Landowners across Pennsylvania are holding up critical clean energy projects — and tremendous potential economic development — and Marcus Hook is caught in the middle of it all.

Delaware County’s natural-gas processing and shipping facilities are the primary destination for several proposed pipeline projects, including the well-known Mariner East 2 buildout of pipeline from Ohio and southwestern Pennsylvania to Marcus Hook.

“Twenty-five to 30 percent of natural gas wells drilled to date do not have access to pipelines that could carry the product to markets,” a Washington (Pa.) Observer-Reporter article by Michael Bradwell stated. “In 2010, the state was producing about one billion cubic feet of natural gas per day. The rate is now about 13 bcf.”

Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Transportation says pipelines are the safest method of moving oil and gas, and the proposed pipelines will “help the state achieve its goals of reaching the benchmarks of President Obama’s Clean Energy Plan.”

Extending more pipelines to Marcus Hook would also bolster economic development.

“For some manufacturers, energy is the largest cost input in their product,” said David Taylor, President of the Pennsylvania Manufacturers Association. “Pennsylvania will help make the United States an energy superpower, but all of this depends on increasing the energy infrastructure.”

Read more about the pipeline bottleneck in the Washington (Pa.) Observer-Reporter here.