LUBA Board Has Ask for Another Extension: The Oregon Land Use Board of Appeals (LUBA) decision that was to come out today - June 26th, on the appeal of the Coos County Land Use Application approved by Coos County Commissioners on the Jordan Cove LNG Facility, has been extended or LUBA has requested that it be extended once again
for an additional two weeks. This will make it July 10th when the final decision should come down from them.

A "BIG THANKS" to Everyone who participated in the June 19th Environmental Quality Commission (EQC - or the DEQ Bosses) meeting in Medford. The Report I received back is that everyone did an outstanding job and made a good impression on the EQC board.

Good Job Everyone and "Thank You" Regina, Lesley, Diane, Dan, Barbara and everyone else who helped organize the effort.

The following link is to a letter and exhibits that were submitted by Jody McCaffree and uploaded today to the FERC library. If you do decide to look at this, while the letter itself is only 5 pages, several of the exhibits are quite large - (Exhibits D, F and G). Those of you who have dial-up may have trouble accessing these three particular exhibits.

To view the document for this Filing, click here;
http://elibrary.FERC.gov/idmws/file_list.asp?accession_num=20080626-5001

ALSO - If you are a registered intervener with FERC and you submit comments to them, you will need to serve all the other parties to the proceeding with a notice of the web link to your comments or the comments themselves. If you do not do this you could risk your comments being discredited by the proponents of these LNG and
pipeline proposals. I will help any of you that need help on how to do this. - Jody

MONDAY June 30th: 7:00 p.m. - Strategy Meeting of Citizens Against LNG at the Coos Bay Public Library in their small meeting room. The Library is located at 525 Anderson in Coos Bay.

Tuesday July 1st: 11:00 a.m. - The appeal of the second application on the Marine Terminal slip dock for the LNG tanker ships is set for legal oral argument to be heard by LUBA. LUBA is located at 500 Capitol Street NE, Suite 235 in the PUC building in Salem

Tuesday July 8th:

Bill Bradbury to Lead Corvallis Public Forum on LNG

WHEN: July 8, 2008 at 6:30 PM

WHERE: Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, 2945 NW Circle Blvd, Corvallis

WHO: Oregon Secretary of State Bill Bradbury, along with these clean energy activists:

Rory Cox, Pacific Environment

Jody McCaffree, Citizens Against LNG

Dan Serres, Columbia Riverkeeper

WHAT: Public forum, "Liquefied Natural Gas: Oregon at a Crossroads." Oregon is faced with three proposals for terminals and pipelines to import Liquefied Natural Gas, a new form of imported fossil fuel. These proposals have created an uproar in Oregon among climate activists, farmers, property owners, fishermen, forest and river conservationists, and others. The projects have pitted the clean energy, global warming and land use policies of Oregon against those of the Federal Government, setting off a critical debate over states' rights. The impacts of LNG on Oregon's climate, environment, economy, and quality of life, as well how the state can develop clean energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, will be discussed.

WHY: To inform the Corvallis community about this critical issue, and how they can take action.

This event is sponsored by Environmental Action Council, Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Corvallis; Sierra Club, Marys Peak Group; Pacific Environment; RACE Coalition; Columbia Riverkeeper; Physicians for Social Responsibility, Citizens Against LNG, Benton County Democrats, Other sponsors to be announced on website
below.

Images of LNG facilities and protests against LNG projects available by request.

For more information:

http://www.LNGPollutes.org/

http://www.citizensagainstlng.com/

http://www.oregonfirst.net/

http://www.pacificenvironment.org/

Contacts:

Elizabeth Waldorf, Environmental Action Council, Unitarian Universalist Fellowship -
541.207.3613

Rory Cox, Pacific Environment - 415.399.8850 x302

July 28th - August 4th: Climate Convergence at River's Turn Farm in
Coburg, Oregon (Oregon central) - check http://www.climateconvergence.org for a map. This convergence will be an awesome opportunity to bring together many people fighting the dirty energy projects and strengthen our movement across the State and West Coast. Plus, this year will be a great opportunity for people fighting the Jordan Cove terminal and the Pacific Connector pipeline to learn new organizing skills and connect with resources around the region. More details on this event to
come......stay tuned..... We hope to have a LNG event on Friday, Aug 1st of this Convergence so reserve that day if you can.

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ACTION ITEM

The following letter deserves some rebuttal. If you have time to go on-line and make a comment or write a letter to the editor - PLEASE DO!!

http://www.theworldlink.com/articles/2008/06/21/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/doc485c8de9ef973460881513.txt

Research center won't be job maker

Saturday, June 21, 2008 | 2 comment(s)

There was a letter written by Steve Jones the director of OCEAN and a member of Citizens against LNG (The World, May 31), extolling the virtues of a coastal research center in Charleston. His opinion is that the dredging of the bay, which would be required if the port were to land the container facility, would destroy that opportunity. He seemed to lump the idea that the liquefied natural gas terminal would require much additional dredging, which is not a fact.

While having a research facility in Charleston is a great goal, I wonder how many family wage jobs would be created by it. The LNG terminal alone will create 120 of those jobs. There could be many more because of the cheap source of energy available near the terminal. There would be more than 500 jobs during the construction periods - jobs that local people could fill. Just look at what Titan Maritime, the company removing the New Carissa, has done for our local businesses and employees.

