uptick in interest in the public hearings since the explosion at Williams Partners’ Lathrop station in Springville Twp. DEP published a news release for the second hearing on Monday and spokeswoman Colleen Connolly expected to see more response after that.
But an organizer of a recent Wyoming County informational event about one proposed station and an environmental group urging stricter air pollution controls at all of the stations said public interest in the facilities is growing.
“In the wake of this explosion, especially, I think a lot more people will be coming out to the hearings than before,” Matt Walker, a community outreach coordinator with the Clean Air Council, said.
Each event will combine a public meeting with an official public hearing during which comments on the proposed air quality permits will be recorded.