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frontline communities
'Right Thing to Do': FERC Delays Controversial LNG Export Terminal
"We are happy about the delay, but these projects don't ever need to be approved and neither does any other LNG facility," one frontline advocate said.
Dec 04, 2024
Frontline communities along the Gulf Coast were granted a "temporary reprieve" last week when the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission moved to pause its approval of the controversial Calcasieu Pass 2 liquefied natural gas export terminal while it conducts an assessment of its impact on air quality.
FERC approved Venture Global's CP2 in late June despite opposition from local residents who say the company's nearly identical Calcasieu Pass terminal has already wracked up a history of air quality violations and disturbed ecosystems and fishing grounds in Louisiana's Cameron Parish, harming health and livelihoods.
"This order reveals that FERC recognizes that CP2 LNG's environmental impacts are too great to pass through any real scrutiny" Megan Gibson, a senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC), said in a statement on Monday.
"FERC's pause on construction may give us some temporary reprieve, but this project never should have been authorized in the first place."
FERC's decision follows a request for a rehearing of its June decision filed by frontline residents and community groups including For a Better Bayou and Fishermen Involved in Sustaining Our Heritage (FISH) as well as the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council. In their request, the groups and individuals pointed to errors the commission had made in its approval decision.
"With this order, it seems FERC is finally willing to acknowledge that it has not done enough to properly consider the cumulative harm on communities caused by building so many of these LNG export terminals so close together," Nathan Matthews, a Sierra Club senior attorney, said in a statement. "Prohibiting construction of CP2 LNG while FERC takes another look at the environmental impact of this massive, polluting facility is the right thing to do."
"Still," Matthews continued, "FERC must take concrete steps to properly evaluate the true scope of the dangers posed to communities from gas infrastructure moving forward and avoid making unwarranted approvals in the future."
FERC's decision comes over four months after the D.C. Circuit Court remanded the commission's approval of Commonwealth LNG, also in Louisiana, over concerns that it had not fully assessed the impacts of that project's air pollution emissions. Now, frontline advocates are urging FERC to do its due diligence as it weighs the environmental impacts of CP2.
"Through the lenses of optical gas imaging, we've seen massive plumes of toxic emissions, undeniable proof that these projects poison the air we breathe," James Hiatt, director of For a Better Bayou, said of LNG export facilities. "Modeling must use the latest data from the most local sources to fully capture the harm these facilities inflict on Cameron Parish. Anything less is a betrayal of our community. FERC must choose justice over profit and stop sacrificing people for polluters."
Gibson of SELC said that FERC had already repeated some of the errors in its CP2 approval in its new order.
"This continued failure to fulfill its regulatory duty is not just an oversight—it is a failure to protect vulnerable communities and our economy from the real potential harms of this massive export project," Gibson said.
FERC's decision comes as the fate of the LNG buildout itself hangs in the balance. The Biden administration's Department of Energy is currently rushing to complete its renewed assessment of whether or not LNG exports serve the public interest. Environmental and frontline groups have argued that they do not because of local pollution, the fact that they would raise domestic energy bills, and their contribution to the climate emergency. CP2 alone would spew 8,510,099 metric tons of carbon dioxide-equivalent per year, which is about the same as adding 1,850,000 new gas cars to the road.
While President-elect Donald Trump has promised to "drill, baby, drill" and is likely to disregard any Biden administration conclusions, a strong outgoing statement against LNG exports would help bolster legal challenges to Trump energy policy.
At the same time, Bill McKibben pointed out in a column on Tuesday that the administration's pause on LNG export approvals while it updates its public interest criteria has acted to slow the industry's expansion, and that FERC's reconsideration of CP2 could add to this delay.
"The vote for the new review is 4-0, and bipartisan," McKibben wrote. "It could slow down approvals for the project till, perhaps, the third quarter of next year. And that's good news, because the rationale for new LNG exports shrinks with each passing month, as the gap between the price of clean solar, wind, and battery power, and the price of fossil fuel, continues to grow."
Ultimately, frontline Gulf Coast advocates want to see the LNG buildout halted entirely.
"I, along with the fishermen in Cameron, Louisiana, know firsthand how harmful LNG exports are, and see the total disregard they have for human life as they poison our families and seafood," said FISH founder Travis Dardar, an Indigenous fisherman in Cameron, Louisiana. "FERC's pause on construction may give us some temporary reprieve, but this project never should have been authorized in the first place. As far as anyone who believes in the fairytale of LNG being cleaner, we have paid with our communities and livelihoods. It's time to break these chains and turn away from this false solution."
