LNG: Controversy Dogs Every Step of the Policy Process

• Attempts to Fast-Track Floating Offshore Facility Are Countered by Steadfast Opposition

BY HANS LAETZ

It’s been four years since Californians first heard about Cabrillo Port, the marketing name chosen by an Australian mining conglomerate for its proposed permanent, floating energy terminal off the coast of Malibu. Five government decisions are expected in the first half of 2007 on whether BHP Billiton will be allowed to anchor its liquified natural gas terminal in the Pacific Ocean some 16 miles off Point Dume.

As the decision approaches, the project’s history is important:

Summer, 1999: California is wracked with rolling blackouts and localized electrical shortages. State investigators later win hundreds of millions of dollars from natural gas wholesalers, including Enron and El Paso Energy, for having manipulated the availability of natural gas, driving up electricity and natural gas prices.

September, 2003: BHP Billiton offers to ease a supposed natural gas supply shortage by importing the fuel through a terminal off California. The Federal Register incorrectly locates the LNG terminal as “between the cities of Oxnard and Port Hueneme” but Malibu residents are later shocked to learn the project would be closest to Malibu, visible from oceanview houses west of Malibu Canyon Road.

December, 2003: About 100 people attend the first Cabrillo Port public hearing, where the project’s environmental impact is discussed. Company officials continue to tell reporters the plant will be located off Oxnard, not visible from Malibu.

January, 2004: An LNG explosion in Algeria kills 27 and does $800 million in damage, BHP Billiton officials assure Californians that such an explosion would be impossible at Cabrillo Port.

June, 2004: Australian Prime Minister John Howard lobbies California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to approve Cabrillo Port, said to be worth $5 billion in Australian gas sales to the U.S. Schwarzenegger political consultant Mike Murphy is on the LNG industry payroll for $1 million to lobby for California permits.

November, 2004: State officials say the worst case explosion from a catastrophe at Cabrillo Port would be a 1.6-mile-wide flash fire, opponents question that and ask for more data.

December, 2004: Environmental hearings begin, residents and coastal advocates begin to object to perceived engineering, safety and operational shortcomings.

January, 2005: Federal officials “stop the clock” and tell BHP Billiton they cannot issue a fast-track license because of a large amount of questions as to the project’s operational details.

February, 2005: BHPB is given a “data gap” list of more than 120 substantive questions that the federal government wants answered before the permit can be processed. Company officials refuse to release the list, saying it’s confidential.

May, 2005: Federal geologists warn that the undersea pipeline route chosen for Cabrillo Port is subject to massive undersea debris flows, landslides and 6.5 magnitude earthquakes, and question the pipeline’s safety.

June, 2005: a Malibu newspaper obtains the list of “data gaps” from federal officials, and reports that Coast Guard has major questions about possible ship collisions, public safety, smog generation, water quality and other issues.

June, 2005: an investigative reporter discovers that dozens of people who wrote letters supporting Cabrillo Port are fakes, other letters were signed by real people who, when questioned, said they never heard of the project. BHPB officials deny any connection, opponents call it outright fraud.

July, 2005: a reporter discovers that EPA officials have quietly reversed themselves after two years: Cabrillo Port gets exempted from smog offsets and other tight regulations. EPA officials do not answer why the change was made, and do not reveal it came at the request of the White House after the Australian government and BHP Billiton lobbying.

August, 2005: Federal officials order Cabrillo Port planners to include stinky gas to be injected on board the ship, in case of otherwise-undetectable leaks.

September, 2005: An Australian energy secretary gets an anti-Cabrillo Port message from California Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, causing the minister to leave Sacramento “in a snit.”

October, 2005: Hurricane Rita rips a floating BHP Billiton natural gas facility off the ocean floor, and sends it 100 miles crashing into the shore of Louisiana. “The facility is designed to withstand the effects of severe hurricanes, so we are not sure why it has gone off location,” a BHPB official says.

March, 2006: Long-awaited, second study of Cabrillo Port concludes it “would result in both short- and long-term adverse impacts” to the coast and its residents that cannot possibly be mitigated.” Impacts that coastal residents would be asked to accept include increased smog levels, the intrusion of a permanent 14-story-high factory ship on Malibu’s coastal horizon, and the extremely remote possibility of a 14-mile-wide flash fire reaching to within seven miles of the city limits.

