CRMC unanimously approves gas pipeline expansion in Portsmouth and Little Compton

"The CRMC has a bad reputation," said environmentalist Greg Gerritt, "because you keep screwing the people of Rhode Island with this stuff."

The Coastal Resource Management Council on Tuesday unanimously approved an Enbridge proposal to expand the capacity of a portion of a pipeline stretching from the Pump Station in Portsmouth to East Main Road in Little Compton.

The CRMC is a state regulatory agency tasked with maintaining and regulating the use of Rhode Island’s 400+ miles of coastline. Agencies like the CRMC said Attorney General Peter Neronha in 2022, “…have been given extraordinary powers by the General Assembly to make decisions that directly and significantly impact the people of this state. Under long-settled Rhode Island law, this grant of power is conditioned on several things, including a requirement that their quasi-judicial decision-making process be transparent and provide for public input, and that every agency decision be supported by specific findings of fact and conclusions of law that objectively justify the decision.”

The Attorney General made this comment in response to a 2022 decision by the Rhode Island Supreme Court that found that the CRMC illegally, and behind closed doors, settled with Champlin Marina, allowing the resort to potentially expand into the Great Salt Marsh on Block Island. This was an attempt to circumvent a public regulatory process conducted by the CRMC that in 2011 denied Champlin’s expansion, a decision that was “well supported by the evidence” according to the Court.

For more history on this, see this footnote.¹

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Here’s the video from the Tuesday evening meeting and a transcript, as always, edited for clarity.

CRMC Chair Raymond Coia: 2023-10-104 ALGONQUIN GAS TRANSMISSION LLC – To replace a portion of the pipeline from the Pump Station in Portsmouth to East Main Road in Little Compton.

CRMC Staff Amy Silva: This is a proposal to replace a portion of a natural gas line that has been in existence since the early 1950s. It's a linear pipeline project that extends from just south of Black Point in Portsmouth to just south of [garbled] in Little Compton. The work is within an existing utility easement and where it is not sign-offs from all the affected property owners have been received. This was reviewed as freshwater wetlands in the vicinity of the coast program because there is some temporary impact on the buffer zone associated with the Cotton Swamp in Portsmouth and some of its associated nearby wetlands. The proposal also crosses beneath the Sakonnet River with no impacts to coastal features or the Sakonet River as the entirety of that would be done by directional drilling. The portion under the Cotton Swamp is also going to be done by directional drilling. There is some temporary disturbance within the buffer zone associated with the wetland which will be restored on completion of the project.

The application was reviewed as we said, as a freshwater wetlands application and it was conditionally approved in February of 2024 and a draft assent was written and provided to the applicant. It was a draft because at that time we did not have all of the signatures from the affected property owners. There was a programmatic challenge between our program and some of the federal things the applicant was going through where we required it ahead of time, they required it afterward and needed some notification from us before they could get to that step. So we wrote up a draft assent and waited to get the conditions to be met, which were the signoffs from all the effective property owners. The Signoffs were received in mid-March of 2024. There are quite a number of them and as the assent was being prepared to be a final assent, not a draft assent, an objection was received.

Since that objection was received, several others were received, which is why it is before you tonight. The staff has reviewed the objections under the freshwater wetlands program as well as the Red Book and believes that the objections do not appear to rise to a substantive objection and has no objections to the Council approving this application this evening.

CRMC Member Donald Gomez: What I want to say is that this project is kind of like a must-do. I mean, we're worried about climate change and we can't have methane leaks off into the atmosphere and stuff. Little Compton is a site that [natural gas] comes to shore off, but we don't use any of that gas that I know of - but it's a necessary infrastructure and we simply don't need any problems with the existing pipelines. They've been there for a while, I think, and need an update and I did see where going to increase their diameter, but so what, you know? [chuckle]

Amy Silva: It's my understanding that this is the only natural gas pipeline to Aquidneck Island.

Donald Gomez: Yeah, it is. And just a little history from, I don't know, whatever they put it in 50 years ago they were responsible for killing off all the rattlesnakes when they put that pipeline through. They went through the rattlesnakes and we used to have great fun going to the town dump and the guy would have a couple of rattlesnakes captured that he caught.... So that's my little history, but in my opinion, you've got to do it. I don't see any way that we shouldn't do it.

