To the leadership of NextEra Energy,
On your website you claim to be an “Ethical Company.” You state that, "At NextEra Energy, being a sustainable company means respecting our environment, delivering outstanding customer value, supporting our communities, empowering our team and growing shareholder value.” You additionally claim “We're leading the industry in clean energy generation, and we're committed to environmental protection and stewardship." In a February 23, 2021 Facebook post you posted: “NextEra Energy is once again recognized as one of the World’s Most Ethical Companies by Ethisphere for the 14th time. We are extremely thankful to our employees and their commitment to doing the right thing every day.” #WorldsMostEthicalCompanies
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Despite these altruistic-sounding claims, NextEra Energy is a major investor in the polluting, climate-changing fracked-gas Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP). MVP, a 42 inch-diameter pipeline, stretching over 300 miles of route, has destroyed farms, streams, old growth trees, endangered species habitat and the lives of many people in West Virginia and Southwestern Virginia. It also threatens humans and habitats in North Carolina with its proposed Southgate extension. The MVP is anything but environmentally friendly or ethical. It additionally compromises major views from the Appalachian Trail, including the Trail itself in Southern WV and southwestern VA. The MVP is facing multiple lawsuits, vacated permit authorizations and is currently under federal investigation. The MVP now $2.5 billion over budget.
You create confusion for your shareholders when claiming to be clean energy leaders, and potentially negatively impact your own investments by continuing to participate in this floundering venture. According to a January 26, 2021 Reuters article “….an impairment charge of $1.2 billion on its investments in the Mountain Valley natural gas pipeline forced the company to report its first net loss since at least 2010.” The same day the Pittsburgh Business Journal reported that “NextEra Energy, an energy company that is a partner in the Mountain Valley Pipeline venture, wrote off $1.2 billion of the value of its investment in the delayed natural gas pipeline.” The MVP project is environmentally harmful and financially disastrous - and NextEra Energy owns 38% of it.
At a time when it is crucial for global temperatures to be kept below 1.5C, your percentage ownership constitutes the shameful support of a project that if ever completed and put into service, would contribute 1% of the total yearly US greenhouse gas emissions. This means an estimated full life-cycle of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (excluding construction emissions) of almost 90 million metric tons per year into our atmosphere—equivalent to the emissions from 23 average U.S. coal plants or over 19 million passenger vehicles driven every year.
As NextEra Energy knows, any previously claimed rationales for the necessity of MVP have evaporated as the US and other countries are rapidly converting their energy systems to renewable resources. It is therefore imperative that NextEra Energy makes the ethical and environmentally sound business decision to withdraw from the unviable Mountain Valley Pipeline project without delay.
We, the undersigned, therefore ask NextEra to lead by the power of your example and live up to the definition of your company - a sustainable, environmentally conscious and ethical company - by exiting the Mountain Valley Pipeline project.
Sincerely,