March, 2006: Mayor pro tem Andy Stern, noting that Malibu is not shy about lawsuits, promises to “dedicate any and all resources” for the coming legal battle “to tie up the Billiton project forever.”

April, 2006: BHP Billiton president Renee Klimszak is booed and cannot complete opening statements as 400 angry people pack Malibu High School for the project’s environmental hearing. “What will Billiton do to compensate me for my ruined million-dollar sunset view?” asks one Point Dume homeowner.

May, 2006: The Environmental Defense Center, backed by a small City of Malibu grant, notes 23 million tons of greenhouse gas per year will be added to the earth’s atmosphere by Cabrillo Port.

July, 2006: Second and third companies propose nearby LNG terminals, both would use substantially greener technology and avoid much of Cabrillo Port’s boilers and smog production.

August, 2006: Nearly 13,000 people send letters or testify before the Environmental Protection Agency to protest the proposed smog permit, which includes the EPA’s earlier flip-flop on the smog offset rules. Lawyers say the smog issue may be the port’s Achilles’ Heel.

August, 2006: A chain of memos from Australia to White House energy office to EPA, resulting in the EPA flip-flop, is uncovered. “Thanks, Amy, to you personally and your team for making this happen” wrote White House advisor Jeffrey Holmstead to regional EPA officials; Holmstead is a former energy industry lobbyist, whose qualifications to be the EPA’s leading smog cop are under Senate investigation.

September, 2006: California Coastal Protection Network screens Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” at Bluffs Park, hundreds attend.

October, 2006: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the only person with authority to veto Cabrillo Port, refuses to comment on the issue as he tries to use Malibu as a backdrop for signing his Greenhouse gas bill. Malibu is invisible, smog from a brushfire obscured the view.

October, 2006: Outside media finally pay attention when Halle Berry, Cindy Crawford, Dick Van Dyke, Ted Danson, Jane Seymour, Pierce Brosnan and other local industry heavyweights attend the now-famous paddleout to protest against all five Southern California LNG terminals.

October, 2006: six crew members are killed when a workboat snags a natural gas pipeline in shallow waters off the coast of Louisiana.

November, 2006: Governor’s office issues unusual denial that he has taken any stand on Cabrillo Port. But his wife’s personal lawyer, a longtime Schwarzenegger political ally, takes a $1 million job lobbying for the project.

November, 2006: Ventura smog board members hand Cabrillo Port a possible stunning setback, and say their smog rules do not exempt the floating factory from the strictest levels of smog regulation. Unless federal officials override the local rules, Ventura’s smog czar says it may not be possible for the LNG terminal to be built under those tough terms.

December, 2006: BHP Billiton officials conspired to sell $5 million worth of Australian wheat to Saddam Hussein in 1996, secretly bypassing American trade sanctions against Iraq, in order to secure valuable oil and gas rights, an Aussie inquiry concludes. Opponents note BHPB was dealing with Saddam at the same time its government was telling Malibu residents it is a trustworthy trading partner.

December, 2006: Company attorney BHPB Thomas Wood says the Ventura County smog board acted as “the result of a politically-charged local decision-making process rather than reasoned analysis” and infers that it will sue if the county holds Cabrillo Port to the same smog rules as all other heavy industry in the area.

As of the end of 2006, the final round of hearings by the California State Lands Commission is slated to be held in Southern California in late March. If approved there, the application will likely go before the California Coastal Commission at its mid-April meeting in Santa Barbara.

Also next spring, two federal agencies, the Coast Guard and the Commerce Department, must act on the project’s license, which is presumed to be a done deal by opponents. The EPA will then have to issue its final decision on the controversial smog and water permits, a possible glitch that could require additional public hearings.

And after all that, the governor has final veto power. A decision is possble by July.

CAPTION 1.

INTERNATIONAL ATTENTION—Worldwide media focused a high-intensity spotlight on the growing opposition to the LNG projects in California at the Paddleout Protest in October.

Dozens of Groups and Conservancy Appeal Planning Panel’s Decision

• Lot Line Adjustment Turns into Trails Issue in Latigo

BY BILL KOENEKER

What appeared to be a routine lot line adjustment approved by Malibu’s planning commission recently for several lot line adjustments on four lots in Latigo Canyon has turned into a major appeal by a state agency and over a half dozen environmental and trails organizations. The city council is scheduled to hear the matter on January 8.

The Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, the Malibu Trails Association, People for Parks, the Santa Mountains Task Force Sierra Club, the Malibu Coalition for Slow Growth, the Malibu Coastal Land Conservancy, the Santa Monica Mountains Trails Council and local activist John Mazza want the city council to reconsider the application in light of a trail sought by the organizations in exchange for the city granting the lot line adjustment on four adjoining vacant parcels located at 5902-5908 Latigo Canyon Road.

The property was formerly owned by an entity called Primrose or Buckingham Properties, but was recently sold. The new owners are identified for each lot as Alison Properties, LLLP, Liffey Properties, LLLP, Cyan Properties, LLLP and Dunluce Properties, LLLP. The city was informed of the ownership change just last week.

Municipal officials insist a trail cannot be conditioned to the lot line adjustment and cannot be required of the applicant.

“There is no nexus to require the trail,” said the city’s planner Stefanie Edmondson, who indicated it would be up to the applicant to donate or make an offer to dedicate a trail.

While many appeals have been heard by the city council, this is believed to be the first time that so many organizations have joined together to try to force the city’s hand in an appellate case.

Solstice Steelhead Restoration Plans Making Progress

• Corral Canyon Road Bridge Construction Will Remove Another Barrier

BY BILL KOENEKER

Municipal officials are close to helping remove another obstacle in Solstice Creek in preparation for returning the steelhead trout to the nearly pristine stream. The latest move—the construction of a replacement bridge—comes on the heels of the National Park Service, which owns a large chunk of the canyon, removing almost all of the obstacles in the upstream portions of the creek in the multi-agency attempt to restore the year-round running stream in Solstice Canyon as fish habitat.

The Malibu City Council, at its next meeting, is poised to award a $770,000 contract for the construction of the replacement bridge on Corral Canyon Road. The concrete box culvert under the bridge was identified as an obstacle to fish passage that needs to be removed. The city had accepted a $637,815 grant from the state Department of Fish and Game for the removal of the barrier to allow fish to continue swimming up the creek under the Corral Canyon Road Bridge.

The state Department of Transportation has indicated it will be involved in removing what will be one of the last obstacles when the state agency begins reconstruction of the culvert under Pacific Coast Highway to allow for fish passage from the creek to the ocean and back. Steelhead spawn in the creek and then return to the open ocean before returning once again to their birthplace in various coastal creeks up and down the Pacific coast.

The city’s award, given in 2004, is already less than the total expense of the current project. Escalating costs of construction materials and labor and some of the uncertainties and risks of building in a live streambed have left the project with a $383,000 deficit, according to municipal officials.

Consequently, the staff is recommending the city use its own money to supplement the matching funds required for the grant. The original matching funds were initially pledged by Heal the Bay and the National Park Service. The city needs to act now so the grant money is not lost when the grant expires in March 2007.

“This project is proposed to be fast tracked through [an] expedited advertising/award process,” wrote Granville “Bow” Bowman, the city’s special projects manager, in a staff report. “Thereby saving an estimated three to four weeks of time.” Construction for the project, if the council approves the contract, would begin in February and be completed by the deadline at the end of March 2007.

The state DFG has completed the environmental documents required by the California Environmental Quality Act and plans and specifications have been prepared and completed by the staff and a consulting firm, according to Bowman.


CAPTION 1.

FREE-FLOWING—This barrier was removed to allow steelhead to traverse the waterway. Even small dams can create impenetrable obstacles for the endangered fish.

Giant Lighthouse Lens Returns ‘Home’ after a 50-Year Malibu Stay

Photo credit, MSN/Hans Laetz
IMAGE—Curator Kristen Heather shows off the seven-foot-high lens that is now back at the Point Femin Lighthouse and the photo of it that was a gift to the man who was its caretaker.

• Fresnel Gets Community Welcome

BY HANS LAETZ

A historic lighthouse lens that sat in an office window on Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu for three decades has been returned to serve as the centerpiece of a beloved monument lighthouse in the small coastal community of San Pedro, and Malibu Realtor Louis T. Busch had a dinner thrown in his honor by its grateful residents.

