[abb]

I think the logic noted in post 39 explains a lot.

[Carry_Okie]

Yep, and one can almost always find such interests at stake. Tracking the donors to the "green group" back to said interests can be tricky when there are usually two to three levels of money laundering involved: Buffet to Buffet's foundation, Buffet's foundation to Tides Foundation, Tides Foundation to Sand Hill preservation group, etc. I'm not saying that's who is involved, but that is why these "tax-exempt nonprofit charities" exist.

I understand the pressures involved. The last project I did had an opportunity cost of $30,000 per day of pure profit per line, with 12 lines available. It was a company with only $100 million in gross sales, so you can only imagine what that kind of profit might have meant to them.

I was the only engineer on the job with but one draftsman.

The lack of a free market in managing externalities means that the market for options in pipeline rights of way with the owners touting their respective environmental advantages does not exist. Socialism has wrecked such markets in land use planning because the government "owns" the assets at risk by dint of its regulatory powers.