If three proposals on the drawing board win approval, there will be port storage and regasification (conversion of liquid back to gas) facilities for imported liquefied natural gas (LNG) offshore from the New Jersey coastline.
The frontrunner is the Atlantic Sea Island Group (ASIG) proposal that envisions building the world’s first man-made open-sea island, located 19.5 miles from Sea Bright and 13 miles from Long Beach, N.Y. A group of investors proposes to build a 116-acre LNG terminal and industrial complex for a project known as Safe Harbor Energy. Critics point out that this group has no prior offshore construction or LNG operations experience.
Next is ExxonMobil’s BlueOcean Energy project, which proposes a LNG floating terminal with storage and regasification facilities. It is slated for 20 miles off Manasquan.
Finally, Excalibur Energy, a new conglomerate of Canadian Superior Energy and Global LNG, a Delaware company, is promoting the Liberty Natural Gas project, which would consist of four submerged turret buoys and 50 miles of new pipeline to be built 15 miles off Asbury Park.
The Environment Committee of St. Mary’s Parish, Colts Neck, chaired by Marie Savoia, hosted an evening information programon the three LNG proposals on Feb. 18.
The presenters were David Byer, the water policy attorney for Clean Ocean Action (COA), an environmental coalition advocating clean water issues, and Suzanne Golas, a member of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace and founder of Waterspirit, an organization with the mission to educate and promote the sacredness of water and all it encompasses.
At the meeting, Byer said the ASIG project had applied for a license from the U.S. Maritime Administration, the sole licensing authority. The other two groups are completing the application process that has a 330-day timetable for public hearings and reviews by state governors and federal agencies.
“ASIG is appealing a recent court decision that allows New Jersey’s Governor Jon Corzine the power of veto action to stop ASIG’s deepwater project as an adjacent state,” said Byer, a graduate of Vermont Law School. “Presently, either Governor Corzine or New York Governor David Paterson can use their veto power and stop the project. Gov. Corzine recently reversed his opposition to the ASIG project.”
Byer said the United States is energy independent for natural gas with 97 percent of the U.S. need supplied by North American sources and 86 percent produced by the U.S. Under current consumption, natural gas supplies are expected to last for 120 years, he said.
“We don’t see any need or benefit for New Jersey from any of these three projects that import LNG from Russia, the Middle East and Trinidad and Tobago,” he said. “The demand for LNG is down and the conventional wisdom a few years ago for more facilities was wrong. This was documented by a recent Wall Street Journal article [Russell Gold, Feb. 8, 2009] that has government reports and LNG owners citing under-usage at LNG facilities, a surge of new gas supplies, and a lowered domestic price that lead to a decrease in demand for imported gas.”
Instead of benefits, Byer said New Jersey residents will pay indirect costs if these LNG facilities are built. Imported foreign LNG is a different composition and facilities will have to be retrofitted. Plus, he said, offshore facilities are considered terrorist targets and will have to be patrolled by an already overtaxed U.S. Coast Guard.
“We are at a critical moment in deciding where to invest in our energy policy,” he said. “We don’t want to invest in another foreign fossil fuel that we will be stuck with for generations to come. We need to get people to influence our leaders to act responsibly and to protect our environment.”
Golas founded Waterspirit in 1998 as a ministry to protect water and its environs when she realized that many communities of female religious owned property that bordered or was near bodies of water. Today, with its affiliate, Religious on Water (ROW), Waterspirit has approximately 11,000 members and is headquartered at her community’s oceanfront retreat house, Stella Maris, in Elberon.
“As a people of faith, we must understand our relationship with the natural world,” she said. “We are part of nature, and as profound changes are made, we must make the connection to our economic, political and scientific decisions.”
In December 2008, Golas received the Roman Catholic Diocese of Trenton’s Gaudium et Spes (Joy and Hope) award for environmental justice. It was the first time an environmental founder and organization was so honored.
“We don’t know the effect or the size of the threat to the ocean proposed by these LNG projects,” said Golas, who is her community’s nongovernmental organization representative at the United Nations. “It will be ongoing and detrimental to marine life that is already endangered. We have to understand that to threaten the ocean is to threaten ourselves. We are all interconnected.”
In additional to environmental dangers of the proposed LNG facilities, including pollution from production spills and waste, she said the public will be denied fishing and boating access to the protected zone around the new facilities. Shipping traffic will be hindered by the facilities, too.
“We have to understand that all of creation is sacred,” said Golas. “If we accept that sacredness, we would not jeopardize the health and life of the ocean. It is crucial to pay attention to these LNG proposals in light of the future generations.”
Cortland Coleman, the director of community relations for the Liberty Natural Gas project, attended the program as a member of the audience. Prior to the program, he said during an interview that his company plans to file for a license before the end of 2009.
“Our project will be good for New Jersey and the region and has the smallest environmental footprint of the three proposals,” he said. “It will decrease our dependence on coal to fire plants and will be a source of heat for an estimated 11 million homes.”
Coleman, a New Jersey native and a graduate of Point Pleasant High School, said he would not work on a project that jeopardizes the shoreline that he knows well and loves.
The Liberty Community Information Center on Main Street in Asbury Park has been established to provide further information about the Liberty Natural Gas Project. The center may be reached by calling 732- 775-3851 or visiting the Web site www.libertynaturalgas. com, Coleman said.
Additional information about the proposed LNG projects is also available at www.atlanticseaislandgroup.com (Safe Harbor Energy) and at blueoceanenergy.com.
A 60-page detailed report, “LNG: An Un- American Energy Source,” by David Byer and Heather Saffert, a COA scientist, that includes LNG supply, demand, costs, security and environmental risks, is available online or in print from COA.
Clean Ocean Action may be contacted at 732-872-0111 or online at www.cleanoceanaction. org; for Waterspirit, call 732-923-9788 or visit www.waterspirit.org.

