More Evidence That We Shouldn't Believe Anything Broadwater Says

Back in late summer, Tom Baptist, who is the executive director of Audubon Connecticut, sent me a copy of a letter he had gotten from Broadwater, the people who want to put a huge LNG facility in the middle of Long Island Sound. The letter was addressed to small business owners, as I remember, and asked them to support Broadwater (Tom Baptist, as the head of an organization on record as opposing the LNG terminal, obviously received it by mistake).

Tom was concerned that Broadwater was going to use it as propaganda in its public relations war, and he was right, to some extent. Broadwater tricked the Stamford Advocate into thinking that its self-serving and self-selected survey was somehow newsworthy.

That’s an embarrassment for the Advocate, particularly because of the story’s headline, which says: “Gas Terminal Gains Support.”

But they saved themselves from completely going into the tank for Broadwater by calling around and finding a number of business owners whom Broadwater claimed support the LNG proposal but who say not only that they don’t support it but that they have no recollection of ever seeing Broadwater’s letter.

So once again it leads me to question why anyone would believe anything Broadwater says. Here are some excerpts from the Advocate:

Fifty-seven of the businesses are in lower Fairfield County. Among the several business owners reached by The Advocate, some maintained their support, others are having a change of heart and still others did not recall receiving Broadwater's letters.

"I never signed a petition for anything," said Sharon Goldstein, owner of Depot Liquors in Westport. "I don't even know what's going on" with the gas platform project….

John Barricelli, owner of SoNo Baking Company in South Norwalk, said he favors low energy costs but did not recall signing a petition supporting Broadwater's proposal.

"If anybody asked me directly, 'Are you in favor of an offshore natural gas platform in Long Island Sound?' I'd say no," Barricelli said….

Olga Ziapoutzis, who owns the Post Road Diner in Norwalk, said it is possible a former business partner signed the petition. The diner is now owned solely by Ziapoutzis and her husband.

"I don't think it's a very good idea," Ziapoutzis said of the floating natural gas terminal.

Martin Mezza, who operates the UPS Store on Westport Avenue in Norwalk, said he might have signed Broadwater's letter out of frustration with his current gas and electric suppliers.

"Sometimes . . . you sign things and maybe don't read them carefully," Mezza said. "If it's going to hurt the environment, I don't want any part of it. But I want other suppliers in this area."

J.C. Woodward, co-owner of The Clockery, a clock shop in Norwalk, said he has misgivings about signing a letter supporting Broadwater.

"I've since received mailings from the other side and they're just as convincing," Woodward said.

Woodward said Broadwater in its letter never mentioned the possibility the security zone surrounding the floating platform could extend more than a mile in either direction, taking away recreational and commercial boating space.

Broadwater's letter stated: "The Sound is an important body of water, however we must remember it is a mixed-use body of water important to local and international commerce and trade."

Woodward likened it to taking parts of Long Island Sound through eminent domain.

"The idea of allocating public resources for private interests . . . rubs me the wrong way," he said.

In a separate story, Soundkeeper, Terry Backer talks about why he opposes Broadwater but also why it’s but such a tough stance for him to take, here.

1:10 p.m. update -- Perhaps sensing that Broadwater might have gotten some public relations advantage from its approach to small-business owners, Citizens Campaign for the Environment sent out the following about 20 minutes ago:

Another 20,000 Signatures Sent to FERC in Opposition to Broadwater The Total: 80,000 Signatures in Opposition, Sets National Record

Farmingdale, New York - Citizens Campaign for the Environment has mailed FERC the latest round of petition signatures in opposition to Broadwater.
To date, a grand total of 80,000 signatures opposing the ill-fated project have been mailed to FERC.

"The signatures of opposition are from all parts of Connecticut, Westchester County and Long Island. The public opposition is widespread, strong and it's not going away," said Adrienne Esposito, Executive Director of Citizens Campaign for the Environment.
"We are hopeful that Governor Spitzer will hear the unified call of the people to protect Long Island Sound."

The Anti-Broadwater Campaign is awaiting Governor Spitzer and New York State Department of State's ruling on weather or not Broadwater will be approved under the Coastal Zone Management Act (CZMA). This federal law was designed to protect waterways from over-intensified uses. "If New York State wrongly decides that Broadwater is in compliance with the CZMA, then New York will have greatly weakened the value of this essential law. A ruling against Broadwater will be a ruling for the protection of all water bodies. This state decision will make history, not only for New York but for the rest of our nation," Esposito concluded.

New York State currently has a deadline of releasing their decision by February 12, 2008, pending the release of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's Final Environmental Impact Statement. This report is currently scheduled to be released at the end of December/ beginning of January.

What's Next for Broadwater? Nothing. It's Dead, Even If Broadwater Wins An Appeal

There was a lot of talk from Broadwater's people yesterday about how New York's rejection of the proposal for a floating LNG terminal in Long Island Sound is just one step in the approval process and that there are avenues of appeal open that could still lead to approval.

Here's what I think is the truth: Broadwater is dead.

Why? Because even if the Broadwater people appeal to the federal government and win, they still need New York State's permission to use the waters of Long Island Sound and the land under the Sound.

We the people of New York State own the land and water on which Shell and TransCanada want to build the Broadwater LNG terminal. New York State, acting on our behalf, has total control over whether it wants to let Broadwater use that water and land.

If Governor David Paterson and the Secretary of State and the staff at the Department of State have determined that Broadwater is not in the best interest of New York, why would they let Broadwater use the Sound and its underwater land, even if the state's decision is reversed on appeal?

New York State's decision, announced yesterday, was based on its authority to oversee activities in the state's coastal zone. The state has that authority because the federal government gave it to the state, through the Coastal Zone Management Act, which is administered by the U.S. Department of Commerce. So if Broadwater wants to overturn New York's decision, the Department of Commerce is the place to go.

Here's how the New York State Department of State describes it:

Unless the U.S. Secretary of Commerce overrides the Department of State (DOS) decision on appeal, pursuant to the CZMA, the decision means that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers cannot approve construction of the project in LIS.

The Hartford Courant quoted Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal:

"They have a right to go to the secretary … and say that national energy priorities should override the coastal zone management determination made here by the governor," Blumenthal said.

Let's take the most cynical point of view. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission of course has already approved Broadwater's proposal, saying it can go forward if it meets 80 conditions meant to guarantee safety and environmental protection. So let's say the Secretary of Commerce gets Broadwater's appeal and says, essentially, "The people at FERC think this is a worthwhile project and their opinion is good enough for me, so I'm overturning New York State's decision." I don't think that's out of the question at all. (This paragraph is corrected from an earlier version in which I mistakenly asserted that the Secretary of Commerce oversees FERC.)

Broadwater then has to come back to New York and ask for the right to use our land and water (Broadwater also needs permits from the state Department of Environmental Conservation).

Yesterday New York State laid out an articulate and compelling rationale for rejecting Broadwater, based on the following:

1. The Sound is not an industrial park.

2. Broadwater would set a precedent and lead to an unacceptable change in the Sound.

3. Broadwater would occupy public land and water for a private undustrial use.

4. Broadwater would damage the Sound ecologically.

Broadwater can appeal New York State's coastal zone determination, and it can win on appeal. All that would mean is that New York State would have to formally issue a permit for use of the coastal zone. It would not force the state to give away our water and our land for a project that the state thinks is bad for New York.

Broadwater Says It Has Set Up a Fishermen's Committee to Help Fishermen, But the Fishermen Say they've Never Heard of Such a Thing

Here’s a great find by a reporter for a weekly on Long Island: A couple of weeks ago, FERC asked Broadwater to provide more information about how its LNG terminal would affect commercial fishing in Long Island Sound. No problem, Broadwater said – we’ve already set up a committee with commercial fishermen to study exactly that! And that’s not all. Broadwater said the committee…

is currently negotiating a compensation package for the fishermen, who will lose access to fishing grounds and equipment as a result of the Broadwater facility, if approved.

