From: Island Institute's "Working Waterfront" newspaper. August 2012 edition
Legal Wrangling Continues over Searsport LPG
By Douglas Rooks.
Review of a proposed $40 million, 22.7 million gallon liquefied propane gas (LPG) storage tank is now in
the hands of the Searsport Planning
Board. But opponents and skeptics of
the project still wonder if their concerns will ever be fully addressed.
“There’s a tremendous number of
moving parts, and the responses we’ve
seen to date tend to raise more questions than they answer," said Steve
Miller, executive director of the Islesboro Island Trust——whose organization has not yet taken a position on the
project.
Attorney Steve Hinchman represents
a local citizens group, Thanks But No
Tank, which has concluded that potential harm from the project outweighs
any benefits, and appealed issuance of
two state permits in Kennebec County
Superior Court.
Among the legal issues raised by the
group are noise levels, visual and scenic impacts, and the lack of a lighting
plan from the developers, DCP Midstream Partners of Denver, Colo.
A brief from the State Attorney
General’s oflice says the Department
of Environmental Protection acted
correctly in issuing the permits. And
DEP spokeswoman Samantha DePoy-Warren, said, “Our review of this project . . . was a thorough and thoughtful one and was completely in keeping
with the high standards of review that
are within our jurisdiction under the
Natural Resources Protection Act and
the Site Location of Development Act."
DEP did impose several conditions
on the permit, including a requirement
that DCP Midstream pay $305,835 into
a state conservation fund as mitigation
for disturbing two acres of wetlands
and rerouting a stream.
DePoy—Warren also noted that, although there were 30 written comments, no one requested a public
hearing, which could have brought
the matter before the Board of Environmental Protection and triggered a
more extensive review.
Hinchman conceded that point, but
said that BEP hearing requests were
only possible for 20 days after DCP
Midstream’s application was filed, in
April 2011, and that “people in town
were just starting to become aware of
the size and scope of this project."
DEP issued the permits in September, while the Army Corps of Engi-
neers signed off in April of this year.
The project still needs a Maine Fuel
Board permit, and will need a federal
Environmental Protection Agency
permit before operating, but at this
point, town review could be the last
major step before construction.
No Tank’s appeal of DEP’s permit
decisions is now before Superior Court
Iudge Nancy Mills, who could issue a
ruling at any time, since the judge has
not requested oral arguments.
But Hinchman is still not convinced
that state and federal reviews will adequately consider the impacts. There is,
for instance, the issue of public safety.
“There are only two LPG storage plants
on the East Coast of this magnitude,”
he said — in Tampa, Fla., and Norfolk,
Va. “And both of them are in heavily industrialized areas remote from
homes and retail businesses?
Hinchman wonders how a volunteer
fire department like Searsport’s would
be able to cope with a major spill or
fire. He noted that a spill at a nearby
fuel depot required dispatch of a foam
truck from Portland.
The tank would be built on 23.6 acres
at the northeast corner of the port site,
relatively close to Route 1. The Angler
restaurant would be a near abutter,
something that led its owner to join
the No Tank group. A mile—long pipeline will connect the harbor site to the
storage tank, which will be 138 feet
high, almost three times the height of
any existing tank in Searsport. A town
height restriction was increased from
50 to 150 feet at a lightly attended town
meeting in March 2011, by a vote of 79-66.
Nor do some local residents believe
the state has appropriately gauged the
impact of truck traffic; initially, all
LPG would be moved by trailer, although rail line access is available.
One comment that doesn’t sit well
with local residents came from Dave
Allen, a DOT traffic engineer, who said
at a recent public meeting, “Route 1
has tens of thousands of vehicles going
down it every day. No one is even going to notice these trucks." The terminal is expected to operate year-round,
24 hours a day.
For Steve Miller, it is coastal navigational issues that are particularly
daunting. In its review of the project,
the U.S. Coast Guard recommended
that no other vessels be in the shipping
lane while LPG tankers are approaching the pier at Searsport. “Managing
traffic during the busy summer months
could take a lot more sophisticated system than anything that’s in place there
now,” he said.
Miller is also disappointed and surprised that the Army Corps of Engineers didn’t require an environmental
impact statement (EIS) for the project,
opting instead for a more abbreviated environmental assessment. “That
could still change," he said. “Searsport
could still request an ElS."
Miller noted that, in an application
for a now-moribund liquefied natural
gas plant on Cobscook Bay, the applicant’s EIS said in its alternatives analy-
sis that Searsport would be unsuitable
for LNG—and, he added, the National
Fire Marshal’s office considers LPG to
be more hazardous than LNG.
Arch Gillies, an Isleboro selectman,
says it’s significant that at least seven
neighboring municipalities have written to the Searsport Planning Board
raising concerns. “There’s a real sense
that this project is a lot bigger than
anyone realized when the application
was filed last year," he said. “I think
that’s starting to sink in.”
But whether that realization will lead
to more scrutiny is anyone’s guess. “In
the filings, it’s diflicult to see the need
for something this large,” Miller said.
“They say there was a propane shortage
in Maine in 2007, but that was really
more about transportation bottlenecks
than supply. It’s hard to argue that all
this new infrastructure is really necessary."
Former Maine Times and Kennebec Journal editor Douglas Rocks has been
covering Maine issues for 25 years. He
lives in West Gardiner.
