Thomas E Adams, III, PhD
TerraPredictions LLC
March 7, 2019

Full report available here.

Overview

This report presents results from technical analyses of 2018 rainfall in Southwestern Virginia in the vicinity of the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) pipeline path. With the exception of a single rainfall event occurring in September 2018 in Franklin County, VA, analyses show that no other exceptional periods of rainfall occurred in the region. is is true in spite of the occurrence of record annual precipitation for some areas in the region over the course of the year. ere were several periods of persistent rainfall that occurred in the region – that, in sum, lead to record annual precipitation accumulations in some areas in 2018 – but only minor flooding resulted and precipitation analyses reflect only slightly higher than normal monthly rainfall totals in most areas. Consequently, the conclusion is that the observed and documented failures of MVP’s erosion and sedimentation control measures were dominantly the result of poor design, construction, and maintenance, not record rainfall.

Well before the start of construction, reports and other submissions by technical experts and informed citizens warned the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), and MVP that proposed soil erosion and sedimentation controls were grossly inadequate for the prevention of violations of Clean Water Act Section 401 Water Quality standards in Southwest Virginia (and West Virginia) due to the combination of steep mountainous terrain and climate, where excessive rainfalls compared to many regions in the U.S. are not uncommon.