Port of Longview commissioners, left to right, Darold Dietz, Bob
Bagaason and Lou Johnson, at Haven Energy hearing at Cowlitz County Expo
Center
2/21/15
Hi folks,
I
attended a meeting Thursday, February 19, on a proposal to use 100 car
unit trains from the Bakken to ship propane and butane to the Port of
Longview for foreign export.
I've pasted my report below.
Dan Leahy
PROPOSED PROPANE TERMINAL
AT PORT OF LONGVIEW
It's an all too familiar scene here in
Washington State as yet another fracked product from North Dakota
wants access to our public ports. This time it's a special meeting at
the Cowlitz County Expo Center in Longview, Washington on Thursday
evening, February 19th.
The hall is filled with 250 to 300
people, the majority of whom are anxious to express opposition to a
psychic, economic and physical threat to their community's security
and work life. In front are the seated and typically silent public
officials, this time three Commissioners from the Port of Longview.
The meeting's chair, Commissioner Bob Bagaason, readies his gavel to
discipline any public impertinence then gives the floor to yet
another corporate front man who, without hearing any gavel, takes up
more time that he is allotted.
George B. Kaiser is among the 100
richest people in the world and the richest person in Oklahoma. He
took over his father's Tulsa based Kaiser-Francis oil company in
1966. By 2010, it was the 23rd largest nonpublic energy
exploration in the U.S. In 1990, he bought the Bank of Oklahoma which
was in FDIC receivership. Now his bank holding company is in nine
states and his ownership share is around $2.3 billion. Overall, Mr.
Kaiser is worth about $10 billion.
Pierre F. Lapeyre, Jr. and David M.
Leuschen are “graduates” of Goldman Sachs where they founded that
investment firm's Global Energy and Power Group in the 1980s. In
2000, they founded their own energy and power focused private
investment firm, Riverstone Holdings, a joint venture with the
Carlyle Group. Since that time they have created a series of
multi-billion dollar energy funds including the 2006 acquisition of
Kinder Morgan, one of the largest pipeline operations in the U.S.
Their main focus has been taking advantage of the fracking/horizontal
drilling revolution in domestic shale oil fields. Riverstone has $6.1
billion committed to investments in energy storage, transportation
and processing.
Mr. Leuschen lives on a 160,000 acre
Montana ranch, funds his own charitable foundation and through it
supported Nature Conservancy's successful effort to buy a million
acres in the Lolo and Flathead National Forests. Mr. Lapeyre resides
at his Redding, Connecticut 24 acre estate with 9,832 square feet of
livable space currently assessed at around $5.6 million dollars.
Riverstone Holdings and Kaiser
Midstream, which is owned by George Kaiser, partnered with Sage
Midstream in 2012. Then in April, 2014, Sage Midstream created Haven
Energy Terminals, LLC. Greg Bowles is the President of both Sage
Midstream and Haven which are based in Houston, Texas.
This brings us to the Expo Center and
Mr. Bowles on a Thursday evening in February.
“Jobs, Safety, the Environment”
Mr. Bowles wants to transport the
otherwise flared propane and butane from the North Dakota Bakken
shale oil fields to the Port of Longview on 100 car unit trains using
pressurized DOT 112 tanks that would arrive every day and a half, 20
or so a month. Then, unload the trains at Berth Four in the middle of
the Port's eight berths, store it in a state of the art tank designed
for “middle east” security and later transfer the liquified gas
via pipelines to 900 foot ships slightly bigger than Panamax tankers
three times a month for export to those countries that don't have a
natural gas distribution system like the U.S. Finally, Mr. Bowles
wants the Port of Longview Commissioners to sign a lease with Haven
on March 10th so the permitting process can begin.
Questions and Answers
As you can imagine, the question and
answer period with Mr. Bowles was both frustrating, yet enlightening
for audience members. Mr. Bowles, of course, was not about a
profitable return on the half billion dollar investment by Kaiser,
Leuschen and Lapayre. Rather he was about “jobs”, “safety”
and “the environment.”
Here's a few of the exchanges between
audience members and Mr. Bowles.
Q. What is the blast zone on the tank
car if the whole car went up?
A. It would depend on how the car went
up.
Q. What is the safe speed at which this
unit train can run?
A. 5 mph inside the facility. Don't
know speed on main line.
Q. Are pipes from tank to ship
permanently fixed.
A. (no answer)
Q. How thick are the tank cars?
A. Don't know. (He can find out later)
Q. Are private investors evading taxes?
Is the money “clean?”