The problem is, Broadwater said it but it appears not to be true. Here’s more, from reporter Denise Civiletti (who now has gotten good Broadwater scoops twice lately):

That assertion took local lobstermen and fishermen by surprise — and has them wondering who's on such a committee, if it exists.

"I don't know the first thing about it," said Jimmy King, a lobsterman who works off the Mattituck dock.

"Nobody out here has heard anything about this committee," said Mary Bess Phillips, Mark's wife and partner in Alice's Fish Market in Greenport. She said she and her husband first heard about the advisory committee when they read about it in last week's Suffolk Times. Chris Smith, Cooperative Extension marine program director, also said he is unaware of such a committee.

On June 20, FERC asked Broadwater to specify the types and geographic extent of "demonstrable loss" by local commercial fishermen as a result of the siting of its proposed 1,200-foot-long LNG plant nine miles north of Wading River.

Broadwater responded that it "has established a Fisheries Advisory Committee open to individuals involved in local commercial fishing activities" and that it is "coordinating closely with local fishery organizations" to ensure that fishermen impacted by the Broadwater plan participate in the committee.

"As the discussions between Broadwater and the commercial fishing interests in the Project Area are currently ongoing, the exact specifics of the process and compensation package are being negotiated," Broadwater's response to FERC stated.

But Broadwater isn't able to provide specifics on the people it says it's engaged in ongoing discussions and negotiations. In reply to an e-mail requesting the names and contact information of members of the fisheries advisory committee, Broadwater's Amy Kelley wrote:

"The fisheries advisory committee is a joint committee between Broadwater and commercial fishermen. The initial meeting was to agree on the formation of a committee. We are now in the process of developing the infrastructure and governance rules. Until the committee is formalized and members are finalized, Broadwater is the contact for this committee."

That has local fishermen shaking their heads this week.

If such a committee exists, Mr. King said, he would surely know about it. The commercial fishermen on the North Fork are a small, tight-knit group, noted Mr. King, who serves as president of the Southold Town Trustees when he's not hauling his catch from several hundred lobster traps on the Sound bottom, from Herod's Point, due south of the proposed Broadwater site, east to Roanoke.

There’s more. Read the whole thing here.

And Denise Civiletti, it turns out, is the co-publisher and executive editor of the Suffolk Times, and co-publisher of a handful of other weeklies on the east end. Here's her blog.

Did Broadwater Answer All the Questions New York Asked 21 Days Ago?

On the day after the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission released the Broadwater final environmental impact statement with the conclusion that the LNG proposal is genrally a sound and safe one, it's worth reiterating that Broadwater not only needs approval from FERC, it needs approval from New York State, including several permits from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

It was just three weeks ago, on December 21, that the DEC sent this letter to Broadwater and its attorneys, with copies to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, detailing why Broadwater's permit applications were incomplete and inadequate and why, the DEC believed, the environmental impact statement should be changed to address the incompletions and inadequacies.

A lot of them critiques are technical and hard for me to understand. But they raise an interesting point as to timing. Here's one example, regarding air quality and tiny particles of pollution that Broadwater's Long Island Sound terminal would spew into the air. It's tough reading but slog through it and then I have a question and a larger point:

The application discusses the impacts of the project on PM2.5 levels in the context of Commissioner's Policy 33 (CP-33. Assessing and Mitigating Impacts of Fine Particulate Matter Emissions. 12/29/2003) on pages 4 8 to 4 10. It concludes that even though these impacts are above the thresholds in CP 33 that would require an environmental impact statement, such a Draft EIS has been submitted to FERC. We previously commented on this analysis and do not know yet FERC's conclusions in the Final EIS.

However, it is seen from Tables 11 to 13 that the impacts from AERMOD predictions are above the 24 hour PM2.5 standard of 35 ug/m3 with and without the carriers next to the FSRU, when the maximum regional background level from the protocol is added to the project impacts. If this background level is used for the OCD model results in Tables 8 to 10, the same standards violations would result. As noted previously, these results do not account for comments 1 and 2 above which could increase the level of impacts.

These projected violations are unacceptable for inclusion in the FERC EIS, and for DEC permitting purposes. Broadwater can revisit the background levels, which they note to be conservative, using procedures allowed in EPA's Modeling Guidelines. In addition, the application (and FEIS) should discuss all measures which Broadwater can take to minimize the impacts of PM2.5 not only to meet CP 33 requirements, but also because the location of the project can be deemed to be in the PM2.5 nonattainment area. [emphasis added]

Now, I haven't read the 2,000-plus-page environmental impact statement, but is it possible that in the 21 days between the DEC's letter and the release of the EIS, Broadwater has answered the state's question and modified the EIS? The state's letter is long and is filled with similar critiques and requests for further information and analysis. In 21 days, could Broadwater have satisfactorily addressed all of them?

The state's decision will be based on the application and the supporting information in the EIS. If Broadwater hasn't responded adequately, is there any way the state can approve a permit? If the EIS was not modified in the 21 days since the DEC sent its letter, presumably Broadwater would still have time to change its application to the state. But if Broadwater modifies its application to the state, doesn't the information and analysis in the application have to correspond to the information and analysis in the EIS?

The answer might be simple: Broadwater answered all the state's concerns and the environmental impact statement was modified over the last three weeks to reflect that. Or Broadwater didn't answer the questions.

There's another possibility: the state's letter was a formality, sent to create a record of the state's concerns, and that in reality the state officials and Broadwater had been working together all along to solve the state's issues. In other words, the letter was the conclusion of a collaborative process and Broadwater had plenty of time to change the EIS.

I have no idea which scenario is the right one. At some point perhaps I'll wade into the EIS and try to figure it out. But for now, it will be fascinating to watch how New York State responds.

Here's Why New York Said No to Broadwater

There were four reasons for New York State's decision to reject Broadwater's proposal for Long Island Sound.

1. The Sound is not an industrial park.

2. Broadwater would set a precedent and lead to an unacceptable change in the Sound.

3. Broadwater would occupy public land and water for a private undustrial use.

4. Broadwater would damage the Sound ecologically.

I was going to summarize them, but even though they're long, they're so compelling and well-reasoned and well-expressed that I'm just going to quote at length (the whole thing is here). (And allow me one more thought: everyone refers to this as Governor David Paterson's decision, and no doubt he had to to say yes to it. But when you read what follows, it's obvious that the decision was the result of a lot of hard work on the part of the staff of the Department of State. Paterson's wisdom was in realizing they were right.)

1. Long Island Sound is not an industrial park. It is an Estuary of National Significance designated by Congress 20 years ago.

• The NYS Long Island Sound Coastal Management Program (LISCMP), the document which contains the standards used in this decision, presents a compelling vision for the future of the Sound – a Long Island Sound coastal area enriched by enhancing community character, reclaiming the quality of natural resources, reinvigorating the working waterfront, and connecting people to the Sound.

• This vision and the details of the program behind the vision, is a consensus of citizens, local governments, business interests, civic and environmental groups, and New York State agencies.

• Over the past 20 years, over $7.2 billion has been invested by governments to protect and improve the Sound’s ecosystem. (New York State Revolving Loan Fund, NYS Clean Water/Clean Air Bond Act, and the NYS Environmental Protection Fund).

• New York has given additional recognition to the Sound by creating the Long Island North Shore Heritage Area and the North Fork Trail Scenic Byway.

• The State isn’t alone in valuing the Sound. Local government plans and programs, including Local Waterfront Revitalization Programs and local comprehensive plans have been prepared and are being implemented to protect and restore the Sound. Federal, State and local governments are aligned in their desire to protect the Sound’s ecosystem, open waters, and traditional maritime uses (fishing, recreation and maritime navigation).

