One banner read, “All That Glitters is Not Gold” and another “No New Power Plant”.  The group began a sit-in at OER office, demanding that Dr. Gold revoke her support of the power plant project and pledge to meet with Burrillville residents.

“For five months we have been trying to schedule a meeting with Dr. Gold to no avail. Enough is enough.“ said Kathy Martley a Burrillville resident who participated in the sit-in and one of the founders of BASE (Burrillville Against Spectra Expansion).  “We need our State’s energy leaders to stop supporting fossil fuel projects”.

After being ordered by the Capitol Police to roll up and remove the banners, Dr. Gold emerged from her offices, initially saying that she did not have time to meet with the small group because the Federal Energy Secretary Moniz, in town to deliver a lecture at Brown University.

Gold then reconsidered and offered the group ten minutes, which turned into 15. Kathy Martley and others explained their objections to the plant. Nick Katkevich, of FANG, (Fighting Against Natural Gas) asked Gold to reconsider her support for the plant. Gold indicated that she is waiting “for the process to play out” before making a decision about the plant, but Katkevich countered that in the past she has supported the plant.

Gold also wouldn’t say she supported the plant, adopting a curiously neutral position, given her past support.

“The power plant is bad for Burrillville, bad for Rhode Island and will impact the most vulnerable communities around the world by contributing to global climate change. We are asking Dr. Gold to do the right thing and revoke her support of this project,” said Sally Mendzela of North Providence in  a statement.

In a statement the group added, “According to the region’s utility regulators, this power plant is not necessary to meet demand. Rhode Islanders should be weary of Invenergy’s false claims. They are not concerned about what’s best for Rhode Island, only what’s best for their own profits.”

You can watch the meeting with Marion Gold in the video below.

City Councilman Seth Yurdin (Ward One) is sponsoring a resolution that calls for a comprehensive analysis of National Grid’s plans to construct a natural gas liquefaction facility in Providence. Currently, National Grid has a liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage tank at Fields Point; the new plant would process natural gas and convert it to liquid form on site. The resolution will be considered by the full City Council on Thursday, March 17th.

Yurdin, who has led multiple legislative initiatives addressing climate change and sustainability, said, “The proposal is a significant intensification of the current activity at National Grid’s Fields Point site—producing LNG is very different than storing it—and the impacts of that intensified activity need to be carefully and thoroughly studied, and communicated to the public.”

The LNG proposal is currently under consideration by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Yurdin’s resolution notes that public health and safety, climate change, and environmental justice concerns must be evaluated closely as part of FERC’s review. The resolution states that, “Rhode Island is positioned to become a leader in renewable energy. . . supporting the proposed Fields Point liquefaction facility could undermine efforts to reduce Rhode Island’s reliance on natural gas and other fossil fuels.” Yurdin cited the Block Island wind farm, renewable energy incentives through Rhode Island’s Office of Energy Resources, and Providence’s ongoing initiative to divest from fossil fuels to exemplify the state’s leadership on addressing climate change.

“The development of the Fields Point liquefaction facility will continue to deepen our reliance on fossil fuels, when, in fact, we should be investing much more into clean, renewable energy sources,” Yurdin said. “The long-term cumulative impact of projects like the National Grid LNG will be devastating to our environment.”

Yurdin also noted environmental justice concerns regarding the facility’s proximity to South Providence and Washington Park—communities largely impacted by socioeconomic and health risks, including high rates of poverty, unemployment and asthma: “We cannot ignore that this project may increase health, safety, and environmental risks for already vulnerable populations living in close proximity to the site. We must address these concerns openly and fairly,” said Yurdin.

The resolution calls for a comprehensive environmental impact statement, which would include air quality and truck traffic studies; a risk management plan; and an inclusive public participation process. The City of Providence would hold public forums in multiple neighborhood locations and engage stakeholders to address concerns.

The resolution will be introduced at the City Council meeting on March 17, 2016 at 7 p.m., at City Hall, Council Chambers, Third Floor.

