Oil terminal opponents showed up in force at the first Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council adjudication hearing Monday. The hearings are one of the last steps toward a recommendation on the oil-by-rail terminal proposed at the Port of Vancouver. (Ariane Kunze/The Columbian)
Vancouver Energy tapped a dozen witnesses this week as it began its offensive in the trial-like battle over the nation’s largest oil terminal, proposed at the Port of Vancouver.
Monday kicked off adjudication hearings before the Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council with opening salvos delivered by the company and the Port of Vancouver as well as terminal opponents, including the city of Vancouver and environmental and tribal groups. From there it became a battle of the issues, with witnesses this week focusing on the purpose of the project, operations and safety, economics, land use and effects on the environment.
“These guys are experts, and I believe they demonstrated their expertise,” Vancouver Energy general manager Jared Larrabee said on Friday. “The most important piece is that the council is engaged.”
While Vancouver Energy has said it is banking on these five weeks of hearings as a chance for “the facts to come out,” terminal opponents will be attempting to counter their arguments at every turn.
Vancouver Energy, a joint venture of Tesoro Corp. and Savage Cos., is proposing a rail-to-marine terminal capable of handling 360,000 barrels of oil per day. To build it, the company first needs to convince the state Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council it can do so with “minimal adverse effects,” according to a filing.
One of the ways that is accomplished is through adjudication hearings, a trial-like setting with pages upon pages of exhibits and scores of experts offering testimony under cross-examination.
“Tesoro’s essential strategy is to downplay the potential impacts of the project,” said Dan Serres, conservation director for Columbia Riverkeeper. “One of the ways they do that is to devalue the economic and environmental resources that would be affected.”
The most striking testimony offered this first week came from Analysis Group vice president Todd Schatzki.
“When a spill occurs, new economic activity occurs to clean up contaminated areas, remediate affected properties, and supply equipment for cleanup activities,” Schatzki wrote in sworn testimony. “(Fishermen) can change their activity to mitigate the economic impacts of the limitation on production. One option producers have is to shift the location of their activity.”
Serres said that reasoning struck the evaluation council, and one member asked if tribal fishing rights had been considered in this analysis. It had not, Schatzki answered, according to Serres.
“Tesoro-Savage is definitely trying to draw attention as much as possible to purported benefits and try as much as possible to downplay risks,” Serres said. “You expect them to do so more skillfully than ‘oil spills create jobs and fishermen can move.’ ”
When the hearings end July 29, the evaluation council will take some time to reach conclusions and offer the governor a recommendation on the project’s approval, denial or conditional approval.
Council members, who with a governor-appointed chair largely comprise employees of several state departments, were attentive and asked many questions during the week’s hearings, which ran 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday at the Clark College campus at the Columbia Tech Center.
“(The council) is listening very intently and is very engaged in the process,” Serres said.
The hearings have so far covered familiar ground — Vancouver Energy sees a need for infrastructure to meet West Coast refinery demand with largely North Dakota-sourced crude oil, and the company says it can build and operate the terminal safely at the Port of Vancouver. The company gets first crack at presenting witnesses and evidence though the many opponents involved in adjudication can cross-examine each person on the stand.
Hearings will continue four days a week (except for Independence Day) through the end of the month. The next three weeks are in Olympia, while the fifth week returns to Vancouver.
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