No North Brooklyn Pipeline, by Gwen C

Last summer I attended a poetry reading at Brooklyn's annual LUNG Festival in one of their many beautiful gardens. After the poets read their poems, there was a lady there named JK who was talking about a fracked gas pipeline that was being built in only global majority communities (specifically Black and Latinx communities) in Brooklyn. Being of Asian descent it really hurt me hearing how racist it was that a company was building something so detrimental not only to the environment, but to the communities they are building it through. Then I heard that the company building it was National Grid, which hurt me even more since my mom works for them. There was definitely an internal battle in my mind whether I should join or not since my mom works for them, but JK said something that shut down that internal battle in my head which was, “We have to fight for mother nature because she can’t fight for herself” and that opened my eyes to what I truly care about which is mother Earth. I then told JK that I would love to join their protest group and help out as much as I could, so she invited me to their protest group chat on signal and that is how my protest journey began.

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National Grid’s seven mile high pressure fracked gas transmission pipeline is being built through predominantly Black and Latinx communities including Brownsville, Ocean Hill, Bushwick, and East Williamsburg. Not only is this pipeline racist, but it’s also extremely dangerous to the health of the people who live in these areas. The pipeline endangers the air, surface waters, health and safety of the people. National grid not only doesn’t care for the health and safety of these communities, but according to Amy Paul’s article New Discrimination Complaint Accuses National Grid of Bypassing Safety Laws for Brooklyn Pipeline they “didn’t follow the required procedures to meaningfully notify or educate the public about the pipeline or its risks or safety precautions, failed to perform required pressure tests and submit critical information about the pipeline route to state and federal regulators, never conducted an environmental analysis of the pipeline’s harms to the surrounding community, despite applying for discretionary permits to expand its LNG facility and to dump millions of gallons of wastewater into New York City’s Sewers, and did not seek or obtain the approval of the New York City Council for the pipeline route, as required by state law."​

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The first event I went to with the No NBK group was handing out flyers to people at the Atlantic Antic Street Fair. There were many people who were interested in striking and not paying the additional price National Grid is adding to their gas bill to create the pipeline. Also, many people that were living in the areas were unaware this was even happening! The second event I went to was a noise march where we were playing instruments around the neighborhood, chanting protest slogans, and holding up signs. We marched to one of National Grid’s pipeline locations and chanted outside. Being a part of this protest group has changed my life and environmental awareness. 
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