Enbridge Attorney Joelle Rocha: Minus the rattlesnakes, Mr. Gomez stole my thunder on this - What we want to emphasize [is] we have our team here - a representative of Algonquin as well as our expert. The report is in the record. A lot of this content is in the record so we will present at a very high level. Again, this is the only pipeline to Aquidneck Island. This is one of the regulatory steps in the process for this. Ultimately culminating in approval from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission [FERC] The Rhode Island Historical Preservation & Heritage Commission has reviewed it. The United States Army Corps of Engineers, the United States Department of Interior, and the United States Fish & Wildlife have also reviewed this. I would also submit, as Ms. Silva said, that none of the objections received were substantive. In our opinion, we won't be addressing things like 'we should be shifting to renewable energy.' We're here on an existing pipeline that needs to be updated.

David Butler: I am the project manager for Enbridge. I think everyone's already stated... the major purpose of the project is reliability. We want to be able to provide gas service to the island. It's a 12-inch pipeline. We have two drills, one that goes under the wetland and the other that goes under the river itself. Our operating pressures stay roughly the same. We go up a little bit but we don't increase our service at all. We are mostly doing this - we're only doing this - for the reliability of the island. That's our main purpose for this project. Everything else is pretty straightforward for us. The means, the methods, and things like that are typical of what we do in pipeline construction. There are no concerns from our side [about] anything that happens or what we're going to be doing. If something does occur, we have plans in place and we'll be able to address whatever it is as it occurs in the project. [It is] pretty straightforward for us.

CRMC Member Ronald Gagnon, DEM: It looks like on the project plans that the pipeline is going to be well past 200 feet deep from the sediment. Is that correct?

David Butler: It is 200 feet deep under the river, not in sediment. The expectation is for it to be into rock. We did do core bores in the river to determine the rock elevations at the bottom of the river and things like that. At the deepest point, we're still about 40 to 50 feet below the riverbed and then the pipe is in solid rock through that path.

Ronald Gagnon: There will be no conflicts with any other pipelines or future transmission cables in the river?

David Butler: Correct. We are quite a bit deeper than that and that's part of the reason for doing this as well...

CRMC Member Patricia Reynolds: Was the condition and size of this related at all to the gas outage that happened in Newport in I think 2018? Is this going to help with that supply at all?

[Note: I wrote an extensive history on the effort to use the Aquidneck Island gas outage to unnecessarily increase pipeline capacity here.]

Joelle Rocha: I will say that the pipe itself is unrelated to that issue. One doesn't have anything to do with the other.

Patricia Reynolds: So this won't [prevent] a situation [like that] from that from happening again?

Joelle Rocha: It is my understanding from the reports that the pipe itself was not the issue.

Patricia Reynolds: But the fact that this is going to be twice the size of that original pipe isn't going to help with the capacity?

David Butler: It doesn't increase the capacity. What it does is it creates a volume bottle, which gives us better reliability. We're able to increase our pressure a little bit, still staying within requirements, but providing a better flow to the island.

Patricia Reynolds: And you're limited on how much gas you can bring to the island?

David Butler: That's correct. We have hard service to the island and we're kept within our requirements in and around what we provide and the contracts that we made.

Patricia Reynolds: I noticed there was one section of pipe that's left in place and most of it's removed. Why was that kept in place?

David Butler: Not exactly. We're leaving the majority of the pipe in place and routing it in place to fill the void. We'll take out the pipe that we need on the west side to be able to make those tie-ins and crossover from the new pipe to the old pipe. So the vast majority gets routed in place and we'll just take out what's required to be able to keep the new pipeline in service.

CRMC Member Kevin Flynn: Many of the comments received seem to focus on increasing the size of the pipe as opposed to the pipe itself. And you're saying that your intention is not to increase the flow and I believe, without putting words in people's mouths, that many of the objections are based on the fact that as a state we're trying to wean ourselves off of natural gas as a primary fuel source over time. I think I heard you say that you're not going to increase the flow, but you would have the capacity to increase the flow, would you not, if you're doubling the width of the pipe?

