Local LNG Foes Get Boost from Major
• Green Powerhouse Litigation Group
Announces It Will Take On Woodside Project •
An environmental watchdog group with a
history of filing and winning green lawsuits has surfaced to
challenge the proposed Woodside liquefied natural gas terminal
proposed for halfway between Malibu and Catalina
Island.
The Tucson, Arizona-based Center for
Biological Diversity has filed a letter demanding that federal
and state regulators protect whales, calculate worldwide
greenhouse gas impacts, and decide if California
can comply with tough new anti-global-warming laws if it
opens up a new stream of imported fossil fuels.
Although those demands have already been
voiced by other ocean-advocacy groups and individuals, the
entry of the CBD into the local LNG fight potentially ratchets
up the legal battle, and gives scattered environmental groups
along Santa Monica Bay a possible lead agency in the
anticipated battle over the proposed Woodside terminal, 21.8
miles south of Point Dume.
“We are in the preliminary stages of
evaluating the Woodside process, and haven’t yet decided
what exact role we will play,” said CBD attorney Jonathan
Evans. “But we are prepared to assume that role when it
starts to become a little bit more contentious.”
At issue is a proposal from the
Australian-based company to station two LNG ships in local
waters, and use them to ferry cargoes of the hazardous
material from transpacific carriers that would then
transfer it farther offshore and upwind of the bay. The twin
ships would regasify the LNG at buoys in the bay, and send the
gas into an ocean-bottom pipeline that would come ashore and
cross Los Angeles International Airport.
The Woodside terminal, marketed as
“OceanWay,” would use a regasification process said
to be cleaner than that proposed by BHP Billiton for its
“Cabrillo Port” LNG initiative, a proposal for 12.8
miles off Malibu that was shot down over environmental concerns
last spring. The environmental review and permitting process
for the Woodside project are underway, with a decision at least
a year away.
The Center for Biological Diversity
has been a frequent thorn in the side of developers and
government agencies in the Southwest, challenging Bush
administration policies that have left many
environmental laws under-enforced. Two weeks ago it gave notice
it will sue the federal government over a plan to sweep aside
environmental protection laws to pave the way for new
high-voltage electric lines across California.
Evans is CBD’s Los Angeles
attorney. He said his group noticed that no lead agency
has surfaced to take on Woodside by coordinating
scientific and legal challenges and decided to take action. The
BHP Billiton terminal went down after the California
Coastal Protection Network hired Santa
Barbara-based Environmental Defense Center
for that role.
CCPN director Susan Jordan said her group,
and the Santa Barbara lawyers, have their hands full with the
NorthernStar LNG terminal proposed for an offshore oil platform
off Ventura, and cannot work on the Woodside proposal off the
City of Los Angeles.
Woodside officials were not available for
comment, but have said in the past they welcome the highest
levels of environmental scrutiny. Company spokesperson
Michael Hinrichs said last November that
the company “anticipated and support(s) the
addition of the greenhouse gas life-cycle analysis” as
already requested by the federal government, which delayed
review of the Woodside project at the request of coastal
advocates while the greenhouse gas and other issues are
examined.
“This helps us provide the public and
decision makers with the most accurate and complete
information,” Hinrichs said.
Woodside officials, he added, are
“proud that we are the first company in California to
conduct such an extensive analysis to evaluate our potential
full-cycle air emissions and compare the results to other
energy sources.”
In legal documents filed this month with
the federal government, the CBD questioned if the
greenhouse gas emissions from transpacific shipments of
LNG can possibly comply with California’s strict new
laws.