Busch, a lifelong local resident and the son of the pioneer Malibu developer , was given the six-foot-high, crystal-and-brass artifact in the 1970s. The lens was in Malibu for the last 50 years, most recently keeping watch on Pacific Coast Highway traffic from Busch’s east Malibu real estate office. “I always felt that if we could prove where it came from, it would go back there,” Busch said.

“He was very sweet about it when we proved the case,” said lighthouse curator Kristen Heather, a City of Los Angeles park employee. Heather and Busch worked together to scour the National Archives in Washington, and found a 1912 picture of the Point Fermin lens.

“The screws on the side of the lens, at the brass cover, made the match,” Busch said. “Every single one of them was lined up exactly as in the photo, and at that point I conceded it was their lens,” Busch said.

“It was like a DNA match, and Mr. Busch offered the light back to Point Fermin,” Heather said. “We are so very thankful for Mr. Busch’s caretaking of the light for all these years.”

The 82-year-old was the toast of San Pedro last weekend, feted at a banquet for returning the lens. The formal dedication of its display Saturday at the 135-year-old lighthouse was a matter of great community pride, with a marching band, Model A parade, Army color guard in World War II dress uniforms and a grand unveiling of the centerpiece of the restored structure.

The lighthouse lens was cast in 1890, but first placed atop the three-story lighthouse on Point Fermin in 1912 to guide ships to the entrance to San Pedro Bay, and to Los Angeles Harbor after it was dredged.

The magnificent glass lens, called a fourth-class fresnel by experts on such things, magnified and reflected the meager light put off by an oil lamp sitting at its base. The entire structure rotated, casting out the only light visible to seafarers in the busy San Pedro Channel, warning of the treacherous rocks below, and beckoning to the welcoming harbor a mile to the east.

The oil lamp was replaced with an electric bulb in 1921, but the mechanical glass and brass device continued to rotate and blink until December, 1941, when fears of a Japanese attack extinguished the light and started the giant lens on its strange journey to Malibu.

Army soldiers dismantled the light and converted the lighthouse into an observation lookout for enemy bombers or ships. The lens was put on display at the Santa Monica Pier, but when storms flooded a museum there the lens was stored for safekeeping in a museum-worker’s house.

That house was sold, and with it the forgotten lens. Somehow the six-foot brass-and-glass tower came into the possession of an Encinal Canyon man named Cap Watkins who worked as a lifeguard in Malibu. His son gave it to Busch, along with the story that the light had been salvaged after being taken to the dump.

In 1971, Point Fermin Lighthouse celebrated its centennial and museum volunteers attempted to gently persuade Busch that he had their lens. Busch remained unconvinced, and the fresnel stayed in Malibu.

“I joined the United States Lighthouse Association to try to find out where my lens came from,” Busch recalled at his office Monday, a Christmas tree sitting where the lens reigned supreme for 30 years. “There were dozens of these things built, and they were discarded when lighthouses were electrified or modified.”

At the Friday dinner, all was forgiven and forgotten. Busch was hailed as the hero who saved the light, the Southland community celebrated, and the grateful members of the Point Fermin Lighthouse Society presented Busch with a near-lifesize canvas photo of the lens as a substitute for the real thing.

“I sat across from Mr. Busch at the dinner,” said society volunteer Henrietta Mosley, a lifetime resident of San Pedro. “He really didn’t want to give up that lens, but in the end, he was very good about it.”

Busch plans to hang the photo in his office. “The lens belongs at the lighthouse, and they did a good job displaying it,” he said. “I feel very good about it.”

SMMC Board Holds Closed Session Exploring Two-Way Cross Litigation

• Conservancy and City to Meet Before Heading to Court

BY BILL KOENEKER

The board of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy held a special teleconference meeting this Monday afternoon to discuss the pending litigation with the City of Malibu and to talk about directing its counsel to initiate litigation against the city concerning the SMMC’s public works plan, according to a Conservancy official.

“They authorized a defense of that litigation. We heard from our counsel about a potential countersuit,” said SMMC executive director Joe Edmiston, who said he could not really discuss much more about the closed session.

The Conservancy took the action after last week’s announcement by the city that council members had directed the city attorney to file litigation against SMMC, contending the state agency failed to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act, that an Environmental Impact Report is required and the proposal requires a Local Coastal Program amendment or permit. An LCP amendment or permit would be authorized by the city. The California Coastal Commission would certify the public works plan.