• Broadwater would be a new large, permanent, continuously operating industrial complex on public space – the open waters of Long Island Sound, a public resource valued by New Yorkers.

• Broadwater would be visible 80% of the time along 44 miles of Long Island shoreline.

• A 2007 survey showed that 79% of visitors to the North Shore of Long Island came at least once per year to enjoy the view. Over 2.7 million people visit north shore parks each year.

• On shore Long Island, industrial uses are being removed from the waterfront and a tourism based economy is growing that builds on the Sound’s visual quality, natural resources, and community character. The tourism economy is $7 billion (current estimate) and employs 122,000 people (2001 data).

2. Broadwater would be precedent-setting and would permanently change Long Island Sound from a place used for recreation, tourism, and traditional maritime activities to a place where more on-water industrial development could happen.

• Broadwater is a new industrial concept that has not been tried elsewhere in the world.

• Siting Broadwater in the Sound would introduce a large permanent industrial complex in an open water estuary of national significance where no such industrial complexes exist.

• Public plans and programs for the publicly owned Sound are aimed at protecting its ecosystem and the people that rely on it. These public plans and programs do not call for permanent floating industrial complexes. Over $7.2 billion in public investments have been made over the past 20 years to improve the Sound’s ecosystem.

• Broadwater’s 1,100 foot long LNG carriers (longer than 99% of vessels now on the Sound) would be on the Sound at least 208 days each year, interfering with traditional users and their ability to work or recreate on the Sound.

• Shell and Transcanada, Broadwater’s parent companies, will not guarantee entering into new partnerships to expand industrial activities on the Sound.

• The immense Broadwater floating industrial facility would be precedent setting if approved for LIS. If it was approved, one result might be more floating industrial facilities proposed for the Sound.

3. Broadwater would occupy public land and water for a private industrial facility.

• The land and waters of New York’s portion of Long Island Sound are held in trust for the people of New York State. Right now, the public has full access to those portions of the Sound where Broadwater would be located and where the LNG carriers would transit.

• With the FSRU and its required safety and security exclusion zones, Broadwater would take 950 acres of public waters away from the people who can use it now and replace it with an exclusive private use industrial facility for at least 30 years. This is an area bigger than Central Park.

• In addition, each LNG carrier that comes into the Sound would have a moving safety and security exclusion zone of 2,040 acres. This zone is larger than Caumsett State Park and 2.5 times the size of Central Park.

• Only commercial ferries would be allowed to enter these exclusion zones. Everyone else – recreational boaters and fishermen, commercial fishermen, and commercial navigation – is excluded from public water around the FSRU, and would have to move out of the way of the incoming LNG carriers.

• The U.S. Coast Guard would have to escort the LNG carriers, and in March, Admiral Thad Allen (Commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard) testified to Congress that they do not have the resources to protect LNG carriers. He also stated that the public funds used to cover Coast Guard escort costs, is a public subsidy of private business. Giving the Coast Guard the needed additional resources of $18 to $36 million per year to cover Coast Guard costs related to Broadwater would place an additional strain on public coffers, and may result in shifting Coast Guard resources from other parts of the region.

4. Broadwater would cause ecosystem damage.

• Long Island Sound is an Estuary of National Significance, and the only region of New York State with its own specifically crafted and focused Coastal Management Program.

• Long Island Sound is valued, in part, because of its rich natural resources, especially fisheries.

• The National Marine Fisheries Service states that Broadwater would cause “significant adverse effects” to the ecosystem.

• Broadwater would damage a 4,000 foot long section of the ecologically important Stratford Shoal by dredging 40,000 cubic yards of the shoal to install part of its new pipeline. Stratford Shoal hosts a rare assemblage of cold water corals and sponges. The shoal habitat attracts a greater concentration of other recreationally and commercially important fish species than sites off the shoal.

• Broadwater and its carriers would use 28.2 million gallons per day of seawater for ballast, power generation and other uses. The NYS Department of Environmental Conservation says that 270 million eggs, larvae and juvenile fish and unknown numbers of other small fish would be killed annually through the water intake. This a significant adverse effect on the food chain that the Sound depends on for its ecological health.

Over the Weekend: Coast Guard Scolds Broadwater; NY Money for Sewage Work; the Orient Point Express; Baykeeper Blog

While other reporters were running around getting silly quotes from politicians about the safety risks of Broadwater’s LNG terminal, Judy Benson of the New London Day dug into the files and turned up some news: The Coast Guard has determined that Broadwater’s safety and security report is inadequate, and has told the company to do it over:

In a Dec. 21 letter to Broadwater, Coast Guard Capt. Peter Boynton indicated that the report was seriously flawed. It provides unusable information, Boynton said, because it is based on LNG terminals with smaller tanks, supplied by smaller vessels with different inner and outer hull designs from what Broadwater is proposing.

Accidental spills would also behave differently. The information, according to Boynton, is based on a Sandia National Laboratories Report that is not applicable to what Broadwater plans. Boynton, as captain of the port of Long Island Sound, is in charge of the Coast Guard's review of the Broadwater plan….

The Coast Guard asked Broadwater to conduct modeling specific to Broadwater's terminal and tankers that would simulate how they would fare in the conditions of Long Island Sound.

Among other problems, Broadwater's report uses weather conditions specific to Baltimore, not Long Island Sound, Boynton said.

Benson also learned that the Coast Guard thinks Broadwater is overdoing it in keeping information from the public for security purposes:

Boynton also said he did not agree with Broadwater's view that the report contained sensitive information that should not be made public.

"Much of the information in the report does not appear to meet the definition of sensitive security information," Boynton said. He asked that the new report be divided into sections that can be released and those that legitimately contain sensitive information.

The Broadwater plant not only would leave the region vulnerable to a disruption of energy because of terrorist attack, it also would make us dependent on unstable political regimes abroad. So argues Joel Gordes, an energy consultant and former Connecticut legislator. In the Hartford Courant, he writes:

In light of this, it is almost unconceivable that we purposely want to further expose ourselves to even greater dependency on the politics of jihadist Islam by increasing importation of LNG. While the availability of that source might continue (and it might not) it would probably be at a higher cost then we would like. That might destroy the economics of the Broadwater project, leaving us with a derelict structure in the Sound that might have to be dismantled at taxpayer expense.

For these reasons, and numerous others, this new facility has not yet passed the sniff test and requires far more scrutiny than it has gotten. Last February, after letting my security concerns be known, I was asked to meet with representatives of the Broadwater project. Armed with 21/2 pages of questions, I managed to ask about a quarter of them. I found their answers insufficient to allay my fears and their attitude dismissive.


$$$ for Treatment Plants ... With all the hoopla last week about New York State’s agreement with New York City on a nitrogen removal plan, I ignored news about state grants to North Hempstead and Westchester County for treatment plant improvements in Belgrave and Mamaroneck, respectively. From Newsday.

The casinos that are making eastern Connecticut’s Indians rich are also making life miserable for some people on Long Island’s North Fork. Residents of Southold are unhappy with all the cars that race through their town en route to the Orient Point ferry, which runs to New London. I think the casino culture is vulgar beyond belief anyway, so I’m biased, but even if I weren’t I’d sympathize with North Forkers. The ferry company, on the other hand, thinks the increased business is just fine. The New London Day.

If you’re interested in the daily musings of the Narragansett Baykeeper, Save the Bay has a new website, up this week, that will include a Baykeeper blog. It's not up yet but when it is it will be at Savebay.org From the Providence Journal.

