Bay History 2007. Dumping dredge spoils into Penobscot Bay. Listen to a 2007 public info meeting

On September 13, 2007, Maine DMR hosted a Public Information Meeting on the Cianbro proposal to dredge part of Penobscot River adjoining the Eastern Fine Paper mill, notorious for its sediments rich in mercury and chlorinated chemicals, and dump it at the Rockland Disposal Site                                 .  

Read National Marine Fisheries Service
Oct 24, 2007 letter to Cianbro on this dredge project

Note: the recording of this event is of  uneven audio quality

1. Intro and summary of public meeting Ron Huber  6min 45 sec 

2.  Brian Swan, DMR Environmental Coordinator  opens meeting 2min 9 sec

3.  Tom __ Cianbro  8min 43sec

4 Parker Hadlock on dredging. Pt 1. 6min25sec

5. Parker Hadlock on dredging  Pt2  9min 5sec

6. Diane Cowan, Lobster Conservancy  1min 53sec

7. Hannah Pingree  3min 7 sec

8. Becky Bartovics  1min 52sec

9. Diane Cowan   1min 54sec

10. Ron Huber barges and Invasive species. 1min 23sec

11. Final Remarks by Cianbro. 1min 17sec

12. Complete meeting 46min 11sec

Maine's Sea Wind Liberation bill: final action Monday

It has been positively Prufrockian in Maine's capital city if you care about the Wild Wind.

LD 1810 is a  bill offering the Dawn State the opportunity to lead America either into a confused beach head of fractured local economics and social unrest, or else divert the ocean wind farm wannabes further offshore.  That depends on whether on Monday April 5th the Maine Legislature finally  denies Maine's territorial tidal waters to intrusive, over-subsidized wind turbo farms like those set up on peaks and ridges of the Maine Woods.


Many more are planned  by  an alliance of utility investment groups, & high end compromise-prone state & New England eco-yuppy outfits, milking trickle-down gold from the Wind Giants. 


Then on March 24, 2010 this  ENGO/corporate hydra had its many heads handed to itselves,  for trying to wade out onto Maine's territorial sea mounts and ledges with similar "dumb growth" designs as they'd foisted on up lands.


The plan to infest Maine state  waters with  bladed towers has been left:

 "spread out against the sky / like a patient etherized upon a table.'   

 Yet similarly, final action on historic Wind Liberation legislation  too, continues to crawl glacially  toward the finish line. This time the final vote has been delayed to Monday - the very last day of the 2010 legislative session. And what amazing changes  the bill has gone through in the month since it first appeared! 

 An Act To Implement the Recommendations of the Governor's Ocean Energy Task Force" came out of that task force ready to force open every square mile of Maine state waters to industrial scale ocean windfarming.  But from the would-be invasion's beginning on March 11th,  Maine's two give-no-ground lobstermens associations held firm, letting wave after wave of windvaders, blades glittering above their briefcased ranks like sarissas, break futilely against their Ancient  Rights.   

But even granite becomes sand under repeated waves. At a major engagement  on March 18th,  Maine's lobstermen's 1st Legion, the MLA, was, to their everlasting ignominy, on the verge of giving up ground,  when a wild charge roaring in on shrimper, scalloper and groundfish boats savaged the invaders'  initiative, driving the windbaggers back mile after mile with their furious onset!  

Completely out of Maine state waters! Then, on March 23rd, as the Windies tried to reform, across the Line in federal waters, they were shocked to find Maine's oceanic cavalry  pouring from Bar Harbor  and other coastal towns in  coordinated small group forays through the three mile gate after them. This would be no Gettysburg, with the southern invaders again allowed to escape after their crushing defeat....

But escape they did, after being chased ten miles from shore, and vanishing, tails tucked,  into venture capital warrens - where no sensible fishermen goes.

Magnanimous in victory, Maine's fishing industry's terms were merciful: a ten mile no-windfarms buffer stretching out from Maine's shore, beyond which the Windies could practise their extraction industry - as long as (1)  the University of Maine held a controlling interest in those operations and not Wall Street, and (2) Maine electricity users had optional first dibs on the juice coming ashore in Maine from those offshore operations. 