The plan calls for linking five Conservancy properties and a National Park Service holding with a multi-use trail, including overnight camping and additional activities at Ramirez Canyon Park where SMMC is headquartered.

City Attorney Christi Hogin had held out an olive branch saying the city did not want to fight the Conservancy in court and the two government agencies had much in common and sought a conference before the litigation was filed by the city.

Edmiston said Conservancy officials were willing to meet with municipal officials over the holidays. The SMMC head noted Mayor Ken Kearsley at a previous meeting had said the city and the Conservancy were in agreement on 98 percent of the plan and the problem was with the remaining two percent.

Edmiston said it would be irrational not to go into negotiations if indeed there was such a small percentage of disagreement. “The key is to see about that two percent,” said Edmiston, who added that in the past whenever the Conservancy brought up key issues it seemed to fall within the two percent of disagreement.

Hogin was not immediately available for comment this week.

Council Votes to Take SMMC to Court over Its Public Works Plan

• City’s Challenge Centers on CEQA Compliance

BY BILL KOENEKER

Malibu City Council members voted in closed session this week to legally challenge the proposed public works plan recently approved by the boards of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy and Mountains Recreation Conservation Authority for submittal to the California Coastal Commission. City Attorney Christi Hogin made the announcement at the start of the council meeting Monday night. Council members made no comment about the action.

The controversial plan has been met by harsh criticism from many Malibu residents who have verbally sparred with other outside recreational interests on the fate of the coastal canyons involved in the trails and camping plan during public hearings.

The plan calls for linking five Conservancy properties and a National Park Service holding with a multi-use trail, including overnight camping and additional activities at Ramirez Canyon Park where the SMMC is headquartered.

Hogin said the basis of the lawsuit, which the council directed her to file, is that the state agency failed to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act. “An Environmental Impact Report is required,” said Hogin, who added, “The Conservancy does not acknowledge that CEQA applies.”

The city attorney noted that many of the substantive issues of the plan involve uses of property that are not owned by the Conservancy. “They are not in the scope of the plan and require a Local Coastal Program amendment or a permit,” he said.

However, Hogin held out a conciliatory note. “We are really hopeful we can avoid the situation where two agencies are dueling it out in court. We have shared goals. The number one priority is to see if we can work out something,” the city attorney added.

The head of the SMMC, Joe Edmiston, has argued that the entire process of the public works plan being submitted to the Coastal Commission will entail the environmental review the city is seeking. The SMMC executive director noted that the final submission to the coastal agency will include detailed technical analysis of its various components, including geology, mapping, grading, traffic engineering and accessibility.

Edmiston has insisted that a public works plan is like a Local Coastal Program and LCP certification does not require an EIR.

The city attorney countered that the state statute does not read that way. “The SMMC argument is a LCP or a LCP amendment are exempt. [They say] the public works plan should be regarded as exempt. But the statute does not say the public works plan is exempt. It only says the LCP is exempt,” Hogin said.

Cabrillo Port Approval Process Moves Forward

• 2007 Hearings Start Taking Shape

BY HANS LAETZ

Public hearings on the controversial Cabrillo Port liquefied natural gas terminal are likely next March and April, and a final decision by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is due in early May, the Malibu Surfside News has learned.

State agencies processing the Cabrillo Port application have been told that the port—if it gets five key approvals plus an okay from the governor—could have its operating licenses and air and water discharge permits in hand by the middle of 2007, nearly two years behind schedule.

A state LNG task force was told Tuesday that a key environmental impact assessment will be completed and released in late February, triggering a series of timetables and calendars that will result in a final decision by June 1.

Proposed in 2003, Cabrillo Port would feature an aircraft-carrier-sized LNG tanker permanently anchored in 3000-feet of water offshore Malibu’s northern end. BHP Billiton, an Australian mining conglomerate, proposes to import more than $5 billion worth of natural gas into California through the floating terminal.

According to the latest timetable, the second version of the Environmental Impact Report is expected to be finished in late February and handed over to federal and state agencies processing the application.

After a two-week period, both the Coast Guard and California State Lands Commission will each hold a last public hearing on BHPB’s application to use public lands for the project.

