"My farm is not that big," 54 acres, "and we intend on farming it for a long time," he said. "It did not make for a good day."
Miller, 55, is one of hundreds in Chester County confronting requests from companies for larger rights-of-way to expand existing pipelines or for new rights-of-way to add lines.
And under federal law, the landowners might not have much choice.
What Dominion Keystone would pay is not known because it hasn't decided whose land it wants. The price depends partly on the land's appraised value; farmers also would be compensated because land dug up for a pipeline takes about five years to return to productivity.
More than 700 miles of natural-gas pipelines crisscross Chester County, and because natural gas is a clean-burning fuel, demand is growing. Last month, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved a controversial expansion of a Williams-Transcontinental pipeline near Downingtown and Exton.
For natural-gas suppliers looking to build pipelines, Chester County has an advantage that few other places can match, Dominion Keystone spokesman Dan Donovan said.
"There is a nexus of three federal pipelines there" - Texas Eastern, Columbia and Williams-Transcontinental - "and from there gas can go anywhere on the East Coast," he said.
There is also plenty of farmland and open space, catnip for pipeline companies.
Now Miller and other landowners who thought conservation easements guarded against development are shocked to find out that when pipelines enter the picture, that protection doesn't mean much.
The 1938 Natural Gas Act gave what is now the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission full authority over interstate natural-gas pipelines, overriding state or local restrictions such as easements, FERC spokeswoman Tamara Young-Allen said. But there is a caveat.
