A proposed Eastern Kentucky gas pipeline to serve a power plant is stirring local opposition

“We were blindsided,” Kulovsek, originally from Chicago, said in a phone interview. “We were more and more upset about it because we moved to Kentucky for the environment, for the beauty.” 

Kulovsek is one of a number of people living near the planned 42-mile route of a natural gas pipeline extension through Rowan, Fleming and Mason counties who are organizing over strong concerns they have about their personal safety living close by to the pipeline, and the pipeline’s impacts on local wildlife. 

Canada-based TC Energy, which owns a controlling stake in Columbia Gulf Transmission that’s proposing the pipeline, has told the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission it plans to spend a little over $400 million to supply gas to electric utility East Kentucky Power Cooperative’s coal-fired Hugh L. Spurlock Generating Station along the Ohio River. EKPC has planned for years to convert the power plant’s generation units to burn up to 50% natural gas, a move that reflects a larger shift by Kentucky utilities investing more in natural gas-fired power. 

Nick Comer, an East Kentucky Power Cooperative spokesperson, in an emailed statement said the pipeline project would provide “greater flexibility to comply with environmental regulations and to manage costs.”

“This flexibility also contributes to EKPC’s fuel diversity, fuel security, fuel reliability and the ability to implement the least-cost fuel options,” Comer said. “Importantly, co-firing with natural gas will provide a tool for EKPC to manage carbon dioxide emissions and extend the life of Spurlock Station, which features a workforce of 250 full-time employees and hundreds of contractors.”

As reasoning for the project, Comer pointed to Biden administration-era rules that would have required coal-fired power plants to capture 90% of their climate-warming carbon dioxide emissions if those plants wanted to operate past 2032. The Trump administration moved last year to scrap those rules.

Comer also said TC Energy’s pipeline project is subject to “rigorous review” by federal regulators and that TC Energy operates tens of thousands of miles of pipelines across the continent.

TC Energy communications staff in an emailed statement said the company is seeing “strong community interest” and that the company has held open houses and has talked with landowners along the proposed route.

“We’ve received positive and productive feedback from landowners and have also had thoughtful conversations with community members and local businesses,” TC Energy communications staff said.

The pipeline also has strong backing from Republican state lawmakers, statewide constitutional officers and manufacturers, who say the project would strengthen the state’s energy grid amid uncertain future regulations on fossil fuel-fired power.  

But Kulovsek and others living along the route of the pipeline don’t believe enough is being done to address their safety concerns or the potential ecological impacts. Kulovsek said in her evaluation, the pipeline comes down to “greed.” 

“I am sure that they would like to have pipelines, you know, all over the state if they could. I know that it’s part of progress,” Kulovsek said. “To put our homes in danger and our property in danger because of a public pipeline doesn’t really make sense.”

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC, is considering public comments as it prepares an environmental assessment before making a final determination whether to approve the pipeline construction in November. 

FERC is a federal regulator that reviews and approves requests for interstate gas pipelines, including expansions of existing pipeline systems that cross state boundaries. The 42-mile pipeline would be an expansion, tying in Rowan County, onto an existing Columbia Gulf Transmission pipeline that runs across state lines. The Kentucky Public Service Commission, the state’s utility regulator, regulates pipeline safety laws and the rates and service of pipelines providing gas to Kentuckians. 

Divided local governments on a gas expansion

Democratic Rowan County Judge-Executive Harry Clark told the Lantern earlier this summer his county government’s opposition to the pipeline partly comes down to who benefits from it. 

East Kentucky Power Cooperative gets a supply of natural gas to its power plant. Clark said Rowan County gets “another pipeline across our properties.” He said he has concerns about the pipeline route running close to populated areas and affecting the environment. Along with the interstate gas line that Columbia Gulf Transmission operates, the Tennessee Gas Pipeline company also operates more than a dozen miles of lines in the county. 

“Progress is progress, and I’m sure they need this in Mason County,” Clark said. “It’s just not a big benefit to us.”

He also said he has another gas pipeline running across his property about a quarter-mile away from his home, and he doesn’t worry personally about it “blowing up.” But he believes such a pipeline could potentially lower property values. Fleming County’s government also passed a resolution last year stating it didn’t support the pipeline. A pipeline in the county owned by another Canadian company exploded six years ago because of welding defects. The explosion didn’t cause injuries but burned a few acres of land. 

Democratic Mason County Judge-Executive Owen McNeill and the mayor for Maysville, the Mason County seat, have also come out in support of the pipeline alongside other Republican elected officials in the state, arguing it creates local construction jobs as it’s being built. McNeill is also backing the construction of a hyperscale data center in his county by an undisclosed technology company. 

Republican Senate President Robert Stivers in a December 2025 letter wrote that strengthening the power grid would “drive positive regional economic impacts, including creating good-paying job opportunities for local working families and increasing state and local tax revenues.” 

“TC Energy has a strong record of developing infrastructure in Kentucky and has committed to prioritizing local resources for the construction of the Maysville Project,” Stivers wrote. “It’s incredibly important for Kentuckians to have access to reliable and cost-competitive electricity.” 

But those who live along the pipeline route don’t believe the risks of the pipeline is worth any broader benefits of it. 

Justin Kulvosek, Sharon’s son, who also owns property in Rowan County, has previously raised questions before FERC about whether the pipeline company has conducted a proper analysis of the impacts on endangered and threatened species in the area. 

The Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources in a January letter to FERC identified 15 species, ranging from mussels to bats to the Eastern Hellbender, as federally endangered, threatened or proposed to be and potentially impacted by the project. 

Sharon Kulvosek said her sister has built a tiny home on the property, and her daughter is building another one despite the proposed pipeline route. She hopes the potential pipeline can be, at minimum, rerouted to avoid disputing local residents’ property. 

“I don’t know if we would stay here if we had the pipeline running through our front yard,” Kulvosek said.