Roisheta Ozaine, a prominent anti-LNG activist and founder of the Vessel Project of Louisiana, said that she, as a mother in an environmental justice community, saw "firsthand how LNG facilities prioritize profit over the well-being of our families. Commonwealth and CP2 are no different."
"We are happy about the delay, but these projects don't ever need to be approved and neither does any other LNG facility," Ozane continued. "My children are suffering from health conditions that threaten their daily lives, all while regulatory agencies and elected officials turn a blind eye. It's time for our leaders to put people before profit and prioritize the health of our communities over the pollution that harms us. We deserve a future where our children's health is safeguarded, not sacrificed."
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Let's Make a Green Energy Transition Without the Dirty Energy Mistakes
In the race to secure the supply for this urgent transition, we cannot afford to follow in the footsteps of the fossil fuel industry’s status quo where profits were put before communities and our air and water.
Nov 27, 2023
As the world grapples with the climate crisis driven by extracting and burning fossil fuels, clean technologies—wind farms, solar panels, and electric vehicles—are essential tools in fighting back. But these technologies cannot be ramped up at the speed and scale that we need without the extraction of minerals such as copper, nickel, and lithium.
This week, over 2000 leaders in the mining, energy, and government sectors will meet in London to discuss this issue, and how to tackle it. As demand skyrockets for these minerals as we develop clean energy and as the industry innovates new technologies, it is imperative that around the world, government leaders implement strong policies and regulations to avoid the problems perpetuated by the fossil fuel industry.
As more electric cars hit the road and more wind turbines are erected at sea, now is the time to right the decades-old problems of these extractive industries, including mining.
In the race to secure the supply for this urgent transition, we cannot afford to follow in the footsteps of the fossil fuel industry’s status quo where profits were put before communities and our air and water. As more electric cars hit the road and more wind turbines are erected at sea, now is the time to right the decades-old problems of these extractive industries, including mining.
While there have been many innovations in the mining sector, like drying mine tailings for their safe disposal, extracting lithium from geothermal brines, and reusing the industry’s old mining waste to turn into minerals used in electric car batteries, the mining industry has still caused—and continues to cause—harm to the environment and frontline communities. This includes polluting air and water, exploiting workers, and standing in the way of necessary reforms despite the many readily available technologies and practices that ensure good stewardship.
Consumers expect products to be sustainably created—electric vehicles included. As we transition to clean energy and clean transportation, industry must embrace innovation and strong safeguards to increase efficiency in mineral use, reduce the need for mining, and ensure communities and workers up and down the supply chain are protected.
There are a number of solutions being deployed right now to meet the increasing demand for minerals used in electric car batteries without having to rely on more and more mining. New technology—like smaller batteries—and strong circularity policies have the potential to make batteries that are more efficient, and nearly halve the demand for minerals by 2050, reducing the need for more mining. Committing to scale and using these best practices consistently would alleviate much of the environmental harm we’re seeing.
Consumers of electric cars are expecting sustainable practices from mine to vehicle, as well as the prioritization of clean air, safe water, and healthy communities.
With better mineral traceability—which proves minerals’ origin and steps from mining to downstream uses—mining companies and the businesses that buy what they extract will be able to complete sustainability certifications, bringing accountability to the process, ensuring the minerals are mined in a way that is as environmentally and ethically sourced as possible. There are international guidelines to follow, as well—the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance has a set of standards to assess mines and help ensure automakers can purchase minerals that they know they can trust to be as sustainable and justly extracted as possible.
Better sourcing, coupled with policies like the EU’s Critical Raw Materials Act and international mining standards are all increasing the efficiency and sustainability of cleantech from batteries to solar panels. These are all just a start. More work must be done to include Indigenous and other frontline communities in the minerals value chain to address human rights issues, governance needs, and local environmental impacts while providing economic opportunities in this transition. Regulations, standards, innovations, and technological improvements must be scaled up and deployed and made a key part of the conversation about electric cars at the local, regional, national, and global levels.
Consumers of electric cars are expecting sustainable practices from mine to vehicle, as well as the prioritization of clean air, safe water, and healthy communities. As global leaders gather in London later this month, they have the opportunity to make the future of electric transportation as sustainable as possible and shape this transition in a way that serves communities on the ground, spurs economic growth, and combats the climate crisis, rather than make the same mistakes as the fossil fuel industry.
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Biden's Key Climate Law Gives Big Oil a 'Massive Escape Hatch': Analysis
"While the IRA was touted as the 'largest investment in climate and energy in American history,' it could turn out to be a failure if Biden doesn't also take bold action on fossil fuels," said Oil Change International.
