The Site of the Proposed LNG Development at Coos Bay
Today, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) released its long-awaited Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the Jordan Cove-Pacific Connector LNG export terminal and pipeline. Crag is working with a coalition of conservation groups and individual landowners oppose the project based on harm to property rights, wildlife, water resources, and the climate. The public has 90 days to submit comments on this massive and controversial proposal.
Jordan Cove requested FERC authority to construct and operate an LNG export terminal on Coos Bay, that would have the capacity to produce about six million metric tons per year of LNG, using feed stock of about 0.9 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas, for shipment to nations around the Pacific Rim. Pacific Connector requested a certificate of public convenience and necessity from the FERC authorizing the construction and operation of a pipeline between the Malin Hub in Klamath County, Oregon and the Jordan Cove terminal on Coos Bay in Coos County, Oregon. The Pacific Connector pipeline would have the design capacity to transport a total about 1.07 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas.
Construction would require a 230-mile long, 95-foot wide clearcut across fire-prone forests and private lands in southwest Oregon to carry fracked gas from the interior west and Canada to the proposed Jordan Cove export terminal on the north spit of Coos Bay, where it would be super-cooled, liquefied, and placed in large tankers for shipment overseas. The potentially explosive facilities would be placed on top of one of the most dangerous earthquake and tsunami zones in North America. The proposed route would impact nearly 400 waterways, including the Klamath, Rogue, Umpqua, Coquille and Coos Rivers, and threaten the continued viability of wildlife species such as salmon, northern spotted owls, and marbled murrelets.
The Jordan Cove facility would also be a significant source of greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change, pouring more than 30 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent per year into the atmosphere, including emissions from the power plant, leakage from fracking sites, and the burning of the gas at the final destinations in Asia. We will be reviewing the FERC analysis in the coming weeks with an eye toward these big picture impacts as well as the specific harm to Oregon’s waterways, wildlife, and property values.
Read the full Press Release here.
Read the FERC release here.