David Butler: We're not because we're going from a 12-inch back down to a 6-inch, so you're bottled back at the island anyway. What's behind that is we've created a volume that we can draw off of.

Kevin Flynn: That doesn't create any other problems? Like four lanes of 195 going down to two that took me 50 minutes to get through?

David Butler: We've increased the pressure of that pipe a little bit to account for that. That's what that increase in pressure is, which in turn allows that on the downstream side.

Kevin Flynn: In your report, I didn't see any discussion of an option of replacing a six-inch pipe with another six-inch pipe. That's not an option?

David Butler: To keep the condition the way it is. It technically would be an option, but for what it's worth for the effort that we go in to do what we're doing, we're able to increase our reliability as well as then give a larger piece of pipe that can provide a better service to the island. By doing that, we're taking the time and the effort to be able to make it a better situation without having to keep issues from potentially occurring down the road.

Kevin Flynn: Several of the comments mentioned the possibility of relining the pipe. Is that an option?

David Butler: No. By relining it you'll reduce the diameter. So depending on the size of the pipe, your wall thickness on that line would be a half inch to an inch thick. You could reduce that down to as much as four inches let's say. Also, those liners are typically used for a lower-pressure system. We're at 368 PSI, I believe. That would be typically over what a liner is good for. What we like to do is have a much larger safety factor in place. We want to be able to test things up to almost double that pressure. When we do our testing, we've got to be able to have enough buffer to feel safe with it.

Kevin Flynn: And relining on the pipe would reduce that?

David Butler: Correct. We'd have to operate at a lower pressure and restrict the flow.

Enbridge Contractor Katelyn Wheeler: I just wanted to provide some background on the environmental surveys and permitting that we completed for the project. We did studies of wetlands and water bodies. We identified natural resources within the project area that would be jurisdictional with the Army Corps of Engineers as well as CRMC in Rhode Island and DEM, and we did habitat assessments for threatened and endangered species. We also did archeological surveys to identify any potentially sensitive archeological sites that may be located within the project area. Following those surveys, we prepared applications with Fish and Wildlife. We reached out to Rhode Island DEM for input. We completed consultation with Rhode Island Shippo [?] and the associated federally recognized tribes in the area. We completed consultation with all those agencies and then we incorporated that into the CRMC application that we submitted to the CRMC. And through those consultations and our permanent applications, we found that the impacts would be minimal, insignificant, [and] would not negatively impact the greater environmental area.

Joelle Rocha: The one thing I failed to add until the last minute - I sent it over so it may not be part of your packet, but there was a letter in support sent to FERC from Rhode Island Energy who summed up the need. It summed up the need for the safety, reliability, and integrity that we've been talking about. I can submit that into the record if it's not already in the record

CRMC Attorney: We can take your representation on those documents but unfortunately, under 1.5.9 of the management procedures, we can't take that into evidence for now.

Raymond Coia: Is there anyone else present this evening who wishes to speak in favor of this application?

[SILENCE]

Raymond Coia: Is there anyone present this evening who wishes to speak in opposition to the application?

PUBLIC COMMENT:

Lorraine Savard: I ask, what is the purpose of the Coastal Resource Management Council? You all must know the purpose, but I did my research and it was a revelation. "... to preserve, protect, develop, and where possible, restore the coastal resources of the state for this and generations to come, to produce the maximum benefit for society, for the best interest of the state and its people, to protect the state's resources."

So allowing the expansion of a fracking gas line does none of the above-mentioned admirable goals. The CRMC must not permit this abomination to move forward. I implore you not to allow the destruction of the beautiful Sakonnet River for the sake of delivering a soon-to-be obsolete power source, that is, natural gas. Remember, natural gas is a fracking lie, and so is its more dangerous sister, liquified natural gas.

David Brunetti: I'm a member of Climate Action Rhode Island. As someone who has spent much time and effort to get Rhode Island's Act on Climate legislation passed and signed into law on April 14th, 2021, I cannot stand by and let this project go forward without expressing my opposition. I strongly urge you to reject this project for the following reasons.

