KPLC 7 News, Lake Charles, Louisiana |Environmentalists Fear LNG Effects

Environmentalists Fear LNG Effects

February 25, 2005
By Theresa Schmidt

Southwest Louisiana seems to be a prime target for proposed LNG receiving terminals and regasification facilities. Besides environmental and safety concerns with individual facilities, some fear the combined effects of multiple facilities is being overlooked.

"Slow the train down!" That' the call from environmental groups, shrimpers and charter boat captains.  They held a news conference in New Orleans this week about Shell's plans to locate an LNG gas plant in the Gulf of Mexico. Among other things they want companies to be required to use the technology least likely to hurt the environment. A.J. Faub is president of the Louisiana Shrimp Association: "We are trading off industries that are profitable in the Gulf, for something we don't know about. And there's other alternatives to the open loop system. That's what's very interesting here."

If you look at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's web site you see Southwest Louisiana is indeed the target for many companies planning facilities. Environmentalists like Darryl Malek Wiley with the Sierra Club and Mike Tritico with RESTORE say it's all happening too fast: Darryl says, "I think what's happening is that these facilities are coming so fast and furiously that it's hard for anybody to really understand what's going on. I think these companies are trying to go underneath the radar screen, trying to slip them in before people know about it and it's of grave concern to the Sierra Club."

Tritico is concerned about safety. "Maybe if people begin talking about this and say, 'Why should we have to face these hazards? Why should our children have to live near this much stored energy that could create a huge fire?' Maybe some elected official in Southwest Louisiana will say, 'Hey, let's take a close look at this. It's a public safety issue.'"

The Sierra Club and numerous other groups have written the governor asking for a study on the cumulative effects of numerous facilities on fisheries in the Gulf of Mexico.  Says Malek-Wiley, "The effect on fisheries is going to be very much a concern and the studies done to date have not really looked at how that's going to impact shrimp, oysters, a whole range of issues." E

nvironmentalists say as of January 22 LNG facilities had been approved or proposed in the Gulf of Mexico. Environmentalists fear the process many companies want to use to re-gasify LNG could destroy fish eggs and larva by the billions. They call for a less destructive method to be used.