Jones goes on to say that the LNG terminal will destroy our fishing industry, because it will close the bay. That is not true! When an LNG tanker comes in, it will close access to large commercial vessels from Charleston for eight minutes.

That would be 80 times a year.

As to the container terminal, he is correct, it would require widening and deepening the channel, however, the upper bay would not be dredged more than it is now.

While the antis continue to oppose development, if we don't have ship calls, we won't be able to continue maintaining our deepwater port, and we are threatened with losing the safest port from San Francisco to Seattle. That fact will affect our commercial fishing fleet much more than the limited clearance required during the passage of the tankers. It is my opinion that we need family wage jobs, not just tourist-related minimum wage jobs.


Andy Nasburg

Coos Bay

Steve's letter referenced above is listed below:
http://www.theworldlink.com/articles/2008/05/31/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/doc4840f747aec75245695843.txt

Marine research idea is best one yet

Saturday, May 31, 2008 | 3 comment(s)

I really enjoyed the piece on the proposed Coastal Research Center to be build in Charleston.

As the director of OCEAN of Oregon and a member of Citizens Against LNG, it was a breath of fresh air, to say the least, to read this article. Now, after spending several years dealing with issues regarding proposals for the development of our unique Coos Bay Estuary, it is plain to see that someone is listening. Over the past years, the citizens of Coos County have heard several proposals that would destroy
irreplaceable habitat, endanger our fishing industry and forests or steal citizens' land to bury gas pipelines. It's easy to see here that the people of Coos County and the residents of the Bay Area are a little bit gun shy to say the least of another proposal, especially one that has the involvement of the Oregon International Port of Coos Bay.

After my review of some comments that were presented to the editor, I felt is necessary to respond and clarify that what I feel may be the essence of the issue here.

If one takes the time to read between the lines, the message here is plain and simple, actually it seems it's more of a question and here it is. Why would the state of Oregon invest in and build one of the west coast's premier research facilities and then at the same time let the port destroy the surrounding habitat with an unneeded liquefied natural gas facility? It also is important to note that the proposed widening of the shipping channel would sound the death bell for much of our salmon, crab, clam and eel grass habitat. This habitat must be protected at all cost especially when you consider that our now endangered fishing fleet may not be able to recover form another direct hit on the health of our estuary.

When the port was granted $5 million seed money from our state for the container proposal and shipping channel widening last year, there were some conditions laid down by our Legislature.

No money was to be released to the port unless there was a signed agreement between the railroad (RailAmerica), the terminal developer (Maersk), and the port. Although none of these conditions have been met, the port has decided to continue with their destructive endeavor. It is no wonder the people of the Bay Area are apprehensive
about the research facility proposal, too.

It seems here that the positives far outweigh the negatives and the marine research center proposal could be just what this community needs to springboard the Bay Area into a positive direction. After all, how could one go wrong with the creation of many jobs combined with the knowledge and experience of the highly regarded professionals that will be working at the research facility.

This facility looks to me like a step in the right directions and we won't have to give away a 235-mile long swatch of Oregon to create these jobs.


Steve D. Jones

Coos Bay


As an aside, other nations have made use of natural gas (methane) without resorting to liquification (LNG) and transport via ocean tankers and coastal terminals. No dredging of estuaries, no extraction of underground natural gas and no supercooling of natural gas needed!

"Bio-Methane from Sewage Sludge to Be Used as Bus Fuel"

Wednesday, May 17, 2006 Posted: 11:25 AM JST

"Kobe City in western Japan has decided during fiscal 2006 to prepare for the practical use of bio-methane gas as a fuel for natural gas vehicles. The gas is produced by purifying the gases generated from sewage sludge. This is the first attempt of its kind in Japan.

The new bio-gas was developed jointly by the city and Kobelco Eco-Solutions Co., a subsidiary of Kobe Steel. They started verification tests in October 2004 using a purification system installed at the Higashinada Sewage Treatment Plant. They successfully produced methane gas at 98 percent purity, the same level as city gas, by applying high pressure to the gas generated by microorganisms decomposing sewage sledge, and dissolving impurities such as CO2 and hydrogen sulfide, which make up 40 percent of the gas, in water. In 2005, they began to use this gas to run natural-gas-fueled city buses on a trial basis.

Bio-methane gas is a biomass energy source that does not result in any net CO2 increases in the atmosphere and discharges few atmospheric pollutants, such as nitrogen oxides or sulfur oxides, when burnt. The newly developed gas is seen as a promising clean energy source as it is 30 to 40 percent less expensive than gasoline. The gas is known as "Kobe Biogas", which was selected from among names proposed by the public.

A new purification plant is being built at the Higashinada Plant, with operations planned to begin in spring 2008. It will supply enough bio-methane gas for 40 city buses, each running 50 kilometers per day, or 700 passenger cars, each running 30 kilometers per day."

First published in May 2006 by Japan for Sustainability (JFS). Many thanks to JFS for their kind permission to reprint the article at iKjeld.com.

http://www.ikjeld.com/japannews/00000319.php