The day after the Coast Guard’s hearing, probably in mid-March, a 45-day clock starts for the governor to cast his decision. But in the meantime, and assuming the Lands Commission approves the project, the California Coastal Commission will consider a Coastal Permit for the ship.

The Lands Commission is tentatively planning a meeting in Ventura County in mid-March to deal solely with the Cabrillo Port environmental report and operating license. The final state hearing would apparently be at the Coastal Commission’s April meeting, scheduled for Santa Barbara between April 11-14.

On the federal side, the Coast Guard and Commerce Department also both must issue approvals, which is expected. Separate air and water discharge permit hearings have already been held by the Environmental Protection Agency, and have generated significant controversy after the EPA changed its mind and allowed Cabrillo Port to avoid the highest level of smog regulation.

EPA has not indicated when a final decision on the make-or-break smog permit will be released, and the White House has already intervened once on behalf of BHP Billiton.

Opponents and BHP Billiton are girding for a court fight that could delay the project further.

The company is in a tight race to secure permits and build its $800 million Malibu LNG terminal. Five other companies plan similar installations between Ensenada and Oxnard, and federal officials expect that the market can support only one or two expensive facilities.

The company plans to build its ship in an undetermined foreign nation in 2009, and start natural gas imports 16 miles west of Point Dume on July 1, 2010.

2007 Tour to Take Major Detour Away from Malibu

Photo credit, MSN/Frank Lamonea
ROADWORK—Pacific Coast Highway faces many frequent problems, such as the recent water main break, that its use as a cycling route drawing thousands of spectators could be subject to postponement or cancellation.

• City Council Responded to Constituent Concerns about Impact of Thousands of Cycling Fans

BY HANS LAETZ

Objections to the specter of hundreds of thousands of bicycle racing fans clogging Malibu’s main road apparently have scared away the Amgen Tour of California, a statewide cycling competition that will bypass the local stretch of Pacific Coast Highway next February.

Tour organizers announced last week that the second-year version of the bike race will detour around Highway 1 in Malibu, and instead head from Santa Barbara inland, through Ojai, Santa Paula and Santa Clarita.

“I think that’s bad news,” said Councilmember Pamela Conley Ulich, who acknowledged that the prospect of closing PCH on a Sunday might not have sat well with many Malibu residents. “The bike race would have led to more acceptance of bicyclists, and the race is such a cool event. It’s like the Olympics,” she added.

But other council members said they wished the race well on its inland course. “We only have one main street, and it’s used by millions of visitors every year,” said Mayor Ken Kearsley. “Did you see the traffic last weekend when we closed off just one lane for emergency repairs?”

Councilmember Jeff Jennings agreed. “Malibu does not have the geographical layout or infrastructure in place to support a public event of that size.”

Last summer, the nationwide entertainment firm that owns Staples Center asked the Malibu City Council for permission to use parts of Highway 1 for the race. AEG Sports had tentative plans to enter the city from Oxnard on PCH, use canyon roads and sections of Mulholland Highway, and then swoop down to a finish line at Malibu’s civic center.

Most council members sounded deeply skeptical about the prospect of closing PCH on a winter Sunday, and finding parking places and spectator services for hundreds of thousands of race fans. Bike race organizers didn’t help their cause when they showed council members a video of last year’s race, which showed huge throngs of cheering people standing astride all four lanes of a San Francisco-area freeway during the 2006 inaugural run.

AEG, owned by Denver billionaire Philip Anschutz, refused to tell the city how much it was making by selling television rights, sponsorships and naming rights. The company had asked the City of Malibu to supply crowd control and fund other services and allow the race in exchange for promotional rights, including the opportunity to host a VIP tent.

The race is sanctioned by international and national bike racing groups, will raise more than $1 million for charity, and will be televised this year on the Versus network.

AEG announced last week that it will start on the streets of San Francisco Feb. 18, with legs starting or finishing in San Francisco, Sausalito, Santa Rosa, Sacramento, Stockton, San Jose, near Monterey, San Luis Obispo, Solvang, Santa Barbara, Santa Clarita and Long Beach.

AEG calls the race the premier bicycle race in the nation, and hopes it will become as popular as the Tour de France. “We are proud to produce this great event, which not only showcases the exciting sport of cycling and our beautiful state, but brings tremendous economic impact to California as well,” said Shawn Hunter, AEG’s race producer, when he announced the new course last week.

