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Gold/Mining/Energy : LNG -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dennis Roth who wrote (476)	5/19/2005 8:48:24 AM
From: Dennis Roth	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 919

Blanco wants LNG terminals frozen Safeguards needed for fish, she says Thursday, May 19, 2005 By Mark Schleifstein Staff writer nola.com Gov. Kathleen Blanco sent a warning shot across the bow of the powerful oil and gas industry this week, saying she will oppose the development of new offshore liquefied natural gas terminals that might harm the state's fishing economy. Blanco notified the federal Maritime Administration on Tuesday that, because of threats to commercial fishing, she opposes the licensing of any more liquefied natural gas terminals off Louisiana's coast that use millions of gallons of water from the Gulf of Mexico. Such "open-loop" warming systems already have been approved for use by two terminals off Louisiana's coast, one of which received its first shipment of liquefied gas in March. Eight others are either in the licensing process or have been proposed. "Until studies demonstrate that the operation of the (open-loop system) will not have an unacceptable impact on the surrounding ecosystem, I will only support offshore LNG terminals using a closed-loop system having negligible impacts to marine life," Blanco said in a Tuesday letter to acting Maritime Administrator John Jamian. The letter comes as Louisiana's congressional delegation is trying to latch onto millions of dollars in recurring federal offshore oil revenue to underwrite the federal-state coastal restoration effort. That restoration effort has been assisted by key players in the liquefied natural gas business, including Shell Oil. While approval of the governor of a state adjacent to the offshore terminal is listed as one step the maritime administrator must consider in granting a license, a spokesman for Jamian said he had not received the letter and could not comment on whether Blanco's objection could block a license. Fearing for Gulf fish Scientists from NOAA-Fisheries have warned that open-loop systems could kill millions of fish eggs and other organisms in the seawater that is pumped through the radiatorlike equipment, which is used to heat the minus-260 degree liquefied gas. More fish are killed when the chilled water and anti-fouling chemicals that are added to it are returned to the Gulf. The federal fisheries agency said approving several of the open-loop facilities would make it more difficult to ensure the recovery of overfished species such as redfish in the Gulf of Mexico. The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration scientists' concerns were overruled by the Transportation Department, which is the parent agency of the Maritime Administration, and the White House Council for Environmental Quality. Those agencies weighed in during the February decision to issue the most recent license to Shell U.S. Gas & Oil's Gulf Landing terminal, to be built 38 miles south of Cameron Parish. Maritime and Shell officials contend the loss of fish will be minimal and is outweighed by the additional cost of using a "closed-loop" heating system, which could require burning as much as 2 percent of the imported natural gas. However, last week, the Coast Guard announced it has suspended the licensing process for ConocoPhillips' proposed Compass Port terminal, off the coast of Alabama and Mississippi, in part because of similar objections raised by the federal Environmental Protection Agency. The Coast Guard conducts the licensing process and writes environmental impact statements on the proposed terminals for the Maritime Administration. Monitoring criticized In her letter, Blanco was critical of the speed in which the licensing process was occurring, which she said hasn't provided enough time to study the effects of the terminals. In 2002, Congress mandated that licenses for the terminals had to be issued within 256 days of the start of the licensing process, citing the need for more imports to reduce natural gas prices. Blanco also sent Jamian a letter from Louisiana Wildlife & Fisheries Secretary Dwight Landreneau that raised concerns about the failure of federal officials to include the state in planning of a system of monitoring marine life around the licensed terminals both before and after they are opened. In his letter, Landreneau said the decision to allow the first shipment of liquefied gas to be unloaded in March at Excelerate Energy's Gulf Gateway Energy Bridge, 116 miles south of Cameron Parish, without a monitoring plan approved by NOAA-Fisheries was "unacceptable." "To allow these types of projects to proceed without baseline monitoring and without the monitoring and adaptive management plan being approved by any fishery management agency is to ignore the potential impacts that such industrial facilities may have," Landreneau wrote. "I share Secretary Landreneau's concerns and hope that your agency will move quickly to develop monitoring and adaptive management plans for all licensed LNG terminals in the Gulf," Blanco said. More projects planned In March, Maritime Administration officials said they agreed to an "interim approval" for a monitoring plan for the Excelerate facility that NOAA-Fisheries has rejected, and it said the company was working with NOAA-Fisheries scientists on a permanent plan. An Excelerate spokesman was unavailable for comment Wednesday. In addition to the Excelerate facility, the Maritime Administration already has issued a license to ChevronTexaco's Port Pelican, which would be built 36 miles south of the state's central coast. However, ChevronTexaco has put that project on hold in anticipation of building a terminal off Alabama and Mississippi. Awaiting licensing off Louisiana's coast are Freeport-McMoran's proposed Main Pass Energy Hub, to be located to the east of the mouth of the Mississippi River; ExxonMobil's Pearl Crossing, proposed for a location 41 miles south of Cameron Parish; and ConocoPhillips' Beacon Port, also proposed for south of Cameron Parish. All have said they plan on using open-loop systems. . . . . . . . Mark Schleifstein can be reached at mschleifstein@timespicayune.com or (504) 826-3327.