The state panel examining a proposal to build a rail-to-marine oil transfer terminal in Vancouver agreed Tuesday to extend to Nov. 1 of this year the deadline for completing the review and for making a recommendation to Gov. Jay Inslee.
The move by the Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council, which was expected, marks the second time it has extended the deadline to wrap up a knotty review that includes an environmental impact analysis, public comment process and judicial hearings. Tesoro Corp., a petroleum refiner, and Savage Companies, a transportation company, want to construct the oil terminal at the Port of Vancouver. It would be the largest such operation in the U.S., receiving an average 360,000 barrels of crude per day.
By law, the evaluation council must reach a recommendation within 12 months of receiving an application for a large energy project. But the law also allows timeline extensions, which are not unusual given the size and complexity of proposals.
Tesoro and Savage, in partnership as Vancouver Energy, filed their permit application on Aug. 29, 2013. As the application’s review approached one year, the evaluation council agreed to extend the deadline to March 2.
But that target date also proved unrealistic. Responding to a new timeline suggested by Tesoro-Savage, the evaluation council voted unanimously Tuesday to move the deadline to Nov. 1.
At one point during the council’s regular public meeting in Olympia, which was accessible by telephone, council member Cullen Stephenson asked Stephen Posner, the council’s manager, whether the Nov. 1 deadline was reasonable. “Well,” replied Posner, “I think it’s possible.” Posner also referred to remarks he made in a Jan. 28 letter he wrote to an attorney for Vancouver Energy. In that letter, Posner said he hoped the evaluation council would make a recommendation to Inslee by Dec. 31 of this year.
In a Feb. 5 letter to Posner, Kelly Flint, senior vice president and general counsel for Savage, said a Nov. 1 deadline “appears reasonable and achievable.” But if “unforeseen circumstances arise” that make the Nov. 1 deadline unworkable, Flint said, the companies and the council can consider a third extension.
Before Tuesday’s vote, Sonia Bumpus, a siting specialist for the council, indicated there could be a delay in getting the oil terminal’s draft impact analysis to the council for its review in March.
Under the current timeline, the council is expected to issue a draft impact study in May. The public would then have an opportunity to comment on it. Bumpus said council staff has made “four data requests” of Tesoro-Savage and received a response to one so far. The wait for the other three reponses to requests could slow down production of the draft impact analysis, Bumpus said.
Eventually, the council will make a recommendation to Washington Gov. Jay Inslee. Once the recommendation is made, the governor has another 60 days to accept, reject or send the proposal back to the evaluation council. Opponents may appeal to the state Supreme Court.