Despite the pessimism from four of the five Malibu politicians last summer, the council voted unanimously to allow the city and AEG to negotiate on bringing the Tour through the city. However, the council majority never pushed for the event.

Conley Ulich said Monday she still hopes that, in future years, the bike race will come to Malibu’s western end, perhaps using PCH to Encinal Canyon Road, and then head up into the hills. “We’re such a beautiful city, and the bike race is such a wonderful way to foster bicycling as a recreation.

“It would show Malibu people that bikers are neat people, and it would open a dialogue about setting up a safe bike route for residents and visitors alike on PCH west of Trancas,” she said.

CAPTION 1. Photo credit, MSN/Frank Lamonea
ROADWORK—Pacific Coast Highway faces many frequent problems, such as the recent water main break, that its use as a cycling route drawing thousands of spectators could be subject to postponement or cancellation.

LNG Behemoth Hints at Legal Action if Strict Smog Rules Are Applied

• Billiton Attorney Says Local Agency Is Attempting to Usurp More Favorable Federal Oversight

BY HANS LAETZ

The Australian company that wants to float a large energy terminal 13.8 miles off Malibu’s coast is hinting at court action should it lose a pending, crucial clean air decision. BHP Billiton says its due process rights will be violated if it is denied use of a disputed smog rule loophole, a ruling that might make it impossible to build Cabrillo Port.

In a letter last week to Environmental Protection Agency officials obtained by the Malibu Surfside News, the company’s attorney blasted local smog regulators for reaching “particularly disingenuous” and illegal conclusions. On Nov. 14, and by a 9-0 vote, the Ventura County Air Pollution Control Board held its onshore smog rules indeed cover the proposed liquefied natural gas terminal, which the company contends is exempt.

That $800 million LNG import terminal, dubbed Cabrillo Port, would discharge 484 tons per year of various smog-causing chemicals into the air upwind of the Malibu coast beginning in 2010. Coastal residents are generally opposed to the prospect of an aircraft-carrier-sized ship, topped by three round domes, on the sunset horizon west of Point Dume.

BHPB attorney Thomas Wood says the Ventura County decision “is the result of a politically-charged local decision-making process rather than reasoned analysis.” The company said local officials have no right to tell federal officials how to interpret local smog rules, and even if they did, acted too late because last month’s vote came after the public comment period had ended.

“That’s just ridiculous,” said attorney Karen Kraus at the Environmental Defense Center, which is partly funded by the City of Malibu, California Coastal Protection Network and donations from local residents. “That disregards the entire meaning of the public hearing process.

“The EPA put out a proposed decision and then held a public comment period, and if those public comments raise issues, EPA is certainly entitled to ask further follow-up questions,” she said.

At issue is the EPA’s proposed interpretation of a local law that may block construction of the LNG terminal, which is worth at least $5 billion in LNG exports to the world’s largest mining company. The Deepwater Ports Act requires the federal EPA to use state smog rules as it decides, among other issues, whether to give Cabrillo Port approval to produce smog without buying “offset” air pollution credits in Ventura County.

Although those offsets would be required if the LNG terminal were proposed on land, BHP Billiton wants to take advantage of what is says is a local offshore exemption rule. The county says it intended only to exempt small Navy power generators on San Nicolas Island, an outpost of Ventura County 60 miles offshore, from strictest smog requirements.

Complicating the matter is the EPA and Ventura County record on the proposed offset rule. In 2003 and 2004, EPA officials strongly argued that the local rules require the offset, but Australian government officials and BHP Billiton lobbied the White House and EPA officials in Washington to overturn that preliminary decision.

In 2005, EPA regional officials said they would “exercise our discretion” and reverse themselves, exempting Cabrillo Port from offsets. Ventura County smog officials at first went along with that proposed federal reversal, but after newspaper revelations of the flip-flop, EPA held public hearings, and got 1200 statements of opposition, as well as evidence that the reversal was illegal.

The offset issue is critical: smog officials said last month there probably are not enough offset credits available for sale at any price in Ventura County to allow Cabrillo Port to be built. “Air pollution,” said one local attorney, “is Cabrillo Port’s Achilles’ heel.”