Blumenthal Tells New York that Blue Oceans Means There's No Need for Broadwater

I have no idea if, when he was New York's Attorney General, Eliot Spitzer had a good relationship with Richard Blumenthal, his counterpart in Connecticut, but if he did he might take more seriously Blumenthal's arguments against Broadwater's proposal to put a liquefied natural gas terminal in the middle of Long Island Sound, just over the border in New York's waters.

Yesterday Blumenthal sent a letter to the New York State Office of General Services, which will have to decide whether Broadwater (Shell and TransCanada) should get a lease to use the state-owned land at the bottom of the Sound. He argued that a recent proposal by Blue Ocean Energy (Exxon Mobil) for the Atlantic Ocean would safer and would do less damage to the environment than Broadwater's proposal. From Blumenthal's press release:

He stated that the New York State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) mandates consideration of alternatives, including the newly proposed BlueOcean Energy LNG. SEQRA says that the office must reject Broadwater if an alternative is safer with less environmental impact and provides comparable service.

Blumenthal wrote that Exxon's recently proposed BlueOcean Energy LNG -- 20 miles off New Jersey -- is such an alternative, promising to provide New York with 20 percent more natural gas than Broadwater while causing less environmental damage and posing fewer public safety risks. New York law therefore requires rejection of Broadwater, he said.

"BlueOcean Energy is a clear, direct alternative to Broadwater, which is obviously far less dangerous and destructive to the environment than Broadwater," Blumenthal wrote. "While Broadwater would devastate pristine, untouched areas in Long Island Sound and endanger the lives of countless recreational and commercial sailors, the BlueOcean Energy project would be located 20 miles off the coast, away from crowded areas of the Sound. BlueOcean would also deliver 1.2 bcfd of natural gas, 20 percent more gas than Broadwater, directly to the important New York and New Jersey gas markets.

"Compared with BlueOcean Energy, Broadwater has far greater negative environmental impact. Broadwater would require approximately 30 miles of undersea pipe while BlueOcean would build only 20 miles. Further, the seafloor of Long Island Sound has unique and highly vulnerable natural resources that would be compromised by construction as described in the Attorney General's comments of April 20, 2007.

"Finally, due to the confined environment of the Sound, any accident or terrorist attack involving either the LNG facility or its attendant tankers would pose a vastly greater threat of unacceptable damage than would an accident in open waters of the Atlantic Ocean. Therefore, the impact minimization requirement of SEQRA mandates denial of the Broadwater project."

SEQRA is an interesting and sometimes maddening law that can frustrate developers, environmentals, neighborhood activists, and even the agency trying to use it to decide what to do on a project -- and all at the same time. It can also be manipulated successfully by any of those or their lawyers. But when it's used right it can actually help lead to a rational decision.

In this case, where three New York agencies -- OGS and the departments of State and Environmental Conservation -- have to make independent decisions based on SEQRA, you'd imagine that it would work something like this: each agency follows its regulations and the laws, keeping the governor's staff informed along the way. Meanwhile, the governor starts to form his own opinion, perhaps guided by Judith Enck, who oversees his environmental program. If the agencies reach conclusions that the governor agrees with, he lets them proceed. If they don't, maybe they work it out, either by the agency convincing the governor that it's making the right decision or by the governor convincing the agency that it ought to look at the situation a bit harder.

In either case, Blumenthal's opinion could carry serious weight, assuming he had a mutually respectiful relationship with Spitzer to begin with.

Here's Newday's story; and Chris Zurcher mentions it on his relatively new blog, here.

Broadwater Coverage From Around the Region

Here are today's news stories, and one editorial, about the Broadwater environmental impact statement. One thing for opponents to keep in mind is that this is a nine inning game, and we're only in the fifth inning. And late in the game is when interesting and crazy things can happen.


LNG report called ‘whitewash’
New Haven Register

State Attorney General Richard Blumenthal and a New Haven-based environmental group are calling on New York state officials to deny the developer of the Broadwater liquefied natural gas plant permission to moor it.


Agency Backs LNG Terminal
Hartford Courant

The proposed Broadwater natural gas terminal could operate safely and would not have a significant environmental impact on Long Island Sound, the federal ...

TransCanada, Shell a step closer to LNG go-ahead
Globe and Mail - Canada

... some analysts are questioning the planned boom in North American LNG projects, saying there simply isn't the global supply to underpin all the construction plans worldwide.

Broadwater Proposal Gets Preliminary Nod From FERC
TheDay - New London

While highly favorable of the proposal, the 828-page report also identifies 79 steps Broadwater should take to reduce its impact on the environment. These range from coordinating with the New York environmental officials about how to avoid impacts on wildlife to consulting with federal wildlife and marine fisheries agencies to following specific guidelines for construction and design.


The Energy Conundrum
The Day - New London

The opposition to the Broadwater project is as vocal as the anger that is gathering in the state over past and future increases in electric rates. Unfortunately, Connecticut's policy makers prefer not to connect the two, the high cost of energy in the state and the need for new sources of energy. Connecticut, for all intents and purposes, has no workable energy policy, and to add to the problem, neither does the federal government.

The Broadwater project is but another emblem of this conundrum, a monstrosity that would add to the manmade clutter in Long Island Sound. Broadwater ... makes a reasonable case that with its LNG terminal 10 miles offshore from Connecticut, it can supply cleaner-burning fuel than coal and oil at a lower cost to energy consumers and to the environment than the market status quo. The project would ameliorate the threat to air quality posed by the state's “Sooty Six” generating plants and pave the way for cleaner, less expensive energy generation in the state. ...

All of what the company says is true, just as it is true that the LNG project would further despoil Long Island Sound....


Regulators: Gas terminal would have minimal effect on environment
Stamford Advocate

The draft report by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission sparked immediate criticism from opponents of the project, including Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman and the Connecticut Fund for the Environment.

Opponents said they would submit written comments and appear at public meetings scheduled for January to challenge the report on Broadwater Energy's proposal. Blumenthal said he was prepared to take the issue to court if necessary.

"The FERC report is a whitewash," Blumenthal said. "Broadwater would be an unnecessary monstrosity permanently defacing and degrading Long Island Sound, another abhorrent step toward industrialization of this priceless natural resource and national treasure." ...

Officials from Broadwater Energy, a consortium of Shell Oil and TransCanada Corp., said they were pleased with the draft report, calling it a significant breakthrough for the project.

"It's a key milestone," said company senior vice president John Hritcko. "It confirms what we've been saying all along."

Officials: Proposed broadwater terminal safe
Newsday

The report is a victory for Houston-based Broadwater Energy Inc., but its project still faces additional federal and state and possible Suffolk County scrutiny, as well as intense political opposition on both sides of the Sound. "We should recognize that they still have a long way to go," said Rep. Tim Bishop (D-Southampton), an opponent.

Broadwater's Attorneys Are Telling FERC Not to Give Out LNG Details

Is the federal government allowing Broadwater’s attorneys (LeBouef, Lamb, Greene & MacRae LLP) to decide who should have a chance to review the all-but-secret details of Broadwater’s proposal to put a LNG facility in the middle of Long Island Sound? From what Bryan Brown tells me, it seems like that might be the case. And if so, Bryan apparently won't be getting the information.

Readers who are following the Broadwater issue remember the flap over keeping details of the proposal secret. Federal rules say that for security reasons, FERC and Broadwater (a partnership of Shell and TransCanada) shall not release certain information about safety and security to the public; individuals can apply to FERC to see that information, but they have to promise not to discuss it publicly. Lots of people, including Connecticut AG Richard Blumenthal, think that means there’s no way we’ll ever know if the plant is safe.

One of those who have applied to FERC is Bryan Brown, a Long Islander who follows the Broadwater issue very closely.

The last time we heard from Bryan, he said he had applied for the Critical Energy Infrastructure Information (CEII) information back in September but hadn’t heard anything, so he re-faxed his request (there's background info here and here). Late yesterday he sent me an e-mail with an update. Among the most interesting things is that when FERC gets a request for information, it forwards the request to Broadwater’s attorneys and asks them what they think.

