The following letter was sent to Premier Christy Clark and MP John Weston and copied to Coast Reporter.
I ask that you please use your influence to optimize impact to B.C.’s economy by having Victoria and Ottawa cooperate to tie potential final permit issue to ensuring enough Canadian content to benefit our local economy.
We are, after all, talking about a clean, value-added business that has ships loading and leaving 40 times per year, less than once a week. Recent discussion appears to have generated fictional setback “standards” such as 1,500 to 1,600 metres. In the States the U.S. Coast Guard has jurisdiction over the permitting of offshore LNG terminals. They have identified mostly site-specific, sometimes ship-specific safety setbacks rules.
A ship-specific example “to provide for the safety of life at sea by excluding vessel traffic from the waters immediately adjacent to LNG carriers” is typically 100-yard separation from LNG vessels transiting the harbour and 150-foot separation from LNG vessels moored pier side.
So let’s not ask Ottawa to block LNG tankers from Howe Sound. Let’s instead have the well-established environmental assessment process deliver a rational decision on whether we want to generate wealth in our own backyard by building a local value chain with local jobs. And do this all at the same time as offsetting some of China and other Asian countries coal burn to way cleaner-burning natural gas.
Sounds like a win-win to me.
