New Haven Independent

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, as expected, Thursday approved the $700 million liquefied natural gas terminal. If built, it would become the first floating terminal for storage and delivery of natural gas in the nation. And it would be located not in an ocean but in an estuary that is part of Long Island Sound.

FERC Chairman Joseph Kelliher said that safety was of prime concern and cited extensive environmental, security and safety conditions — 80 in all. He added that a five mile safety and security zone would be created around the terminal where commercial and recreational activity would be banned. The Commission’s vote was unanimous.

DaRos said he will continue his protest. “I think this is one of the most ill- conceived projects of this size that I could ever imagine. To bring something like that into an estuary is beyond belief that they would do this when there are so many so many other ways. And this is the best they can come up with. You gotta wonder,” he said.

“As a citizen of this country I gotta wonder if anybody has given any credence to studying this for a real energy policy or are we more interested in taking care of Wall Street and making sure these people’s pockets are getting lined. This is being done without any consideration for what we are going to leave beyond as a society.”

RTM Representative Lonnie Reed, a co-founder of Hands Across Our Pond, said “we all saw it coming, but FERC’s approval of Broadwater still feels like a heart-stopping blow to the solar plexus for all of us who have been dreading this day for four years.”

Despite the ruling, she said this was far from a done deal. Attorney General Richard Blumenthal has previously promised court action. He said he plans to ask for an immediate rehearing on FERC’s decision. He told the Associated Press he would take the state’s case to the U.S Supreme Court if he had to. DaRos said the towns and cities in Connecticut need to get behind Blumenthal “and give him as much support as possible to get this thing overturned.”

Before it can forward, the Broadwater project also needs approval from the New York Department of State and from the New York Department of Environmental Conservation. New York must also grant easements through the New York State Office of General Services that would allow Broadwater to use 950 underwater acres of the Sound’s bottom to install a pipeline as well as to drop its sizable barge anchor, Reed said.

Blumenthal has called upon Governor Paterson to stop the project. Former Gov. Eliot Spitzer would have decided in April whether to issue permits. Paterson has said he may postpone the decision.

The Branford RTM was the first governmental body to write and pass with unanimous bi-partisan approval a resolution opposing Broadwater four years ago, Reed said.
At last week’s RTM meeting, Reed (left) stood to authorize a new letter to Governor Paterson, which arrived in New York’s executive chambers Monday, two hours before the new governor was sworn in, she said. Over the years anti-Broadwater resolutions have been passed by other towns and cities in Connecticut and New York. The Westchester County Legislature is the latest body to approve an anti-Broadwater resolution. Reed testified before the Westchester legislature which then voted 15-0 to demand that Albany reject Broadwater. Click here to read the letter.

She echoed DaRos’s sentiments when she said that Broadwater’s LNG barge is designed “for wide-open waters—oceans or gulfs—not fragile shallow estuaries surrounded on three sides by people; not Long Island Sound. Terrorism, accidents and hurricanes pose obvious threats. Serious questions persist about the U.S. Coast Guard’s ability to effectively protect LNG facilities.”

Blumenthal told the AP that FERC’s decision was “Ill-conceived, illogical and illegal. FERC never met an energy project it didn’t like. This decision epitomizes the (Bush) Administration’s lawless love for Big Energy projects, no matter how dangerous or destructive.”

In previous statements, Blumenthal said he strongly opposed what he termed a “monstrous environmental atrocity and severe security risk since it was first proposed more than three years ago.

” It is an unconscionable and ill-conceived project that will permanently remove a vast area of Long Island Sound from all public use and enjoyment for the benefit of a private entity, create unacceptable environmental and public safety risks, and set a profoundly pernicious precedent for the industrialization and degradation of the Sound.”

DaRos believes that at some point reason will prevail. “We poured millons of dollars into trying to clean up the Sound, and make it a valuable resource, which we have done, and now you are going to put in a 1200 foot barge to sit out there to degasify some liquid. That is crazy.”

As for terrorists and other dangers, DaRos said: “Even if you put all that aside and we were living in perfect harmony throughout the world, this is still a stupid project. “

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