Opinion: What’s good for Tulsa isn’t good for New York. No to the Williams Pipeline, again
/By Tammy L. Lewis
The Oklahoma-based Williams Transco company is proposing a pipeline through lower Hudson Harbor again. New York first rejected this pipeline in 2020, and now we must do it again. What’s good for a Tulsa gas company is terrible for Queens’ health and our wallets.
The Williams Pipeline, also called the Northeast Supply Enhancement Project (NESE), would transport fracked gas from Pennsylvania to Rockaway, Queens. To be built, it needs both federal and state permits. Last time it was proposed, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYS DEC) denied its water quality permit because construction would disturb toxic seabed chemicals—arsenic, PCBs, dioxins—that would endanger marine life, human health, and coastal tourism.
Despite the denied permit, at the end of May 2025, the Oklahoma-based Williams Transco company, proposed the project again. Nothing about the project has changed. What has changed is federal policy, which has given fossil fuel projects new momentum. Williams has simply reapplied hoping for a different outcome.
NESE didn’t make sense in 2017 when it was originally proposed, and it doesn’t make sense today. The pipeline is bad for the environment and since 2017 we’ve gotten more details regarding how it is bad for New York’s economy.
As an environmental educator, I teach students to weigh policy choices against the “win-win” idea of sustainable development: the concept that environmental protection and economic development could go hand in hand. Even my most junior students could see that NESE is a lose-lose.
NYS DEC has already shown that digging a trench through a toxic seabed would unleash dangerous levels of copper and mercury. Copper kills aquatic life and blocks reproduction. Mercury accumulates in the food chain, ultimately poisoning seafood consumers who risk neurological damage, especially children. Williams’s own soil samples revealed unsafe levels of arsenic, lead, nickel, DDT, and PCBs in areas close to Staten Island and the Rockaways. Dislodging these contaminants would not only damage marine ecosystems but also devastate beach tourism and boat and recreational fishing—industries that generate $28 billion annually and support nearly half a million regional jobs.
A recent report by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) estimates that National Grid customers in New York City and Long Island would pay nearly $200 million annually for 15 years to build NESE. Yet New York doesn’t need more gas—demand is projected to decline as the state transitions to renewable energy. The profits wouldn’t even stay here; they’d flow to Oklahoma, while National Grid customers from New York foot the bill.
Williams argues that U.S. natural gas demand has risen 49% since 2013. But that national figure is irrelevant—downstate New York’s demand is shrinking. Williams also claims the project will create 2,000 jobs, but none of these are permanent jobs in New York.
We’ve already said no to this pipeline—for good reasons. Now we have even more reasons to reject it. NESE threatens our waters, our health, and our economy. What may benefit Tulsa doesn’t benefit Queens.
Governor Hochul has fast-tracked the permitting process and limited the public comment period to a short window in July. Write to her and ask her to slow this down, extend the comment period to 120 days, and hold public hearings. Urge Hochul to publicly reject the Williams Pipeline—once and for all.
Tammy L. Lewis, Ph.D. is a professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the CUNY Graduate Center, Director of the Urban Sustainability Program at Brooklyn College, and a Rockaway resident.