In the new letter, Wood said “BHP is understandably concerned that Ventura County APCD has changed its original position agreeing with EPA’s application of the Clean Air Act based on the comments of a third party opponent.” But Wood said, “BHP is more concerned that the Ventura County APCD seems to be arguing that it has independent authority to interpret the Clean Air Act.”

The company’s attorney went on to accuse Ventura County of attempting “to tell EPA how the Deepwater Ports Act and the federal Clean Air Act should be interpreted. This is an interesting attempt to usurp EPA’s exclusive jurisdiction to interpret those statutes and to determine how they apply to Cabrillo Port.”

Wood said BHPB relied on the EPA’s 2005 reversal for 15 months, but Kraus said the company has no right to rely on a tentative rulemaking that had not been subject to its mandatory public hearing or formal adoption.

EDC’s Kraus said the Ventura smog board has every right to let the feds know how its smog rules are supposed to work. “The county is simply standing up for itself and telling the EPA how it wants its own rules to be applied.”

The company’s spokesperson, Patrick Cassidy, did not respond to e-mailed questions about his company attorney’s letter.

Final EPA decision on the matter is expected this winter, and likely will end up before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

A parallel application to actually operate the LNG terminal in public waters is beset by other challenges and is nearly two years behind schedule, as officials seek answers to some 1200 technical, safety and operational issues brought up by EDC and Malibu residents last spring.

State and federal agencies might decide on the operating license next spring, with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger having the final veto power.

Ramirez Canyon Homeowners Lose Round in Fight

• Judge Refuses to Issue Injunction Stopping the Conservancy’s Use of Area Park

BY BILL KOENEKER

A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge declined this week to grant a preliminary injunction sought by the Ramirez Canyon Preservation Fund to stop the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy’s use of Ramirez Canyon Park.

The unsuccessful legal action was the outgrowth of litigation filed by the homeowners group that resulted in the SMMC’s coastal permit being invalidated in 2005 by the court.

The Conservancy has continued to use the property, and the Ramirez Canyon homeowners had gone back to court to stop this from continuing to be case.

Conservancy officials, who are headquartered at the property, which was the former estate of Malibu entertainer Barbra Streisand, are calling it a victory for public access to parkland in Malibu.

“We are continuing to operate Ramirez Canyon Park and allow the public access to it within the guidelines of the coastal development permit issued by the California Coastal Commission for this purpose in 2001,” said Joe Edmiston, the executive director of the Conservancy.

Steven Amerikaner, the attorney representing the homeowners, said, “The judge didn’t rule on the merits of the motion. He said procedurally he did not have the authority to rule on the matter. We would have to file another lawsuit.”

The HOA attorney said he and his clients were disappointed by the ruling, but are now considering all of their options before determining how to proceed next.

But there is no uncertainty as Edmiston goes on to explain what the Conservancy’s plans are for the immediate future. “That includes restricting the number of [vehicular] trips on Ramirez Canyon Road with an eye toward minimizing impact on the neighborhood.”

He added, “ We are also voluntarily limiting our uses and have not scheduled any type of [commercial] events, including weddings. We will, however, continue to operate outreach programs at Ramirez Canyon Park for the disabled and elderly.”

The court decision follows on the heels of the boards of the SMMC and the Mountains Recreation Conservation Authority giving the go-ahead for the controversial public works plan to be submitted to the California Coastal Commission. The SMMC head said the submittal is going forward.

“We are proceeding to submit the application for the Public Works Plan authorized by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy and Mountain Recreation and Conservation Authority governing board last week to the California Coastal Commission,” Edmiston added.

Amerikaner, commenting on the recent court action, said he and his clients still do not believe the Conservancy board complied with the Coastal Act, nor did they respond to the many concerns of the City of Malibu or other interested parties.

When asked it any additional litigation would arise because of the board’s most recent action, Amerikaner again reiterated that he and his clients were looking at all of the options that are available to address the matter.

The attorney said they are also still exploring whether they would attempt to bring their conflict with the Conservancy to court before the Coastal Commission considers the public works plan or wait until the coastal panel took some kind of action.

The controversial parks plan proposes linking a series of five SMMC properties and National Park Service land with a multi-use trail, including camping in several of the coastal canyons and expanded uses of Ramirez Canyon Park and, in effect, giving the SMMC a valid permit for its park headquarters.