Fracking pipeline threatens Massachusetts apple orchard

Clarkdale Farm is in the pipeline's path.

A proposed pipeline to bring natural gas from Pennsylvania to eastern Massachusetts would cut through a 100-year-old orchard in Deerfield, Massachusetts.

The controversial plan would bring gas extracted by hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, from Pennsylvania and possibly New York, to feed the region's growing appetite for natural gas.

Critics say the multi-billion-dollar pipeline project, to be paid for by electric rates, is much bigger than needed.

Tom Clark, the owner of the Clarkdale Fruit Farms, is resisting attempts by the pipeline company to survey his property, according to a story in the Greenfield Recorder.

However, a recent New York Times report notes that the company will be able to survey and take land without permission of property owners if the project wins approval from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

Clarkdale is well known in the Pioneer Valley. I visited in 2012.

Once again, farms stand in the front lines of energy development.

Opposition to the pipeline is being coordinated by the Massachusetts Pipeline Awareness Network.