BEP to hold hearing on Quoddy Bay plan -- The Quoddy Tides, Eastport, Maine

Having just completed the hearings on one liquefied natural gas proposal for Passamaquoddy Bay, the Maine Board of Environmental Protection (BEP) is gearing up for more hearings on a second proposal. The board held the hearing on the Downeast LNG proposal for Mill Cove, Robbinston, during the week of July 16 in Calais and Robbinston. As with the Downeast LNG project, the board has assumed jurisdiction of the Quoddy Bay LNG proposal for Pleasant Point, and will hold a hearing early in 2008 at a site close to the proposed project location. The Quoddy Bay proposal is for a 2 billion cubic-feet-per-day LNG import terminal at Split Rock and a 35.8-mile pipeline that would run through Perry, Pembroke, Charlotte, Cooper, Alexander, and Princeton.

The decision for the board to assume jurisdiction allows for a more public review of the project than a staff review by the Department of Environmental Protection would have allowed. The board is now asking for those who would like to be intervenors in the hearings to file a petition with the board. Any individual, government entity, corporation, or organization that desires to participate as an intervenor must submit a petition to intervene by August 31. Petitions should be addressed to: Virginia Plummer, chair, Board of Environmental Protection, 17 State House Station, Augusta, ME 04333. They may be faxed to (207) 287-2814 if followed by receipt of the original document within five working days. Questions about the petitions should be directed to Cynthia Bertocci at (207) 287-2452. The board may consider the petitions to intervene at a meeting tentatively scheduled for September 20.