[From a press release]

Governor Raimondo has troubling connections to Wall Street going back to her days as Rhode Island treasurer.  Here are just two of a recent flurry of publications questioning the pension fund reforms that she pushed through in those days:

• R.I. pension fund sharply lags expectations again
• Follow the money on Raimondo pension scheme: the local sponsors

One of Governor Raimondo’s key supporters is John Arnold, a former Enron trader who went on to found a profitable hedge fund.

The irony of the Coit-Gold ProJo editorial is that it’s based on Enron-style accounting, used in this case to hyper-inflate Governor Raimondo’s “visionary” contributions to the climate change battle.

In their editorial Coit and Gold mention that RI ranks number four on the State Energy Efficiency Scorecard put out by ACEEE.  You do not have to know how this ranking is produced to understand that it is pure bunk.  Just look at what the Energy Information Adminstration web site has to say about Rhode Island:

• Natural gas fueled 95% of Rhode Island’s net electricity generation in 2014.
• Rhode Island is the second-lowest emitter of carbon dioxide among all states. Like the lowest emitter, Vermont, Rhode Island does not have any coal-fired electricity generation.

Natural gas is mostly methane. It is a greenhouse gas that is about 100 times as potent as CO₂.  Methane is burned and escapes unburnt to generate Rhode Island electricity, but we put all of those climate threatening emissions on our neighbors’ tabs.

There is more about the ACEEE rating of Rhode Island as fourth in the nation that is disconcerting.  Scan the ACEEE web site and you quickly discover that they mention EPA’s Clean Power Plan again and again.  There are some minor problems with this plan:

Obama’s “Clean Power Plan” is a huge gift to the methane (“Clean Energy”) industry — we’ll show you how in a minute. And guess who’s big in methane? Big oil, of course […]

The plan fits perfectly with Obama’s general practice of saying one thing and doing the opposite.

Director Coit is one of the members of the Energy Facility Siting Board that is currently deliberating the fate of the new fracked-gas power plant with the Orwellian name Clear River Energy Center, Invenergy’s plan to sacrifice Burrillville to unfettered greed.

Coit is publicly on record with her support of methane:

With her so-called pragmatism, doesn’t Director Coit not sound remarkably like House Speaker Mattiello?

In the Coit-Gold editorial there is not a word about Clear River, nor about the natural gas that already produces 95% of RI’s electrical power.  There is no mention that Governor Gina Ms Wall Street Raimondo is on record supporting fracked gas.  That silence must be “because there is a fire wall,” as Director Coit said in the preliminary hearing of the siting board last week.  How convenient!

As the Clear River theater of the siting board progresses, we might hear about the CO₂ emissions the power plant will produce in Rhode Island.  What we will not hear from the Governor and her allies on the board is to whom we will charge the fugitive methane.  Most of that escapes at the wellheads in Pennsylvania and along the pipelines and from the compressor stations.  Nor will we hear about the suffering it causes to the people on the frontlines in Burrillville and across the globe.  None of that, but we’ll follow the statutes, because we are a nation of laws.

Indeed, all of the Enron-style accounting is perfectly legal, but, dear reader, you surely do not believe any more than I do, that Mother Nature is impressed.

There is yet another accounting trick buried in the Coit-Gold editorial: the Zero-Emission Vehicle Action Plan.  True, we need electric cars and they have no tail pipes that emits CO₂.  Still, the electric energy such cars use has to be generated somewhere.  If  it comes from renewables we win; if we generate it with fracked gas, we loose.  The latter is of course exactly what will happen if we let Invenergy build the Clear River Energy Center.

We are constructing a 30 megawatt wind farm off Block Island and are talking about a frack-gas facility with 30 times that capacity in Burrillville.  Accounting gimmicks devoid of physics may fool the people, the editor of the the ProJo and our hapless leaders, but none of that will change the laws of nature.

Update after the original post:  Senator Sheldon Whitehouse from National Grid has finally made up his mind and now supports the Clear River Energy Center.  He uses his same old arguments about choke points and price spikes. That was none of that last winter is but an irrelevant detail: As New England freezes, natural gas stays cheap.