The purpose of the Act on Climate legislation is to reduce our state's collective carbon emissions to net zero by 2050. We cannot do this if this project is approved. There is deceit in Enbridge's stated objective for the project, which they claim is for reliability, not additional capacity. By doubling the diameter of the pipeline, there would be an increase in its capacity by 300%. The total amount of flow would be increased to four times the current capacity. It's simple math. However, even though there is a stated bottleneck of a six-inch diameter pipe elsewhere, this could easily be, later on, a diameter increase to allow for this increase in flow. Instead, they should increase the reliability of the pipeline, their stated objective, by relining the existing pipeline via a process known as cured in place lining, CRPL, which can line pipelines from four inches to 48 inches in diameter, creating a durable and impermeable composite pipe within the original pipeline without affecting flow capacity. This is what they should be doing.

Additionally, the proposed process for expansion of the pipeline, which is a mix of horizontal directional drilling for some segments and cut and cover for other segments, is very disruptive to the environment of the workspace. Horizontal directional drilling is often touted as much less disruptive but can experience accidents through frac-outs which leaks during drilling margins into the environment. Notably, Enbridge has a bad record with horizontal directional drilling. Enbridge’s Line Three, built in 2021, had 28 frac-outs while under construction.

To add to the potential negative impacts of such a project, the Sakonnet River is home to sea turtles, Atlantic sturgeon, and other threatened species. A frac-out could have disastrous impacts on their habitats. We do not need extra capacity for natural gas. What we desperately need is a massive transition to clean and renewable energy. By allowing this project to move forward, you would be committing us to decades more of gas use or stranded assets. If the system becomes disused before its end of life, this is not acceptable.

Susan Kelley: I'm Susan Kelley from Cranston Rhode Island, previously from Fairmont, West Virginia. My experience with oil and gas companies is not a happy one - Marcellus Shale. Rhode Island and the CRMC are compelled to comply with the law. As David Brunetti said, the Act on Climate mandates that we reach net zero by 2050. Expanding fossil fuel use and pipelines will not help us achieve that goal. In addition, the International Energy Agency is calling internationally for an immediate end to all investment and all new investment in fossil fuel pipelines. Our very survival is at stake and that is now on your shoulders. Beyond the absolute necessity to end the expansion of fossil fuels, it would be best not to deal with perhaps untrustworthy players. Enbridge's pipeline record is not the best. Between 1996 and 2014, Enbridge had 1,270 spills of one nature or another. Moreover, Enbridge has a history of not listening and not being truly careful.

For instance, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) reports that the rupture on August 1st, 2019 in Danville, Kentucky, which resulted in the release of 101.5 million cubic feet of natural gas that ignited into a massive fireball, was due to training failings and to a manufacturing defect. NTSB indicates that Enbridge knew about the defect for years and failed to properly mitigate the situation. While there are integrity management regulations that work to maintain safe and functional pipelines, it is largely up to the operator on how they identify and mitigate threats. The NTSB notes in their investigation that even though Enbridge did complete a few integrity management actions, there were several deficiencies. This article ends by noting that what happened in 2019 eerily repeated from their NTSB 2012 Marshall Michigan report. In other words, Enbridge knew ahead of time that there were difficulties not only from warnings around the Danville, Kentucky pipeline but also from what they should have learned from the NTSB 2012 report analysis of what happened in Marshall Michigan.

As an aside, when I read in the Algonquin report the CRMC made available to the public, I saw that the answer to endangered species that might be affected by the pipeline was basically that Enbridge will be careful, I was not encouraged. While you may say, “Those pipeline problems happened years ago,” I say, “My years of watching oil and gas fracking in pipelines and local and federal government's unwillingness to rein them in has convinced me that anything at all that might interfere with profit or speed will be disregarded or the subject of endless lies.”

