An artist's rendering of what the proposed shore-side facility would look like should a proposal to construct an unloading platform in Mount Hope Bay is approved. (Courtesy Weaver's Cove Energy)
NEWPORT, R.I. – The developer of a proposed $700 million liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal, which opponents claim would devastate the local ecosystem and disrupt recreational boating on Narragansett Bay, is disputing a scathing ad campaign aimed at rallying public opposition to the plan in the run up to a critical federal hearing process.
In a five-page letter addressed to Save The Bay Executive Director Jonathan Stone and released to the media on Friday, Weaver’s Cove Energy claims that the environmental group’s recently launched multimedia blitz against the proposal to construct an LNG offloading platform in the middle of Mount Hope Bay, purposefully uses “exaggerated, misleading, and inflammatory rhetoric.”
Dissecting claims made in the oppositional campaign, Gordon Shearer, president of Hess LLC and a partner in the Weaver’s Cove project, lambasted Save The Bay’s assertions, referring to them as a “cynical attempt to manipulate public opinion and raise funds for your organization.”
According to Shearer, Save The Bay has made no fewer than nine distorted or false claims in their advertisements.
The first, he says, pertains to the claim that a critical fish habitat would be destroyed by the construction of the off-shore facility. According to Shearer, the project will not destroy critical fish habitat because “neither Narragansett Bay nor Mount Hope Bay is designated critical fish habitat.”
He does, however, acknowledge that the project would likely have an impact on winter flounder residing in Narragansett and Mount Hope bays, which he notes are designated as an “essential fish habitat.”
Secondly, Shearer sought to downplay the impact that necessary dredging would have on the bay – something Save The Bay is contending could have devastating consequences on local wildlife.
According to Shearer, only 73 acres, or “less than 1 percent of the potential habitat area of Mount Hope Bay (and obviously a much smaller fraction of Narragansett Bay)” would require dredging.
Regarding the likely need to shut down traffic during LNG tanker deliveries on the Pell and Mount Hope bridges, Shearer deflected the issue to the Rhode Island Turnpike and Bridge Authority, which he says is solely responsible for that decision and does not necessarily reflect the position of Weaver’s Cove.
Further, he added, concerns over recreational boating exclusion zones in the East Passage are equally overblown. Save The Bay has warned that should the plan be approved, a mandatory security zone 2 miles ahead and 1,000 yards in diameter would be implemented during deliveries. However, Shearer contends that the final security protocols have yet to be made by the Coast Guard, and that outgoing vessels may not require any security zone.
He also noted that LNG tankers make regular trips into Boston Harbor, and that he could see no reason to support the contention that regular shipments of LNG would pose an economic harm to the area. In fact, he said, the facility is projected to create 1,000 direct and indirect jobs during the three-year construction period, and another 400 permanent direct and indirect jobs, resulting in $100 million per year in local economic activity.
But in an interview with the Providence Journal, Save The Bay’s Stone found a critical distinction between Boston Harbor and Narragansett Bay. “Boston Harbor is a very different body of water,” he said. “Narragansett Bay is an intensively recreational body of water…This represents a real shift in the balance of the use of the Bay toward a more industrial orientation. That’s a challenge when there are 44,000 boats resident in Rhode Island. ”
The debate over LNG has heated up in recent months, beginning first with a Coast Guard ruling that unlike a previous on-shore plan, Weaver’s Cove’s proposed off-shore facility does not represent a significant safety threat to the area. That decision was followed by a ruling in the First District Court of Appeals in Boston that decided that Rhode Island’s Coastal Resources Management Council (CRMC) had missed out on an opportunity to hold hearings on the project.
Now, with a critical Environmental Impact Statement expected to be released in the coming weeks, followed by federal hearings on the proposal, the debate is hitting a fevered pitch.
The public will be able to weigh in on the project once the EIS is presented to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) expected some time in February. FERC had approved an earlier version of the Weaver’s Cove project for an on-shore facility in Fall River in 2005.
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Newport, RI
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Methinks Gordon Shearer doth protest too much.
Ok, so Mt. Hope Bay is not a “critical fish habitat”. Shearer is splitting hairs and if he thinks he’s building support for his project he’s wrong.
A critical piece that’s consistently missing from coverage of this topic is Hess’s motivation. Despite their protestations, the well being of our region is not at the top of their list. What financial windfall does Hess stand to reap that motivates them to use so many resources to push this facility that the people of the region clearly do not want?
I think that if the LNG will hurt the enviornment, it will hurt us. Shearer said he acknowledged that LNG might have an impact on winter flounder. If the flounder are impacted, then the things that eat the flounder will be impacted, and the things that eat those things will be impacted, and so on. Soon, it could impact all of the Bay, and finnaly, impact us. If Shearer says it won’t impact us, he is wrong. We need to keep the Bay alive by preserving it and saving it, not killing it’s ecosystem. That’s why I think we don’t need LNG.
I have been advised that “empty” LNG tankers also retain some volume of the cargo, for technical reasons and are thus just as likely as full ones to suffer any of the hazards from religous nut jobs of any stripe and or mishandling. In my experience at sea many incidents occur AFTER, the vessel has arrived in good shape and or after the worst of the storm has passed- people naturally let their guard down after the objective has been met.
Regardless, why do we need one of these things in NB, if there is one in Boston?