And in Bryan’s case, LeBouef, Lamb (Beef & Lamb) told FERC that he shouldn’t be allowed access to the information. Here’s what Bryan told me in a recent e-mail:

I want to bring you up to date on my personal efforts to gain access to Broadwater CEII.

Here's the chronology:

1. I submitted my original request for CEII on 9/28/05 via a fax that followed the instructions provided by FERC exactly.

2. By mid-January, I hadn't heard anything, so I re-faxed my request.

3. On 1/17, I received a phone call from FERC explaining that there was a backlog and my request from September would be processed soon.

4. Early February, FERC copied me on a letter that they sent to LeBouef, Lamb, Greene & MacRae LLP (Broadwater's counsel) saying that I was seeking CEII and that LeBouef Lamb needed to respond if they felt that I shouldn't be allowed access.

5. Within days, I received a non-disclosure form (a copy of which is attached) from FERC that I was instructed to sign and return (which I did).

6. At the same time, I was copied on a letter from LeBouef Lamb to FERC in effect making the case why I should be denied access.

7. I spoke with FERC today and was advised that they continue to work on my request and that their forwarding of the non-disclosure agreement was pro forma.

Based on my experience, I concur with AG Blumenthal's comments that the process doesn't make any sense. The policy is unclear and I'm scratching my head as to what vetting process I've undergone (I certainly wasn't contacted by anyone from the government; on the other hand, I don't think I have a file at the FBI). It appears that the onus is on me to make the case and that Broadwater (via its counsel) gets to decide.

Then there is the backlog. My original request was made during the pre-filing process but still within days of Broadwater's submission of Resource Report 13. I have already missed the opportunity to comment during the pre-filing phase and who knows if/when I'll
get an opportunity to submit a post-filing comment.

One good thing I learned is that (as per the non-disclosure agreement) I can discuss the CEII with other folks who have been granted access. FERC will tell me if another recipient has been granted access (I'm guessing that I'd have to make a specific query,
rather than be provided with a list of individuals who have been granted access).

As much as I feel that this information should be available to the public, I have some reservations.

Although I haven't read RR 13, I can tell you the approximate distance between the inner and outer hull plates of the FSRU. Not only that, I can tell you how fast a ship displacing 5000 tons needs to travel to penetrate the inner and outer hulls and cause a
breach. How do I know this? From reading the information submitted by Broadwater to the FERC docket that IS available to the public. That, to me, is an eye-opener.

I guess the proof of Beef & Lamb’s (and hence Broadwater’s) influence will be whether FERC gives Bryan the information he wants, or whether Beef & Lamb can delay the applications enough so that people get it too late to comment on it.

Broadwater is Failing to Give Us All the Info We Need

Here's Save the Sound/Connecticut Fund for the Environment's take on the New York State Department of State letter to FERC about Broadwater:

New York Department of State disputes Broadwater assessment.

Broadwater Fails ‘Information 101’ Again.

In a letter addressed to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) made public this week, the New York Department of State (DOS) points out numerous flaws in Broadwater Energy’s application process and illustrates how Broadwater’s assumptions have failed to provide full information on alternatives and due consideration for the project’s impact on the interests of the region’s citizens.

The letter points chiefly to three things. 1) Broadwater has so far glossed over potential Atlantic Ocean alternative siting options for its proposed liquefied natural gas storage facility; 2) When reviewing siting alternatives, Broadwater and FERC have not sufficiently considered the impact of the safety exclusion zones, which prohibit public use of public land and water around the LNG delivery tankers (4-6 a week) and the facility itself; and 3) FERC should not “rely exclusively on information provided by Broadwater in its filing to assess environmental impacts associated with shore crossings.”

To read the letter, visit
http://elibrary.FERC.gov/idmws/file_list.asp?accession_num=20070703-4006

Save the Sound’s comments can be found below.

“The DOS letter points to issues Save the Sound has raised from the beginning” said Leah Schmalz, “a public light is being shown on Broadwater’s ill advised scheme which side-steps alternative options for siting their LNG complex in the Atlantic Ocean with less destructive technology.”

“The DOS rightly demands that FERC consider the types, sizes, and impacts of the facility’s exclusion zones, like those surrounding the platform and the LNG supply tankers, on the public’s use as part of the ‘foot-print’ of the facility,” Schmalz said, “Broadwater has no problem seizing the public’s water and land for their exclusive use, they shouldn’t be allowed to ignore or whitewash the consequences.”

“The New York Department of State accurately points out to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission what citizens have been demanding for nearly two years – that FERC do its own careful analysis, and not merely reiterate Broadwater Energy’s party line,” Schmalz said.

Remember: Broadwater Was Rejected Because It Was The Wrong Project in The Wrong Place, Not Because People Opposed It

The Broadwater people and the reporter who wrote this story for the Courant either didn’t read or are deliberately misrepresenting what New York State’s rejection of Broadwater said about alternatives to putting a liquefied natural gas factory in the middle of Long Island Sound.

New York was not saying that we don’t need Broadwater because there will be other LNG terminals coming online. Rather, the state said that alternative locations exist for Broadwater’s project but that Broadwater did not consider them seriously enough.

And yet Broadwater and the Courant’s reporter are peddling the myth that it’s somehow going to be the fault of officials in New York and Connecticut, and of activists who opposed the project, if energy costs rise because Broadwater won’t be built. Here’s what the Courant said:

The other liquefied natural gas terminals proposed, in locations in Delaware and New Brunswick, Canada, will do little for Connecticut, Broadwater officials said, and that's assuming they win approval. "The alternatives that the opposition points to don't exist, haven't been reviewed or aren't designed to serve Connecticut or New York," said John Hritcko Jr., a senior vice president for Broadwater, a consortium of Shell Oil and the TransCanada Pipeline.

That might be true but how is it relevant? The important thing is not the alternatives that the opposition points to, as Hritcko puts it, but the alternatives that the New York State Department of State said were more viable than the middle of Long Island Sound – alternatives that could have and should have been given serious study in the project’s environmental review. It was Broadwater – Shell and TransCanada – who picked the wrong spot. Hritcko should be looking in the mirror and saying, “We made a mistake in not seriously considering the alternative locations that the state identified.”

Here’s what the state said:

DOS has proposed two alternative locations that are feasible and would be consistent with the NY Coastal Management Program. These alternatives would: • present fewer use conflicts with recreational boating, sport fishing, commercial fishing, and commercial vessels;
• have reduced effects on coastal resources when compared to the effects on the LIS estuary;
• be sited outside New York’s public trust waters; and,
• not be visible from shore. Alternative 1 - An FSRU [floating storage regasification unit, jargon for a big LNG terminal] in the Atlantic Ocean, approximately 13 miles south of Long Beach Island, west of Cholera Bank. Alternative 2 – An FSRU in the Atlantic Ocean, approximately 20 miles south of Fire Island Inlet.

The Broadwater people miscalculated badly. They put all their eggs into the Long Island Sound basket and when the basket fell, all the eggs broke. It was their mistake. Don’t blame us.

Dear Governor Spitzer: Reject Broadwater's Proposal for Long Island Sound (II)

Tom Baptist, vice president and executive director of Audubon Connecticut, has written an open letter to Governor Eliot Spitzer, explaining why Broadwater's proposal to put an LNG terminal in Long Island Sound, should be rejected:

Dear Governor Spitzer:

I recently received a letter from Broadwater Energy that began “Dear Small Business Owner.”

Broadwater had written to me to obtain my support for the construction of a massive liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility in the middle of Long Island Sound. Their letter contended the proposed LNG facility would “have limited adverse environmental impacts” while saving the average homeowner “$300 per year” by providing more natural gas - - “an additional 25% of what we use right now”.