Let us not fool ourselves into thinking things have become better over time. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Office of Response and Restoration, there have been 64 incident reports in May of 2024 compared to 19 incidents in May of 2023. For the planet to survive, it is immoral, and I would claim criminal, to pursue any expansion of fossil fuels in any form whatsoever. I urge you to do all in your power to stop the expansion of the Sakonnet River Enbridge pipeline. It is dangerous, it is unnecessary, and only accelerates mass extinction. Stop it now. And the reason I say it is unnecessary is exactly what David Brunetti was referring to, the lining that could repair a pipe. You don't need a new pipe and you don't need more capacity. It's like having nuclear weapons. If you've got them, you might have to use 'em.

Joel Gates: I'm a resident of Gloucester, Rhode Avenue.

We have a climate change problem. This pipeline expansion plan is counter to what we should be doing. Rhode Island is supposed to be decreasing its reliance on fossil fuels, so increasing the size of the pipeline under the river is exactly the opposite of what we should be doing. The Act on Climate demands it. We should have a plan in place to not only reduce our gas consumption but eliminate it. With this plan, we are heading in the wrong direction. Enbridge is setting Rhode Island residents up for a lawsuit which can happen if we do not meet our act on climate goals.

Does Enbridge care? Supposedly they do. To prepare for tonight's meeting. I checked out Enbridge's website and they do have a modest portfolio of wind and solar energy generation projects. It looks good, but I sense it messes with their business model. Under their sustainability tab Enbridge states, I quote, “As a leading North American energy delivery company, we're positioned to help society transition to a lower emissions future.”

Helping us is not part of Enbridge's plan. Enbridge also states and I quote, “We are committed to net zero greenhouse gas emissions by the year 2050.” That sounds great, but is too little and too late. We have to quickly phase out all combustible fuels, including so-called “clean” bridge fuels like “renewable” natural gas. The only bridges we should be building are with real renewables like wind and solar. Please deny this application.

Justin Boyan: I didn't prepare remarks, but I am in opposition to the expansion of the pipeline under the Sakonnet on two bases.

One, judging from personal experience and also looking at international statistics, fossil fuel use has peaked. We see a transition already underway and accelerating. Looking at my usage in my home, having switched to an electric vehicle and electric hot water heating, my use of natural gas is down. That will be true for the residents of Newport County and places served by this pipeline. In terms of the need for expanded gas, it's not in line with the trends. We see that fossil fuel use is decreasing not only because it has to, by law in Rhode Island, but because the technology is now available to power ourselves with clean energy. More renewable energy will be coming online as the wind farms go up.

The second point is the environment and the future for my kids who are now entering adulthood. We heard the testimony that Enbridge conducted environmental assessments and that they checked out the seabed and the marshland on the side of the river, but I didn't hear a climate impact analysis, and every environmental group from Climate Action Rhode Island to the Sierra Club to the Audubon Society of Rhode Island to Save the Bay to The Nature Conservancy - anyone who's paying attention to the science of the environmental catastrophe that we're in right now knows that the number one environmental concern is climate change.

It's important to pay attention to the health of the marsh grass and so on, but the climate crisis is what's threatening every ecosystem in Rhode Island and on Earth. So I was surprised that there weren't any questions about the environmental testimony that was given when the climate wasn't even mentioned. Hopefully, in your paperwork, there are clear-eyed assessments about what the climate impact of an expanded pipeline would be and I hope those can be weighed in your decision-making.

Peter Trafton: I'm a registered voter and resident of Providence, but I spend more of my life at this point in Little Compton on the shore or just above the shore of the Sakonnet River. Our kids and our grandkids, when the water's feeling warmer, swim in the river. We're less than half a mile from where the pipeline's going to be. The tide goes in and out. It's not downstream or upstream - that's the kind of river the Sakonnet is. So anything that leaks out of that pipe is likely to be where we swim, where we windsurf, and where we try to catch some fish, who may be threatened as well.

I think that you've heard my most important message, and that is that climate change is the villain, and that's what we all need to do to protect our families, friends, and environment from the future. It's getting warmer, more polluted, and more dangerous for us throughout the state - not just on the coast, but throughout the world. You know that and you also know that the answer is that we've simply got to stop burning fossil fuels.

