Governor Inslee: Green "Hero" or "Zero"?

As posted recently on this Blog, [Inslee admin meets secretly with Longview refinery lobbyists  ] the Governor's staff has met frequently with promoters of the proposed Riverside Energy refinery in Longview.  While he maintains a posture as a "green" advocate for renewable/clean energy, Governor Inslee appears to have much greater and more frequent contact with the Fossil Fuel Industry.
 
Representatives of labor, community and environmental organizations from around the state, organized as the Solidarity Roundtable on Oil, have attempted to meet with Inslee and staff to voice their concerns since last year. When a meeting eventually happened on 03/31/15, two members of Governor Inslee's Cabinet met with them to discuss their concerns.  Rob Duff, Senior Policy Advisor to Governor Inslee, decided not to attend the meeting.

What follows below is the letter sent to Mr. Duff and Department of Ecology directors just prior to the meeting. No actual results of this meeting have been forthcoming. 

It's probably time for Governor Inslee to come out from behind the "green curtain."

cwr
 
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March 30, 2015

TO: Rob Duff, Senior Policy Advisor to Governor Inslee

Maia D. Bellon, Director, Washington State Department of Ecology

Denise Clifford, Director of Governmental Relations, Department of Ecology

Dr. Kathy Taylor, Shorelands and Environmental Assistance Program, Department of Ecology

FROM: Solidarity Roundtable on Oil (Delegation)

Kelly Fox, President, Washington State Council on Fire Fighters

Laura Ackerman, Oil Policy Advisor, The Lands Council, Spokane

Bruce Amundson, President, Washington State Physicians for Social Responsibility, Seattle

Cager Clabaugh, President, ILWU Local 4, Vancouver

Diane Dick, President, Landowners and Citizens for a Safe Community, Longview

Tom Glade, President, Evergreen Islands, Inc. Anacortes

Arthur R.D. Grunbaum, President, Friends of Grays Harbor, Aberdeen

Don Steinke, Coordinator, Sierra Club of SW Washington, Vancouver

Larry Thevik, Vice President, Washington Dungeness Crab Fisherman's Association, Westport

Re: Our Requests for Executive Action: Discussion and Response to our letters to Governor Inslee, November 21^st and March 16^th.

Monday, March 30^th at 1:30 pm. WSCFF Conference Room, 1069 Adams St. SE Olympia

Thanks very much to Governor Inslee and to each of you for meeting with us to discuss our letter and its requests for executive action.

As our letters to Governor Inslee state, we are “opposed to the proposed oil terminals in Grays Harbor and Vancouver and to the expansion of oil refineries in Washington State, including the Shell oil refinery in Anacortes” and we look to the Governor's executive action in this regard.

At this point, we would like Governor Inslee to take the following executive actions:

Add his voice to local, state and Congressional voices calling on Matt Rose (BNSF) and Warren Buffett (Berkshire Hathaway) to get these dangerous oil tank cars (DOT 111s & CPC 1232s) off the rail road tracks that endanger the three million Washington residents living in the blast zone.

Join us in publicly opposing the siting of oil terminals in Vancouver (Nustar) and in Grays Harbor (Westway, Imperium and US Development).

The Governor's current semi-judicial relationship to the EFSEC decision on Tesoro/Savage does not prevent his public opposition to these four terminals. The Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility has stated its opposition to the siting of any such facilities in Washington state population centers. These proposed terminals also threaten Eastern Washington cities, like Spokane, whose EPA designated sole-source drinking water aquifer intersects with BNSF rail lines, oil pipelines and mingles in places with the Spokane River. We need all the downline impacts in eastern Washington thoroughly studied including traffic, greenhouse gas emissions and diesel particulate matter.

Direct his EFSEC Chair, Bill Lynch, to respond to the systematic circumvention of EFSEC review authority by oil companies proposing a series of oil terminals each technically below the threshold, but cumulatively above the threshold, such as in Grays Harbor. These are likely to engage in project creep such as what Global Partners did in Clatskanie, Oregon by quickly exceeding throughput by 400% and paying a fine of pennies per tank car.

Direct his EFSEC chair Bill Lynch and Ecology to include a Health Impact Assessment for its fossil fuel projects, to include in its reviews recent revelations with regard to oil train fires and spills and to insist on a 120 day comment period after a DEIS is published and that SEPA be applied to the full extent of the law.

Direct Ecology to become the lead agency in the EIS process currently mandated for the Shell oil refinery rail expansion project at March Point, Anacortes, and with the NuStar proposal in Vancouver. As a result of the Swinomish Supreme Court decision, Skagit County is disinclined to work with Ecology in developing the Shell EIS. Consequently, the Governor must intervene to require Ecology to assume the role of lead agency.

Direct his Transportation Secretary, Lynn Peterson, and Ecology Director, Maia Bellon, to require environmental assessments for all rail infrastructure improvement projects within the state to include thorough evaluation of all potential and cumulative impacts, short and long-term, caused by increased rail infrastructure capacity by all rail users of those projects, both freight and passenger. To revisit the November 2010 Finding of No Significant Impact for the Pacific Northwest Rail Corridor, projects utilizing state and federal ARRA funds, to ensure remaining projects assess the cumulative and projected environmental impacts of increased freight train capacity, not just improved passenger rail service on which the projects were justified. To assess the private versus public benefits of infrastructure improvements for all rail and highway projects under the Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP).

Direct his FMSIB Chair, Dan Gatchet, and other state agencies (especially Ecology) to fully support a SEPA requirement for wide area cumulative impacts of proposals that studies the nexus between the extraction, transport, refining, use of fossil fuels, oil spills, inadequate spill response and, among other things, increased ocean acidification. Specifically, Governor Inslee should tell Mr. Gatchet that he rejects the suggestion in the May 2014 Advisory Committee report that SEPA review be restricted to the project site.

Direct his UTC Chair, David Danner, to impose on BNSF the full allowable fine of $700,000 for the railroad's 700 violations of state regulations which occurred between November 1, 2014 and February 24, 2015.

Direct his legislative staff to support the inclusion of minimum train crew language in the conference session reconciling Senator Ericksen's (5057) and Representative Farrell's (1449) bills. BNSF's efforts to enforce a one-person crew on these 120 car unit trains is a direct threat to our communities, regardless of their cargo.

We look forward to our discussion on Monday and to Governor Inslee's Executive Actions.