Unfortunately, Broadwater’s calculations don’t add up. They ignore the $5.5 billion contributed annually to Connecticut/New York economy by Long Island Sound. Any potential negative environmental impact to this Estuary of National Significance would jeopardize this economic engine and the revenue it provides.

The potential for environmental impacts is real. Dozens of experts have concluded that the Broadwater proposal understates or ignores the potential for environmental damage from the project. There is no shortage of testimony to this effect: the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission records contain hundreds of pages contesting Broadwater’s claims. These potential impacts include significant disruptions to fish and bird habitats, and the impairment of recreational and other commercial uses of the Sound such as fishing and lobstering.

Broadwater assumes – wrongly I believe – that small business owners will be willing to sell off Long Island Sound, our state’s most important open space and natural resource, for a vague promise of $300 in annual savings that may never materialize.

Governor Jodi Rell recently requested a Congressional investigation into the possible manipulation of natural gas prices. In her letter to federal officials, the Governor cites the fact that according to federal data natural gas prices for residential users increased 169% from June 2002 to June 2007. The record is even worse for business users. Over the same period, natural gas prices for commercial users increased 175% and for industrial users 207%.

So how does Broadwater with its massive construction project propose to generate the promised $300 in annual savings? By slowing the rate of increase in the price of natural gas, that’s how. And the savings promised are only for residential consumers. No such figure is promised for commercial or industrial users – presumably the very small business owners whose support the company is seeking in their letter.

Perhaps most importantly, Broadwater ignores energy conservation and increased efficiency as viable alternatives to its project. Taking steps to conserve energy and to improve efficiency will put money directly into the pockets of small owners faster than any promised reduction in the rate of increase offered by Broadwater. Given the conservation potential in Connecticut and New York, this LNG facility might not be needed at all if we implemented conservation measures statewide. For those small businesses interested in realizing savings through conservation and increased energy efficiency, the Connecticut Energy Efficiency Fund offers information on available conservation programs at www.ctsavesenergy.org.

Broadwater wants us to put the Long Island Sound ecosystem at serious risk and forever restrict public access and commercial use of the vast area consumed by their facility, all for the promise of $300 in annual savings that may never materialize when simple energy conservation can guarantee that amount of savings or more. Connecticut small business owners should not be fooled.

Thomas R. Baptist
Vice President and Executive Director
Audubon Connecticut

Audubon Connecticut, the state organization of the National Audubon Society with more than 13,000 members statewide, works to protect birds, other wildlife, and their habitats using education, science and conservation, and legislative advocacy for the benefit of people and the earth’s biological diversity. Through our network of three nature education centers, more than 4,500 acres of protected wildlife sanctuary lands, and11 local volunteer Chapters, we seek to connect people with nature and inspire the next generation of conservationists.

Another Newsday Columnist Loves Broadwater

It used to be that newspaper publishers, as represented by their editorial writers, always promoted whichever development scheme big business was trying to bring to their area, and it was the newspaper’s reporters who had to find out and then write the reality that these development plans at best usually compromise environmental qualities and at worse damage them. From what I see of newspapers in our region, publishers and editorial boards are deeply skeptical of Broadwater’s plan for a liquefied natural gas terminal in the middle of Long Island Sound, but reporters – or at least columnists – are on the side of big business.

Joye Brown in Newsday was one example the other day, and today it’s Raymond J. Keating (see footnote at end of this post), who mocks the Long Island residents who think Broadwater’s proposal is a bad idea but seems to have swallowed about a gallon of the Broadwater and FERC kool-aid.

Raymond J. Keating seems to think that because a government agency makes an assertion in a draft environmental impact statement, the assertion is correct. “Earth to Raymond J. Keating! A draft environmental impact statement can be as much a promotional document as it is an analysis of environmental impacts! The developer pays for it and it pretty much gets to conclude what the developer wants it to conclude! And even at its honest best it’s a document to be debated and analyzed.”

I’d bet a dollar that Raymond J. Keating hasn’t read more than the executive summary of the DEIS, if that. And I’d be another dollar that he’s not qualified to say whether the DEIS’s analysis is on the mark. Yet here’s what Raymond J. Keating writes:

Of course, a little sober reflection could point to something substantially different than the frightening environmental and security sermon preached by the environmental crowd. Might the Broadwater terminal actually help meet rising energy demands in the region by providing 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day, powering roughly 4 million homes? Isn't it possible that FERC was correct when concluding in its November report that the terminal would have no "significant impacts on the environment"? And could the U.S. Coast Guard be right in its assessment that with additional measures, safety and security would be responsibly managed?

In fact, given the extensive expertise used for these reviews and the obvious economic incentives for Broadwater to serve consumers and the public, as well as to protect its investments, the most likely answer to each of these questions is yes. This project would be good for consumers and the economy, while doing no substantive harm to the environment. For good measure, it is worth noting that natural gas ranks as the most environmentally friendly fossil fuel because it burns so cleanly.

Hey, Ray. Broadwater might help meet rising energy demands, although it also might be true that a LNG plant about to be built in Canada will meet rising energy demands, as the company says despite the Broadwater/FERC assertion to the contrary in the DEIS.

[Here’s what the president of the Canadian company wrote to FERC about the assertion in the Broadwater DEIS:

… The important fact to be considered in the Broadwater analysis is that Repsol will be able to deliver at least 0.73 bcfd of gas sourced from Canaport LNG, into the northeastern United States pipeline grid with access to all of the markets served by that grid. It is also important to note that the Canaport LNG terminal can be expanded to provide additional incremental supply that can access northeastern US markets, including New England and New York.

… Second, the DEIS states in Section 4.3.2 (page 4-20) that the Canaport LNG terminal would not be able to supply the needed volume of gas to the regional markets and that substantial upgrades to the downstream interstate pipeline systems would be required to meet regional market needs. However, since the DEIS does not identify specific markets that have committed to utilize gas supply from the Broadwater LNG Project, it is difficult to judge the accuracy of such a grad statement. …]

And it’s possible that the project will do no substantive harm to the environment but it’s also possible, as four Connecticut scientists said (here and here), that the environmental analysis isn’t worthy of a lazy college student.

Here’s what Raymond J. Keating is really saying: I don’t like Long Islanders’ attitudes or the way they behave; they should prostrate themselves in front of the wonderful folks at Shell and TransCanada and Broadwater (with newspaper downsizing you never know, I might want a corporate PR job someday). Basically, don’t confuse me with the facts, or with a serious analysis.
[Footnote: I'm afraid I owe respectable reporters and columnists an apology for lumping them in with Raymond J. Keating. Keating works for a group called the Small Business Survival Committee, which lobbies on behalf of the tobacco industry and opposes and disagrees with essentially everything environmentalists believe in, according to SourceWatch. To compare him to a respectable journalist like Joye Brown is an insult to Joye Brown, in my opinion. But why doesn't Newsday identify him in their online edition?)

After a Day of Anxiety, New York Delays Its Broadwater Decision

Broadwater hit the fan yesterday. Anxiety is high. Early in the afternoon, Adrienne Esposito of Citizens Campaign for the Environment, send out an email saying her group had filed a Freedom of Information request with the state seeking documents and correspondence about Broadwater; they were particularly interested in anything to do with a meeting Governor Spitzer held three weeks ago with John Hofmeister, the CEO of Shell (Broadwater is a joint venture between Shell and TransCanada).

That meeting and a subsequent PR blitz by Broadwater pissed Adrienne off. Meetings between government officials and businessmen don’t necessarily worry me, unless environmentalists can’t get a similar meeting (and Adrienne learned of Hofmeister’s meeting with the governor, she asked for one too and is getting it, on Monday); PR blitzes don’t overly concern me either. It doesn’t even concern me that CCE criticizes the governor for holding a “secret” meeting with Shell but then arranges its own meeting with the governor (which presumably will be private if not “secret”) or that CCE criticizes Broadwater for its PR blitz when it’s hardly a shrinking violet when it comes to its own PR efforts.