It is a big project. It's going to be demanding for Rhode Islanders to make it. I fear that there will be lawsuits, but we're trying to start now to stop the problem of the building by bringing in more gas. You heard from my eloquent companions that this is going to bring more gas. It's not going to just make it a little bit more efficient or a little bit more reliable than it's been. I have colleagues who are working to try to change the whole process of energy provision to Aquidneck Island. There's a docket in the Public Utilities Commission and I am privileged to participate in that too, trying to figure out what the future of natural gas will be, how we'll be able to stop bringing natural gas into Rhode Island, and stop having it from providing heating and other energy sources for Rhode Island. This is something we have to do to comply with the Act on Climate.

Greg Gerritt: Last year, in Phoenix, Arizona, twice as many people died of heat as ever before. If you look around the world, the floods, the hurricanes, the monsoons, and everything that's related to the weather is going crazy and killing more people. I want you to keep that in mind - the climate crisis is already killing thousands of people a year. I consider these guys murderers for promoting fossil fuel use.

CRMC is a member of the EC4 Have you brought this to the EC4? Did you talk to them about the climate implications of this project? I mean, most of those people are just bureaucrats too and they're not going to stand up. But none of the advisory committees are going to tell you that this is a good project for Rhode Island. You've heard about Enbridge's record and their record isn't very good. We've all heard about Enbridge. The people of Rhode Island, when given a fair opportunity, stop these kinds of projects, they do not let them go. If you conduct a full, open public process, you will hear hundreds of people telling you this. The CRMC has a very bad reputation, which is probably why people keep trying to disband it - because you keep screwing the people of Rhode Island with this stuff. You keep doing a lot of really bad stuff.

Raymond Coia: Why don't you keep your comments relative to the application?

Greg Gerritt: This application is a direct threat to the people of Rhode Island. I will say what I think is important to this issue, which is the issue of gas pipelines. Gas pipelines are killing people. They are killing them directly with explosions, and they're killing them because of climate. Rhode Island is going to have its sea level rise get faster and faster.

Do you want that on your heads? Do you want that on your shoulders? You guys need to think clearly about your obligations under the Act on Climate. It doesn't seem like the Act on Climate affected anything you did at all. DEM is focusing on the Act on Climate, how come you guys aren't? It's not at the front and center of your agenda. Amazingly, the CRMC is essentially saying, “We are neutral on gas” when you should be looking at every possible way to eliminate it. The fact that you continue to do this stuff is criminal on your part. I've dealt with CRMC before and nobody's happy with you and I'm hoping that they finally pass something to get rid of you guys because all you've done is screw the people of Rhode Island repeatedly. It is time for you to say “No more fossil fuels and no more fossil fuel infrastructure whatsoever.” The fact that you keep going and it gets this far says you're all incompetent fools.

Raymond Coia: Sir, are you done? You're done.

Greg Gerritt: I'm done. And you guys are criminals. I want that on the record.

Raymond Coia: You are done.

[You can read Greg Gerritt’s comments on his experience before the CRMC here.]

Will Nakshion: I live in Cumberland, Rhode Island and I'm a member of Climate Action Rhode Island. I'm opposed to this pipeline. Rhode Island and the rest of the world need to end their dependence on fossil fuels in to mitigate the worst effects of the climate crisis. Installing this unnecessary pipeline will extend Rhode Island's dependence on fossil fuels far beyond what is needed. Continued expansion of gas infrastructure will prevent the state from meeting the climate goals mandated in the Act on Climate and the Renewable Energy Standard legislation that passed. This project also creates the potential for harmful environmental damage. Repairing the existing pipeline is a far more practical and safer solution. Let's make our state a renewable energy leader instead of committing to decades more of polluting harmful energy sources.

[END PUBLIC COMMENT]

Joelle Rocha: Briefly, Mr. Chair, we're not here tonight to debate the current or future use of fossil fuels. We're here under CRMC jurisdiction over the regulations for the work proposed here, which is outlined in staff reports and the draft as sent. As to the lining issue, you've heard from our project manager as to why that's not feasible. As to the fracking comment, as noted in the staff report, there is no fracking proposed under this application. I would last add that we have reviewed the draft assent, which contains a compliance portion with inspections required where there were no objections to any of that in the normal course as set forth therein. We would request that this council approve the draft assent as final and we remain here for any additional questions.

