I would like to thank Gov. Jay Inslee for his decision to deny Vancouver Energy’s (Tesoro-Savage) application for an oil transport terminal in Vancouver. His decision undoubtedly saved jobs and lives whether considering transport of oil from North Dakota, Utah, or Canada, or an accident in Vancouver that could easily wipe out the salmon runs and other fishery-dependent jobs along the Columbia River.
I hope the Port of Kalama and Cowlitz County use similar reasons: transport problems, seismic danger, and explosion to deny the proposed Kalama methanol refinery. Northwest Innovation Works, a Chinese shell company, wants to construct America’s largest methanol refinery using fracked natural gas primarily from Canada. The pipelines, subject to accidents and earthquakes, would endanger communities all along the pipeline route with a vastly increased volume of gas.
The refinery would sit on fill, not solid ground, just as the proposed Vancouver oil terminal would have, and the release of methanol from storage tanks in Kalama after a major earthquake would kill the fish and all aquatic life downstream in the Columbia River.
Please follow Inslee’s lead.