Dominion Energy SVP Speaks Out On Biggest Threat Facing Fracking Industry - Environmentalists

[hatrack]

Donald Raikes arrived at 2019’s DUG East conference, a major shale gas industry gathering in Pittsburgh, with a mixed set of messages for his fellow fossil energy officials.

“We are faced with a lot of challenges in this industry,” Raikes, senior vice president of gas infrastructure at Dominion Energy, said. “And this morning what I plan to do is use my time to carve out a call for action for all of us. We need to be very aware of the forces that are out there and how they are coming against us.” What sorts of forces? Raikes warned specifically about opposition from environmental groups.

But Raikes also warned that the oil and gas industry was doing itself no favors by denying that it affects the environment, and he even dipped his toes into the issue of climate science denial. “Regardless of how we feel about the term 'climate change,' the one thing I hope we all agree on is that each of us individually, as companies, impact the environment,” he said. “And it is our responsibility to do everything we can to make sure that we can be respectful in terms of that impact.”

EDIT

“Many in the environmental community have made us public enemy number one,” Raikes told the gathered shale industry representatives. “And the news about them is this: Number one, they're sophisticated. Number two, they're well-funded. Number three, they have very good messaging. Very good messaging. It's something that we need to be aware of.”

EDIT

Dominion has also funded the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a group frequently described as a “corporate bill mill,” and is represented on the board of the Marcellus Shale Coalition (whose president David Spigelmyer was paid $482,000 in 2017, according to the coalition’s most recent available tax filings). The company is a member of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which the Center for Media and Democracy’s OpenSecrets project lists as the single organization that spent the most on lobbying in 2018 — and in all years from 1998 to 2019, where it racked up over $1.5 billion in lobbying expenses. That's triple the spending of any other lobbying client.

EDIT

https://www.desmogblog.com/2019/07/16/dugeast-climate-deniers-dominion-raikes-natural-gas

[gtar100]

1. Yep, people who want safe drinking water are the real problem.

These oil industry frackers are the real enemy. They do the damage, they poison our water sources, they pollute our air and destroy the lands on which they work. They are fighting to exploit, we are fighting to survive their short-sighted stupidity.