Permission, too, was granted to test prototype offshore floating windsnatcher technology at  three tiny border sites off Midcoast Maine, to the relief of Bath Iron Works and Prock Marine, which would build the experimental wind-gathering machines, and even the mighty offshore behemoths that would be taken  by the University of Maine deep into the Gulf over the horizon.

Treaty terms made, it is up to the maine legislature and the Governor to ratify them. Bureaucratic dawdling has delayed the final signing of the agreement  by Govenor Baldacci, but  Monday is the final day of the legislative session, and already, witnesses have "heard the mermaids singing, each to each" and the governor grumbles "I do not think that they will sing to me."

* Quotes from "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." by T.S. Eliot

The War of 1810 - Maine's fishermen move to repel Big Wind invaders from their home waters.

A good day for fishermen at Maine's State Legislature concerning LD 1810, An Act To Implement the Recommendations of the Governor's Ocean Energy Task Force.  

Listen to testimony at the March 11 hearing

Prelude to battle. In the 36 hours before the hearing, members of the Utility and Energy Committee  heard loud and clear from Maine fishermen about their extreme displeasure with the notion of this bill opening up Maine state waters to nearshore commercial windfarms, pushing scallopers shrimpers & groundfishermen out.  

A war of words.  At the hearing, not only fishery activists, but Representative Leila Percy, co-chair of the Marine Resources Committee, let them know both that the bill  threatened Maine fishermen and was not acceptable, and that she spoke for Speaker of the House Hannah Pingree (who couldn't be there)  on this as well.  Listen to Representative Percy here (2 minute mp3)  Other legislators too, chimed in that their constituents weren't having any part of it.. Listen to them all  (7 recordings so far; more being added. Keep checking back)

Shock and awe. As the TV cameras rolled, and energy lobbyists reeled in dismay,  the Utility and Energy Committee switched from unqualified support for LD 1810, to acknowledging two alternatives: either 

(1) turning LD 1810 into a Resolve, and shipping it round  to other legislative committees and commercial fishing communities next year before taking any action, or 

(2)  removing from the bill all wording related to anything that would facilitate  commercial windfarm operations in Maine state waters.

Under # 2, the bill would continue with sections that give the wind industry tax breaks and immunizes it from a variety of conservation and environmental laws, also known as  "streamlining"  the laws.  "Streamlining? More like amputating the law," one conservation  activist grumped to the committee,  and the room filled with uneasy laughter.

Also remaining in the altered LD 1810  would be a controversial "Welfare Wind" section, This part of the bill forces Mainers to subsidize the wind industry by requiring electricity utilities to purchase wind-generated power for triple what they pay Bangor Hydro and other  electricity providers,  but then allows the utilities  to pass  the increased cost on to Maine consumers.

The Enemy of my enemy is my Friend. The oil heating industry also showed up in opposition to LD 1810  In particular, they opposed a section that calls for phasing their industry out of the home and commercial heating business and requiring Maine consumers to use electricity for heating.  

While oil and lobsters don't mix well in nature, in Augusta they may together push LD 1810, and the energy industry behind it, far away from its original goals.  


Counteroffensive in the offing?  The Windies will surely strike back and try to retake the conceptual ground , will try to recapture the bill and keep it as they wrote it.  It will be important for those concerned with keeping Maine state waters open for fishing and closed to wind extraction to keep up the pressure on legislators   The work session where the final decision will be made will happen  next week. 


Stay tuned. Stay ready.

Maine faces new 'Closing of the Commons'. State's fishery agency "caught with its pants down."

Wind industry-backed  bill would stimulate massive leasing of Maine's fish-rich nearshore coastal waters to energy companies. 

Augusta. Beleaguered Maine scallopers, groundfishermen and shrimp harvesters face financial ruin as a tiny state public lands agency looks to become a political powerhouse by leasing Maine's commercial fishing grounds  out from under them. Meanwhile, the state's marine resoruce agency is poised to shrug.