Most interesting to me though was a sentence in CCE’s press release:

CCE has learned that Broadwater is in secret negotiations with NYS to delay the ruling for several months past the Feb 12th deadline.

I was doing real work yesterday and didn’t have time for blogging but I sent off a short email to Adrienne:

you sure of that? how do you know?

Her response:

I am sure.

Then I noticed this terrific piece posted by Denise Civiletti early yesterday morning, which included this:

Mr. Spitzer is in a bind. Both of the state agencies charged with reviewing the Broadwater plan hate it, but he’s under pressure from people like NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg to clear the path for its approval, according to sources inside the Spitzer administration. Word is the energy execs sat down with the governor to propose another extension of the state’s consistency review decision deadline.

By the time I got home from work, two reporters – Civiletti and Newsday’s Tom Cantalupo – had learned that, indeed, the state and Broadwater agreed to extend the deadline 60 days, and that it was the state that asked for the extension.

So what does the delay mean? I don’t know but I’m hard-pressed to see it as necessarily a bad thing. Having followed other big coastal zone decisions made by the Department of State, I have no doubt of the staff’s honesty and integrity. They are not pushovers for big development. If they asked for a delay, the probably need it. For one thing, they know they’re going to get sued. That reality probably makes them want to be sure their reasoning is sound beyond reproach and that they followed the right legal process to the letter. If it takes an extra 60 days to do so, that’s fine with me.

CCE seems to be concerned that an extra 60 days will allow Broadwater, with its deep pockets, to buy public support through PR efforts and ad campaigns. I’m dubious. The Broadwater argument has been going on since late 2004. How many hearts and minds remain to be changed?

Nevertheless, to go back to the top, it will be fascinating to see what CCE turns up from its Freedom of Information request, which should certainly be complied with before the 60 days are up. The only way for the state to dispel any suspicion is to release every document and email it was asked for, and then for those documents to show that the state is playing it down the middle.

Is Shell Trying To Buy Influence on the Broadwater Decision?

Does this sound like an attempt to buy influence in the Broadwater LNG decision?

Each year a government grants program called the Long Island Sound Futures Fund doles out money to groups in New York and Connecticut who are working to improve the Sound. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service administers the fund, in cooperation with the Long Island Sound Study, which is a project of the U.S. EPA. Money for the grants generally comes from the Fish & Wildlife Service, EPA, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is part of the Department of Commerce.

The fund gives away about $900,000 a year in grants. This year, according to Citizens Campaign for the Environment, $135,000 of that came in the form of a donation by Shell Oil, the company (along with Trans-Canada) who wants to build a huge liquefied natural gas terminal in the middle of the Sound.

Buying influence or simply buying goodwill, which is an oft-practiced public relations technique? NOAA, Fish and Wildlife, and EPA all have roles in the Broadwater review. Here’s how someone with knowledge of the process explained to me the potential for influencing the Broadwater decision:

Broadwater needs a permit from the New York State Department of State's Coastal Zone division; it’s actually a federal permit delegated to the state by NOAA. If the state denies Broadwater a permit, Broadwater can appeal to the guy who oversees NOAA, namely the Secretary of Commerce. EPA and Fish & Wildlife, meanwhile, participate in the Broadwater environmental review by providing information to Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which will make the final decision on Broadwater’s proposal.

I have a hard time imagining that EPA or Fish & Wildlife would someone give incomplete or biased information to FERC because Shell shelled out $135,000 for a grants program. On the other hand, it might be exactly the kind of thing that influences the Department of Commerce.

The other issue, as someone who has been following the situation put it to me in an e-mail, is “pervasiveness of influence.” Keep in mind that Broadwater, through a company consultant named Joel Rinebold, got themselves a seat on the Citizens Advisory Committee of the Long Island Sound Study. Now one of Broadwater’s sponsors is pouring money into the region to help fund the work of grass roots organizations. The email said:

I think the issue is more about pervasiveness of influence and the chilling effect they could have on the region's stakeholders -- they squirmed onto the LISS CAC and now they are a major cash infusion for the primary granting program of NY and CT LIS work. Will anyone who gets a grant have to plug Shell's generous support?

I don’t know the answer, but it’s worth being aware of what Shell is up to.

Dear Governor Spitzer: Reject Broadwater's Proposal for Long Island Sound (III)

Adrienne Esposito, executive director of Citizens Campaign for the Environment, has written an open letter to Governor Eliot Spitzer, explaining why Broadwater's proposal to put an LNG terminal in Long Island Sound, should be rejected:

Dear Governor Spitzer,

The Broadwater battle has never been about opposing energy infrastructure but rather it is a battle to protect Long Island Sound. The Broadwater monstrosity will be detrimental to the Sound. First, it will diminish the already-struggling lobster population. As the NYS Department of Conservation just confirmed in their December 21, 2007 letter, the Broadwater project will increase water temperatures resulting in lobster fatalities. The project will need approximately 28.2 million gallons of seawater per day, which will result in an estimated 274 million eggs and larvae being killed annually and in addition an unknown number of young and small adult fish will be lost. Many of these fish deaths will include the commercial and recreational valuable Winter Founder.

As you are aware, the NYS Department of State will soon release an evaluation of Broadwater’s conformity to the federal law, Coastal Zone Management Act (CZMA). This critical law requires the state to evaluate and assess potential impacts to the water dependent uses and public access of a waterway. If Broadwater were to be approved, it would set a new low standard for applying the CZMA and weaken protection for other waterways. The CZMA was designed and crafted to protect waterways and to allow them to continue to be used for traditional maritime purposes. Broadwater will need a 1.5 square mile security zone and another moving security zone around each and every LNG tanker entering the Sound. This would set a new, dangerous precedent for restricting public access in favor of corporate control of a waterway. The security zone would require a 24 hours per day armed surveillance, establishing the first “militarized zone” in the middle of one of NY’s waterways. This would be a national precedent for an estuary of national significance – one that future generations will regret.

CCE has long argued that alternative LNG technologies and alternative locations need to be fully explored and evaluated. We will not support energy infrastructure that causes severe environmental damage, such as Broadwater. However, we understand the need for energy, and encourage the development of a regional energy plan. This plan should seek to identify the least environmentally damaging energy infrastructure. To date, two other LNG alternatives for the tri-state area have been proposed, the Atlantic Sea Island and the BlueOcean Exxon proposal. In addition, there are other LNG proposals moving forward for the northeast such as the two sub sea pipelines approved off of Massachusetts. Each one of these LNG projects will provide 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day into the northeast market.

We understand that change is inevitable; however, change does not have to come at the cost of losing what it is that we love. The Long Island Sound is a special place and that’s why so many of us have fought long and hard to preserve and protect this water body. To so many, the Long Island Sound is our equivalent of Central Park. If you would deny an LNG facility from being place in the middle of Central Park then we are urging you to join with the 80,000 members of the public who oppose Broadwater. Thank you for your consideration to this important matter. We look forward to the state’s ruling.

Adrienne Esposito
Executive Director
Citizens Campaign for the Environment

On the Broadwater Issue, the Long Island Association is an Arrogant Meddler

The annoyance at the Long Island Association's announcement last week that it was giving its conditional support to Broadwater's LNG proposal for Long Island Sound wasn't limited to just environmentalists. One of the association's board members, Richard Kessel, chief executive of the Long Island Power Authority, thought the association's announcement was just slightly premature too, particularly since one of its conditions was that Broadwater provide gas at a discount to the Long Island Power Authority. Here's what Newsday reported today:

Kessel said he was especially rankled by plans for the association to negotiate with Broadwater on the conditions that the LIA board has set for the board's full support.

