A company seeking to build a terminal in southwest Washington to ship U.S. coal to Asia says it has offered to settle an appeal by removing controversial aspects involving coal from its permit.
It's the latest development in a debate over whether a port along the Columbia River should be the site for exporting millions of tons of coal to Asia from the Powder River Basin of Montana and Wyoming.
Environmental groups have appealed the shoreline permit to a state hearings board, and still oppose the project. Trial is set for April.
Millennium Bulk Terminals announced late Monday that it would conduct a full environmental review surrounding the export of coal from the facility. It wants to modify the disputed permit so it can move forward with dock repair and maintenance dredging. Repairing the dock is needed, it said, to allow the continued import of aluminum at the site to the Alcoa plant in Wenatchee, as well as the import of cement.
Chief Executive Joe Cannon said in a statement that dock work and cleanup at the site would support several hundred jobs and added that "jobs shouldn't be held hostage."Environmental groups including Columbia Riverkeeper quickly fired back, saying the company is trying to deceive the public by proposing to build the dock for the coal terminal while analyzing the impacts later.
"We can't trust them to do anything. We've already seen that they misled our county officials and state agencies in their original application," said Gayle Riser, a Longview resident. "They need to face the hearings board as scheduled."Company executives had internal discussions as recently as December on a project that could handle 80 million tons of the fuel annually -- about 15 times the volume disclosed publicly, documents show. Critics said the discrepancy shows the developers attempted to deceive state and local officials about the scope of their plans. Cannon told the AP last month that his company conducted design and engineering work on a larger port, but has since shelved those plans at least temporarily.
Janice Adair, special assistant to Ecology Director Ted Sturdevant, said her agency is waiting for more information from the company. "We want to be sure we understand what else is left to be covered by the permit," she said.
The state would like to see the dock repair work done, she said. "We believe they could withdraw the whole permit and reapply for a new permit for the dock."Cannon said in the statement that a modified permit would allow Millennium to begin cleaning up the former aluminum site. But Adair told the AP she thinks the cleanup to go forward without the permit.
Dan Coffman, president of the International Longshore & Warehouse Union Local 21, said his group supports Millennium's efforts to create jobs.（Bloomberg）
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