On Thursday March 11th , LD 1810 "An Act To Implement the Recommendations of the Governor's Ocean Energy Task Force"  will come before the Maine legislature's Utilities and Energy Committee.   

The bill would authorize the Maine Department of Conservation's  Submerged Lands Program to: 

 * Offer 30 year wind energy leases of the state's submerged marine lands to wind energy industry  investors. Lobster grounds, scalloping zones, shrimp and urchin grounds, and cod spawning areas would all be opened  to windmill companies leasing by the Maine Bureau of Parks and Lands, which stands to gain millions of dollars in fees leasing thousands of acres of nearshore Maine waters. 

* Ban commercial fishing within the wind leases of any gear that wind industry insurers deem risky to wind farm's underwater cables and  structures.

* Allow wind companies to use eminent domain on shoreline and inland property owners to allow the industry to cut powerline and tower rights of way through private land  to connect the offshore developers to the national grid.


* Allows nearshore windfarms to degrade local scenic values without penalty or need to compensate other users for lost value.

* Forbid coastal towns from assessing property taxes on wind turbines or related equipment and facilities in the municipalities' waters tha are "below the mean low-water line on waters subject to tidal influence."

* Forbid Maine citizens from filing appeals of Maine DEP windmill project decisions to the Maine Board of Environmental Protection.

* Forbid the Maine Board of Environmental Protection from assuming jurisdiction over Maine Department of Protection windmill applications.

FISHERMENS'  FORUM FURY
While Maine Marine Resources chief George Lapointe has expressed dismay about the plan, he wants fishermen to weather the corporate storm by giving up fishing grounds. At the March 6th wind energy Seminar at the  Maine Fishermen's  Forum,  Commissioner Lapointe  noted  that the ocean wind industry in Europe  bans fishermen operating their boats and gear inside their 'exclusion zones', 



 "If their windfarm is 5 miles  by 5 miles, no fishermen are allowed in there." he said.

" It's a huge issue for their insurance companies," Lapointe said .  "You've got the structures  generating the wind connected by cables and then to shore. The impacts of gear on that is clearly a big issue."  

He suggested the developers interested in Maine waters will require the same. "We know that is a component," he said. "Prepare to share."

"The key is how we share." he told the roomful of grim-faced fishermen at the wind industry seminar, but then admitted "there's no direct compensation" [in the bill].

While admitting it was "an accelerated process"  Lapointe insisted the bill is "still going to give time for people to work on real issues ."

The panelists repeatedly declined, however, to answer a key question that arose among the stunned fishing industry and conservationists there: while the wind industry spoke glowingly of the megawatts of energy for Maine and the world,  how many turbines does the industry plan to install in Maine  coastal waters  to reach the state goal of  300 megawatts by 2020?  How many towers to reach the bill's  5,000 megawatt goal for 2030?

Tellingly, neither Lapointe  nor any of the other wind industry and agency people speaking at the seminar received a single clap of applause following their presentations.  This break from traditional civility at the Forum  reflected the mood of  fishermen who had just been shone maps superimposing enormous windfarm leasing areas over their traditional  shrimp, scallop and groundfishing areas. "DMR was really caught with its pants down," one meeting participant said.

Fishermen and grassroots environmentalists have appealed to the Legislature to either send the bill over to the Marine Resources Committee  and/or hold the bill over to next year or both..


"Let's hope Speaker of the House Hannah Pingree and other coastal legislators  stand up for their constituents, " one coastal activist said. " The Department of Conservation certainly won't.
 
In the meantime, they said. priorities should include developing model ordinances for coastal towns and attempting to have Maine's commercial fishing fleets delineate windmill siting areas acceptable to their industry. If there are any.    
                                                

"Most disturbing to me" one scalloper noted, " is the section on the Renewable Ocean Energy Trust.  Proceeds from offshore leases go into this trust and then are disbursed to the DMR for research and monitoring.  This will be millions of dollars put into an organization that is not trust-worthy, unresponsive to the needs and desires of traditional coastal communities, and a bureaucratic mess largely under the influence of the Federal government and private non-profits."