ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times

DATE: Thursday, February 6, 1997             TAG: 9702060069
SECTION: VIRGINIA                 PAGE: C-3  EDITION: METRO 
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: Associated Press

JUDGES HEAR PIPELINE APPEAL VERDICT COULD TAKE UP TO 6 MONTHS

A panel of federal judges accused lawyers who are trying to block the Lake Gaston water pipeline to Virginia Beach of defying logic in some of the arguments against the project.

But a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals, after a 90-minute hearing Tuesday, adjourned without a ruling. A decision could take up to six months.

Work on the $150 million project is about 80 percent complete.

North Carolina Special Deputy Attorney General Alan Hirsch said it was impossible to guess a verdict from questions asked by the court.

``You're reading tea leaves,'' he said. ``You get a sense of what the judges think, but not what they're going to decide. ... Experience has told us it's impossible to know, but we've got a lot of confidence in our case.''

Sen. Charles Robb, D-Va., attended the hearing and said afterward he was confident that Virginia Beach, which has been seeking the pipeline for more than a decade, would prevail.

``I thought that all three of the judges seemed to understand what the issue was, so I expect that this will be another legal victory for the pipeline,'' Robb said.

Since the early 1980s, Virginia Beach has won a series of regulatory and court battles to build the pipeline as a water supply. North Carolina says the proposed withdrawal of up to 60 million gallons of water a day would cause environmental and economic damage to areas downstream.

The lake, part of the Roanoke River basin, is primarily in North Carolina, although the 76-mile pipeline would be built entirely in Virginia.

The issue before the appeals court is whether the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission permit for the project is valid. North Carolina challenged the permit, which was required because Lake Gaston is used to produce electricity.

North Carolina contends that its approval should be required for the pipeline under the federal Clean Water Act.

Both sides have said they plan to take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court if they lose at the appeals court.

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