Bush appointees may have skirted Green laws and Australian PM pressing for the mega-terminal off star-studded Malibu Beach
By P.J. Stratton
Keely, Pierce Brosnan
HOLLYWOOD, CA (Hollywood Today) 3/11/07 — Pierce and Keely Brosnan and Martin Sheen led a 200-person protest to sink the controversial BHP Billiton LNG Terminal proposed off the famed Malibu Coast.Other celebrities who live or play in Malibu opposing the terminal include Tom Hanks, Charlize Theron, Barbra Streisand, Cher, Australia’s Olivia Newton-John, Danny DeVito, Rhea Perlman, Sting, Dick Van Dyke, Jane Seymour, Dylan McDermott, James Brolin, Kenny G, Ted Danson, Mary Steenburgen, Cindy Crawford, Daryl Hannah and Ed Harris. Newton-John has been a longtime resident of Malibu.
This floating city full of highly-flammable liquid natural gas would be hard to miss. The LNG Terminal would be 14 stories high, 3 football lengths long and about 14 miles off the coast of Malibu, one of America’s best known beaches.
Sheen told the press, “This project has to be stopped and stopped now.” The movie and TV star known for “Apocalypse Now” and playing the President “West Wing” is a longtime Malibu resident and hopping mad. “We have to stand up and protect the environment.”
Keely Shaye Brosnan had some words for the Governator. “We call upon Governor Schwarzenegger to use his absolute veto power to “Terminate the Terminal.”
She went on to say, “The only thing green about this project is the money that will line the pockets of BHP.” She thanked Pierce “for his support through all these events” who stood at the rally Saturday with their two sons Dylan, 10 and Paris, 6-years-old.
But it’s more than its proximity to Malibu that’s causing concerns among its rich and famous denizens. Opponents say it could end up being the biggest air polluter in the area. They say the terminal would receive and store LNG, a highly flammible gas, from huge LNG tankers that would arrive two or three times a week from foreign countries and is predicted to process 800 million cubic feet of natural gas daily and emit 219 tons of ozone forming emissions and 35 tons of smoke and soot.
California State Assembly member, Lloyd Levine, told the crowd he rescinded his previous 2004 support. “BHP Billiton assured me their LNG project was clean and would comply with all of California strictest environment laws. This statement turned out to be false and I am now strongly convinced that the project will pollute the environment, threaten the health and safety of residents, violate the Clean Air act, and place a needless and dangerous facility off our shores. This proposal is fraught with bad federal government politics and is a giant step backwards for California” Levine said.
The rally was staged prior to the upcoming decisions by lawmakers. Three hearings are slated in April to investigate the project reportedly worth $15 billion in export contracts to Australia. Governor Schwarzenegger has the deciding vote later this year and has been lobbied by Prime Minister John Howard of Australia to approve it.
CCPN’s attorneys at the Environmental Defense Center did the painstaking legal detective work that uncovered the behind-the-scenes lobbying by BHP that led to the reversal. They used the Freedom of Information act to uncover thousands of pages of key documents and correspondence that demonstrated the behind the scenes lobbying by BHP Billiton.
Rep. Henry Waxman said hat EPA had no valid justification for reversing its position, said Linda Krop, Chief Counsel for the Environmental Defense Center. “The decision was based on pressure from Bush appointees in the EPA. It is illegal to exempt this company from the Clean Air Act requirement to obtain emission offsets. We know it. BHP Billition knows it. And now the public knows it. Without those offset, BHP cannot legally build the LNG terminal.”