A. Riverstone is a registered
investment adviser with the S.E.C
Q. 900,000 barrels in the storage tank.
What is the evacuation distance?
A. The local fire officials will know.
Q. Why not place this in a less
populated area like Barlow point?
A. We considered it, but not suitable.
Q. If a tank car is on fire, how much
water would you need?
A. The fire department will determine
this.
Q. We are due for a 9.0 earthquake. We
are in a liquefaction zone. What would happen?
A. It would depend on the location of
the quake.
Q. How will the tank ships effect the
spring salmon run on the river?
A. A Coast Guard study waterway
suitability assessment will determine that.
Q. Will there be another hearing after
Coast Guard and Fire Department report is finished?
A. (Addressed to Commissioners): No
answer.
Public Comment Next
After the question and answer period,
comes another ritual familiar to those who participate in such
“special meetings,” a tightly regulated two minute comment period
in front of silent public officials. Still people speak, though.
It's what's available. Besides, despite the rush to Olympia during
legislative session, the public ports are ground zero in this state
for the political struggle over fossil fuel extraction, their bomb
train transport and overseas export.
Spokespersons for ILWU Local 21,
President Jason Lundquist, Vice President Michael Wilcox and Labor
Relations Committee representative Darin Norton each state their
Local's opposition to the project. They have met with Haven for the
past year, but find them misleading with no answers to their
questions. They don't think this project is a good fit for a break
bulk port. The proposed facility has an inherent danger, doesn't
generate enough revenue, will cut the port property in half and turn
the port into a landlord.
Health professionals like Dr. Kelly
O'Hanley, Regna Merritt from Physicians for Social Responsibility and
Alona Steinke from Vancouver point out how trains delay emergency
vehicles at crossing, spew cancer causing diesel particulates
particularly susceptible to school children near the rail lines, pose
a catastrophic risk far beyond any capacity to respond and create
sacrifice zones for the twenty-five million Americans who live in the
blast zone.
Jasmine Zimmer-Stucky, an organizer for
Columbia River Keepers, states that if all proposed fossil fuel
terminals are built it would mean thirty-five more ships a month in
the river, all of which, including the VLGC propane tankers, could
shut down other river traffic with safety zones as they transit the
66 miles from Longview through the notoriously dangerous Columbia
River bar to the Pacific Ocean. Jasmine's point is reinforced by
retired Captain Phil Massey who tells the Commissioners they must not
sign any lease before the Coast Guard study is completed.
Diane Dick, a close observer of the
Port and President of the Landowners and Citizens for a Safe
Community, points out that this project is not in the Port's publicly
developed Schedule of Harbor Improvements and therefore should not
proceed. She also notes that the Commissioners are contemplating a
decision that will effect communities all along the rail line from
Spokane south to Pasco and down the Columbia River to Vancouver.
Diana Gordon from the rail town of Washougal points out that both her
city government and school district have passed resolutions of
concern about these dangerous trains.
There are a few folks who speak in
favor of the project. A spokesperson for JH Kelly, a union contractor
in line to build the facility, wants SEPA and FERC process to vet
the project so the community can live safely. A Trustee from Lower
Columbia Community College thinks the vetting process will lead to a
more educated and better paid work force. The head of the Economic
Development Council believes the permitting process will be very
thorough and that the Haven project will mean local jobs.
Where's the Lease?
As the meeting winds down, Commissioner
Bagaason states the Port will meet here again to vote on the proposed
lease with Haven. Community leaders like Diane Dick have not seen
the proposed lease and have no idea if the Port intends to make it
public before the vote. Don Steinke, a community organizer from
Vancouver, points out that if the Port signs such a lease they will,
like the Port of Vancouver, be obligated to advocate for the project
through the entire permitting process just like the Port of Vancouver
advocates for the Tesoro/Savage Bakken oil marine terminal despite
massive community and political opposition.
Getting Ready to Sign
Despite their formal silence, it
appears the Port Commissioners are preparing to sign the lease. They
have negotiated a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Cowlitz
County as a co-lead in the process for a SEPA determination. The MOU
identifies their respective point persons for this process, chooses
the international engineering firm, Parsons Brinckerhoff, as the
third party environmental consultant for the SEPA analysis and enters
into a “Staffing Agreement” with Haven covering the costs of SEPA
compliance. Nevertheless, the Port is still accepting comments on
this proposed project until March 10, 2015 when they say they will
vote on the lease and at least one of the Commissioners is up for
election in August.
Dan Leahy
PO Box 602
Olympia, Washington 98502
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