Nov 20, 2023
The 2022 law heralded as U.S. President Biden's key climate achievement may support an expansion of clean energy, but a new analysis out Monday demonstrates how the Inflation Reduction Act leaves the fossil fuel industry with vast opportunities to extract more oil and gas and continue boosting its record-breaking profits at the expense of frontline communities.
The report, said Oil Change International (OCI) as it released the new findings, proves that the Biden administration can't rely on the IRA to demonstrate its commitment to the emissions reduction that scientists agree is needed to mitigate the climate crisis.
Titled Biden's Fossil Fuel Fail: How U.S. Oil and Gas Supply Rises Under the Inflation Reduction Act, Exacerbating Environmental Injustice and released 10 days before the 28th annual United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28), the analysis uses previously unpublished data from climate modeling by the Rhodium Group, an environmental think tank.
"The model projects that despite the IRA's investment in renewable energy, electric vehicles, and batteries, the United States could still miss its Paris Agreement goal of reducing U.S. emissions by 50 to 52% below 2005 levels by 2030," reads the report, noting that as the world's largest historical emitter of fossil fuel emissions, the U.S. has a responsibility to "cut its emissions faster than the global average."
The group's model projects that domestic fossil gas demand in the U.S. will decline by 16% by 2035, yet production is expected to rise by 7%. Petroleum demand is expected to decline by 20%, yet production will rise by 13%.
"The gap between production and demand is filled by surging exports," explained OCI. "Gas exports are projected to double by 2035, while oil and petroleum product exports rise 23%."
Wind and solar power are expected to replace gas domestically, added the organization, but the positive effects of the decline in gas demand in the U.S. are "tempered by an increase in gas consumption within the oil and gas industry itself."
The "energy-hungry" liquefied natural gas (LNG) export sector will essentially cancel out progress made by surging wind and solar power in the U.S., said OCI, with gas consumption by LNG export plants growing 140% by 2035.
"The Biden administration touts the Inflation Reduction Act as a centerpiece of its achievements on climate," said Collin Rees, U.S. campaign manager for OCI. "In reality, the bill leaves a massive escape hatch for the fossil fuel industry to continue business as usual."
Rhodium's modeling projects that the U.S. will miss its targeted emissions reduction for 2030 by 16-18 percentage points if the Biden administration relies on the IRA and its investments in technological fixes like carbon capture and storage and fossil hydrogen production while allowing continued investments in oil and gas exports.
"While the IRA was touted as the 'largest investment in climate and energy in American history,' it could turn out to be a failure if Biden doesn't also take bold action on fossil fuels," said OCI in a statement. "As the world gathers for COP28, Biden still has a chance to be the climate leader he claims he is by making a commitment to phasing out fossil fuels."
The phase-out of all oil and gas production in the U.S. is widely recognized as necessary by energy and climate experts, and has long been demanded by advocates for frontline communities, which bear a disproportionate public health burden due to the strong links between fossil fuel extraction, storage, and transport and harms including respiratory illnesses, cardiovascular disease, and poor outcomes for pregnant people and infants.
Boosting fossil fuel production and exports "while exacerbating pollution in environmental justice communities," said OCI, is a "deadly combination."
Roishetta Sibley Ozane, founder of the Vessel Project of Louisiana, said Biden's approval of projects like the Willow oil drilling initiative in Alaska, nearly $2 billion for publicly financed fossil fuel projects abroad, and his support for the Mountain Valley Pipeline, among other pollution-causing infrastructure, has shown frontline communities that the president's campaign promises regarding environmental justice were "nothing but a smokescreen."
"We supported [President Joe] Biden for change, not to deal with deadly decisions made without us at the table," said Ozane. "The fight against climate disaster is collective, and the United States cannot preach about caring for communities while exporting pollution globally."
The pollution impacts of continued fossil fuel production and exports will be "disproportionately borne by Black, Brown, Indigenous, and poor communities—specifically in Appalachia, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Permian Basin of Texas and New Mexico," said OCI.
To align with Biden's stated climate goals, the group said, the president's efforts must go far beyond the IRA and include a phase-out of oil and gas exports, an end to fossil fuel leasing on federal lands, and a halt to all approvals for new fossil fuel infrastructure.
"At COP28 the spotlight will be on our collective effort to end the fossil fuel era," said Rees. "Will the United States deliver, or will Biden's climate legacy be one of disastrous oil and gas expansion and failure to adequately tackle the climate crisis?"
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