Public Expresses Overwhelming Opposition to LNG Port in Coastal Waters

Over 10,000 Comments 

Submitted in Opposition to Port Ambrose

Ever since Liberty Natural Gas first proposed constructing a liquefied natural gas (LNG) port in New York and New Jersey waters, the project has engendered a storm of opposition and received almost no public support. Today, as the public comment period draws to a close, the extent of this opposition can be seen in the thousands of comments that have been submitted to the Maritime Administration. Catie Tobin of Clean Ocean Action has been closely monitoring the government website, and she reports that as of this morning only 12 out of more than 10,000 comments express support for the project.

As expected, much of the opposition stems from concerns that the port would create air and water pollution and harm marine life, including endangered species, and would exclude fishermen from prime fishing grounds. Others have expressed concern that the facility would be an attractive terrorist target, and that it could disrupt shipping to and from the Port of New York. These hazards and more were identified by New Jersey Governor Chris Christie when he vetoed this project in 2011 and reaffirmed his veto in 2012. The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management noted that the port could interfere with the construction of an offshore wind farm proposed for the same location.

Claudia Borecky, of the Coalition of Nassau Civic Associations, says, "Our south shore communities are still struggling to recover from Superstorm Sandy. Siting an LNG port off our coast would stress our communities to the breaking point."

Matt Gove, Mid-Atlantic Policy Manager for Surfrider, adds, “Our thousands of members in New York and New Jersey are strongly opposed to the Port Ambrose LNG project. It is dangerous and unnecessary, and not worth the risk it presents to our economically and recreationally critical coastal ecosystems and communities"

But not all of the opposition to Port Ambrose comes from coastal areas.  Bruce Ferguson is with the all-volunteer Catskill Citizens for Safe Energy, which has been working to prohibit high volume fracking in New York State. He is concerned that the proposed LNG port will be used to export fracked gas overseas. “The project sponsor and the Maritime Administration insist that Port Ambrose will only be used to import LNG from abroad, but that doesn’t make any economic sense. Foreign gas companies are unlikely to ship LNG to the United States facility, since natural gas prices are three-to-five times higher in Europe and Asia. I have no doubt that if Port Ambrose is built, it will be used to export fracked gas overseas, and that could have a devastating effect on New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio.” Catskill Citizens submitted more than 5,400 comments on the proposed port; many of them were about fracking related “upstream impacts” of fracking.

“It is clear that Port Ambrose is not in the public’s interest,” said Cindy Zipf, Executive Director of Clean Ocean Action.  “Our organization has described the many adverse safety, environmental, economic, and cumulative impacts in 127 pages of detailed comments we are submitting to the Maritime Administration.”  Zipf points out that the governors of both New York and New Jersey have the authority to unilaterally prevent Port Ambrose from being built. “It would be a great end-of-the-summer gift to all of us if our governors would keep our ocean safe for tourists, fishermen, commerce and the future by officially vetoing the project.” 

Port Ambrose (US) & Port Meridian (UK): The Untold Tale of Two Ports

Despite Claims about Imports, Corporate Connections Expose Export Future for Proposed Facility Offshore of New York & New Jersey Coast That Would Devastate the Region

Groups urge companies to come clean about their intent to export

A triangle of corporate connections makes clear the link between natural gas imports and exports for the proposed Liberty LNG Port Ambrose facility off the New York and New Jersey coast.  That was the evidence presented today by Clean Ocean Action, Catskills Citizens for Safe Energy, and the Coalition of Nassau County Civic Associations, along with many others in the broadly-based Anti-Liberty LNG coalition. 

This coalition called on Liberty LNG’s owners, West Face Capital (a Cayman Islands investment account), and project lead Roger Whelan, to come clean on the corporate energy interests of Liberty LNG’s owners that have not been disclosed to the public or to the federal agencies reviewing the port in the application.

Across the nation, energy companies by the dozen are lining up to export U.S. domestically produced natural gas – over two dozen companies have already been granted authorizations by the Department of Energy – and, under the law governing Port Ambrose simple written permission from the federal government is all that would be needed to change an import facility license to an export license.

West Face Capital, and Port Ambrose project lead Roger Whelan, have thus far failed to disclose a significant interest in another port – a facility that appears to have been built with Port Ambrose exports in mind.  Last November, Roger Whelan announced, on behalf of West Face Capital, the purchase of “Port Meridian” – a deepwater port of the exact same design as Port Ambrose.  This port, already approved for construction, anticipated to come online around the same time as Port Ambrose, would be operated by Höegh LNG – the exact same company and fleet of LNG vessels as Port Ambrose.

Höegh LNG, the partner in operations with West Face Capital, is the self-proclaimed global leader in floating liquefaction (“FLNG” - the technology needed to liquefy natural gas on a vessel moored at a Port Ambrose- and Port Meridian-style “turret buoy”); the Höegh LNG website claims: “no FLNG service provider has the same competences and capacity” and that Höegh LNG has invested over 400,000 engineering man-hours in developing this technology.

“West Face Capital bought a facility in the United Kingdom (a nation starved of natural gas supplies), and a facility in the United States (a nation where exports are being approved at a staggering rate), and set up Höegh LNG (a company leading the world in liquefaction at-sea from the same turret “STL” buoys which would be in place at both Port Ambrose and Port Meridian) to operate both ports,” summarized Sean Dixon, Coastal Policy Attorney at Clean Ocean Action.  “The evidence clearly points to this Cayman Island bank account’s plan to send U.S. natural gas overseas through its own energy bridge.” 

“While Port Ambrose and the federal government continue to claim that the sole intended use of the facility would be imports, reality is that this is a ‘bait and switch,’” warned Clean Ocean Action Executive Director Cindy Zipf.  “For the American people, our safety, our quality of life, and our environment, the stage is set for disaster if Port Ambrose is licensed.”

“Although Port Ambrose is being sold to the public as an LNG import facility, there is abundant evidence that it will actually be used to export fracked gas overseas, given that there is no viable market for imported LNG in New York City or on Long Island - I have no doubt that the current license application for an LNG import facility is a Trojan horse,” stated Bruce Ferguson with Catskills Citizens for Safe Energy.  “If Port Ambrose is licensed and used to export fracked gas, the ‘upstream impacts’ of fracking will devastate a broad swath of the Northeast, leaving Americans with contaminated drinking water, contaminated air and the destruction of important, sustainable economic industries such as agriculture and tourism. And for what? So other countries can be supplied with cheap energy, and so a foreign corporation can make a killing.”

“Keeping in mind that Nassau's south shore communities are still struggling to rebuild after Superstorm Sandy, situating an exporting liquefaction facility less than 19 miles off our southern coast would stress recovering communities to the breaking point if the facility were to be damaged by a severe storm, cautioned Claudia Borecky, LNG Port Committee Chair at Coalition of Nassau Civic Associations.  “In recent weeks, LNG facilities in Yemen were reportedly on Al Queda's target list.  Situating an exporting liquefaction facility at the entrance of one of the busiest harbors in the United States would place our entire region at risk for a terrorist attack.”

Comments on the proposal are due Thursday, August 22, 2013, to the federal docket (USCG-2013-0363-0181) at www.regulations.gov.

Related Links:

1.       Read an article about the sale of Port Meridian by Höegh LNG to West Face Capital (along with quote from Project Lead Roger Whelan), HERE

2.       Read a story about the sale price of Port Meridian, HERE

3.       See Höegh LNG’s claims about floating natural gas liquefaction (including at “disconnectable turrets” like those proposed at both Ports Ambrose and Meridian), HERE