The first meeting was Tuesday.

Among the LIA's conditions is a long-term contract between Broadwater and LIPA for natural gas at "significantly discounted" prices.

"The LIA is certainly free to say what it wants," Kessel said, "but it should not put itself into a position of negotiating benefits for LIPA; that's LIPA's job."

Someone else made an interesting point to me yesterday about the chutzpah of the Long Island Association. The group's president, Matthew T. Crosson, said last week that that association wants to meet with the Broadwater people:

Crosson said in the association's statement that the group would meet with Broadwater executives to discuss specifics of its conditions. "If we are unable to negotiate those conditions to our satisfaction, the LIA board of directors will reconsider its support of the project," he said.

That's nice that he wants to be involved but on the other hand what makes him think anyone wants his pro-business group negotiating with Broadwater, or that it has any right to negotiate with Broadwater?

As it was expressed to me yesterday, who are they to act as brokers to sell off Long Island Sound?

Long Islanders might be impressed with the Long Island Association, but I'm not. Whatever they might have done or not done in the past, the association ought to pipe down on the Broadwater issue until it knows what it's talking about and has something useful to say. Until then I can only think of it as a arrogant meddler.

The Broadwater PR Battle is in Overtime

I haven't seen what, if anything, Broadwater has been doing on the PR front over the past two weeks. Maybe it's flooding the airwaves with ads, maybe it's organizing a grass roots movement of proponents, maybe it's holding secret meetings with government decision makers. Who knows?

What I do know however is that Broadwater seems to be continuing to take a hit in the press. Way back on the day I left for vacation, Newsday moved a story about a new letter from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation saying that Broadwater still hasn't answered the questions it asked in December and as a result Broadwater's application remains incomplete (here). Newsday then published anti-Broadwater letters from Leah Schmalz of Save the Sound and from Assemblywoman Patricia Eddington, a Democrat (here), and an op-ed piece by Richard Blumenthal, Connecticut's AG (here). And the Westport News editorialized against it (here).

A couple of weeks ago, when New York State extended its own deadline for making its coastal zone consistency decision by 60 days, the anti-Broadwater folks thought Broadwater would use the extra time to try to win public support. But if this were a basketball game, we'd be in overtime and the anti-Broadwater team has come out aggressively and scored the first few baskets. Overtime isn't over though and Broadwater has a chance to catch up.

Broadwater Appeal Decision is About Three Weeks Away and I'm Not That Worried Although Some Political Pressure Wouldn't Be a Bad Idea

"Multiple" anonymous sources told the Long Island Business News the other day that there was a good chance the feds will overturn New York decision to reject Broadwater's proposal to put a liquefied natural gas terminal in Long Island Sound. The deadline for a decision is April 15.

The New London Day reports (here) that the Broadwater suits are making the rounds of newspaper editorial boards and "displayed a disconcerting air of confidence during their visit" to New London. There's also a news story about the visit here.

Make of this what you will. I don't put much credence in the Business News story -- "multiple" sources might mean two people, and since we don't know who they are it's hard to say if we should believe them. Part of the evidence for the conjecture is that the Commerce Department is questioning New York State officials, wanting to know why they rejected Broadwater if FERC and the Coast Guard said it would be safe.

Asking questions means nothing, of course; it would be odd if no questions were asked. On the other hand, the state's extensive reasoning for rejecting Broadwater had nothing to do with safety. Here's what the state said:

1. The Sound is not an industrial park.

2. Broadwater would set a precedent and lead to an unacceptable change in the Sound.

3. Broadwater would occupy public land and water for a private undustrial use.

4. Broadwater would damage the Sound ecologically.If the feds wanted to know why New York rejected Broadwater, all they'd have to do was read the decision, which I'm sure they did. From that point of view, the Business News story makes little sense.

Of course the Business News story could be nonsense and still be right. The feds have to say yes or no, so there's a 50-50 chance that they could overturn New York's decision.

I also think the disconcerting air of confidence on the part of the Broadwater people means little. It's an act. I don't think word has gotten out to them that they're going to win; if it had, it would have gotten out to others, including environmentalists and officials in New York and Connecticut, and we would have been an eruption of conern by now.

Still, it might not be a bad idea to get some political pressure applied in the right places. Christopher Dodd, Chuck Schumer, Rosa DeLauro, Tim Bishop -- someone ought to be urging those folks to make a couple of phone calls.

12:35 p.m. -- David Reich-Hale, the reporter who wrote yesterday's Long Island Business News story, is now saying this, on his blog:

Yesterday, LIBN reported that many business leaders and high-ranking government officials believed the Department of Commerce would reverse Gov. Paterson’s rejection of the Shell Oil/TransCanada LNG.

It's possible that he spoke to many business leaders and high-ranking government officials, but that's not what he reported yesterday. Read it again (here) and you'll see he says next to nothing about who his "multiple" sources are. He said two of them had "strong connections to the state and federal government" and one had "no ties to Shell but with plenty of ties to officials in DC and Albany" (it sounds to me like there are only two sources there).

The only reason I care, by the way, is that he's asking us to believe him but offering very few reasons to actually do so, beyond "I said so."

Short Lobsters On Sale Now. What's Dumber than Broadwater?

Short lobsters … New, bigger size limits for lobsters caught in Connecticut’s portion of Long Island Sound take effect Monday. Lobsters will have to have a carapace length of at least 3 and 9/32nd inches. The idea is that the lobsters will have a little extra time to breed before they’re caught, which might help the Sound’s lobster population rebound.

But there’s a catch. The law applies not only to lobstermen but to stores that sell lobsters. They will no longer be allowed to sell anything shorter than 3 and 9/32nd of an inch. That’s a problem for them in two ways: by Monday, they have to sell (perhaps at a bargain price) any short lobsters they have in their tanks; and in the future they have to beware of short lobsters coming in from Maine and Canada, where the minimum length is 3 inches.

The Connecticut Post has a story, here. And by the way, a “fisher” is a large, aggressive weasel generally found in the north woods. Whenever I read a sentence like this, “… the rules are aimed at helping Connecticut lobster fishers who thought undersized shellfish from out of state would hurt them,” it makes me groan. Fishermen is a perfectly good word.

A retrospective … The Journal News summarizes the “Sound Health” report, two and a half weeks after the report came out. (My own posts about the report are here and here.)

Dumber than Broadwater? … How bad of an idea is Broadwater’s proposal to put a liquefied natural gas terminal in the middle of the Sound? The Anti-Broadwater Coalition thinks it’s bad enough to mock with a “Dumber than Broadwater” contest. And there are prizes:

Weekly winners will receive a handsome and practical backpack, laughable for use in evacuating Long Island in the event of a Broadwater vapor cloud ignition. The Grand Prize Winner will be selected to receive dinner for two at the top-rated La Plage Restaurant, featuring the last view of Long Island Sound without a gas platform larger than the Queen Mary II and LNG supertankers delivering their volatile fuel. The Grand Prize Winner will also receive a fill-up for their car as a reminder of Long Island’s ongoing dependence on expensive foreign fossil fuels if Broadwater is licensed and a round-trip on the Port Jefferson Ferry so you can leave the Island quickly and return if there’s anything to return to.

Broadwater is serious and so are we. But, your creativity will keep Long Islanders smiling as we go through the scary Broadwater review process, currently before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in Washington. Think of anything “Dumber than Broadwater,” and enter today.

Hmmm. Let me think … How about a nuclear power plant on the Sound in Waterford, Connecticut? Oh wait. We already have one of those.

New E-mail … Sphere readers who regularly send me e-mails should note that I have a new address: tandersen54@optonline.net. Both of you should change your address book accordingly.