The Battle of Mariner East 2 is not going away.
This week, proponents of the massive pipeline plan scored a huge victory in court.
Commonwealth Court tossed out a suit by several Middletown residents looking to halt construction of Mariner East 2, which is cutting across western Delaware County and the heart of Chester County, in order to ferry hundreds of thousands of barrels of volatile gases such as ethane, butane and propane from the state's Marcellus Shale regions to Marcus Hook.
The residents don't believe this is such a great idea, especially the notion of routing this project through densely populated neighborhoods, including right next to schools and senior centers.
They wanted to use Middletown zoning laws to halt the project.
And that is there problem.
The courts have been pretty clear that is not going to work. All of this stems from a ruling early in this battle by the state Public Utility Commission that granted Sunoco Pipeline LP, the spinoff from Texas-based Energy Transfer Partners that is building the pipeline, public utility status. The state agency concurred with Sunoco's contention that the pipeline would result in "public benefit."
The bottom lines is that ruling is going to make it very difficult for opponents to challenge the pipeline in court.
That does not mean the fight is over.
Not by a long shot.
You can read our editorial here.
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