Kevin Flynn: Chairman, I want to note that in the limited time I've been on the council, we have spent I don't know how many hours reviewing proposals to support wind energy development offshore, and before my time on the council, many more hours, sometimes hearings going on days with a lot of opposition to developing wind power offshore. These are not easy issues, but the notion that the council is somehow not cognizant of issues regarding climate change and the need to shift our energy portfolio to renewable resources is simply not accurate.

Donald Gomez: As to the people who protested this - the staff report noted that their objections did not rise to the level of something that we needed to address, but the people here ought to understand. I live in Little Compton. My house's electricity is supplied by solar. My house has six-inch walls with isoline. My heat is geothermal, my air conditioning is geothermal and I have propane gas. I need a generator because I live a quarter of a mile into the woods. When the electricity goes out, I'm the last person to get it [restored]. I have a gas stove and I need that when the electricity fails.

I had a call within the last week. Somebody very concerned called me at night and was very upset about the whale kills along the coast and it was attributable to those damn offshore platforms that are being put up. Now if you go down to Chase Point in Little Compton, you can see 11 or 12 [windmills] you can see five off Block Island.

Audience Member: That is ludicrous.

Donald Gomez: You laugh, but that's the way people feel. When I drive around Tiverton, when I drive around Little Compton, I see a substantial number of signs that say “No Wind Turbines.” [See also here] I see three, four, five [wind turbines] gradually coming along. I'm voting yes for the offshore turbines, [but] they're a long, long way away. We have to have interim solutions.

I spent 57 years working with the Navy. My solution for Rhode Island is to put in four very small nuclear reactors as is going to be done down in the middle of our Atlantic coast because they can't work with the wind turbines that would cover the whole state. Nobody wants to talk about that. You power [nuclear reactors] up once. In 40 years you come back and power them up again. They are safe. They've been in submarines for 60 years.

I see this proposal for what it is. It's new equipment that will increase reliability and integrity. As stated in the staff report, the procedure is proven. No expansion of capacity has been discussed. I worry about old infrastructure. I know what old infrastructure does. It fails.

This is going to be very deep and the diameter is choked off by the smaller pipeline on the land. I believe that the technology requiring the reservoir that a 12-inch pipe will provide versus a six-inch pipe is a good feature for maintenance. There is no fracking in the project. In my opinion, it is the best interim technology we can have until renewables are here, and as pointed out by a member of this council, there has been an awful lot of blow-back on [wind farms]. That being said, along with my opening remarks, I motion to approve the proposal as presented by the staff.

Raymond Coia: A motion has been made by Councilmember Gomez to approve it.

David Butler: I'd like to comment.

I'm sure many people agree with me that we respect and appreciate all the comments that were made in opposition to the application, but I also have a tremendous amount of respect for the professional staff that has reviewed the project and conditionally approved it as a Category, A Freshwater Wetlands insignificant alteration on 2-14-2024 and ready to provide a final assent at the time that they received the objections. And for that reason, I'll be voting in favor of the motion to approve the application.

The CRMC unanimously approved the application.

1. This out-of-control, backroom dealing CRMC, headed by Governor Gina Raimondo appointee Jennifer Cervenka, was only doing what it was intended to do: Serve the interests of the wealthy and connected, all other concerns be damned.

This was evident back in July 2017 when Governor Raimondo made the unusual – even unprecedented – decision to radically alter the makeup of the CRMC six months earlier than she needed to. As reported by Tim Faulkner in ECO RI, quoting former CRMC Chair Anne Lingston, …changes on the council are typically announced closer to January, when the General Assembly begins its session.”

But little attention was paid to the changeover, and a complacent and complicit State Senate rubber-stamped the changes with no real “advice and consent” being provided.

Tony Affigne is a professor of political science at Providence College and was a CRMC member from 2011-2017. Along with along with Chair Livingston and Council member Paul Beaudette, Affigne was replaced by Governor Raimondo in July.

The Governor’s action, said Affigne, left the CRMC “without any members with strong environmental commitments, and without its only member (me) who knows and understands the South Side community. I have many family members who still live in the area; previously worked as an adult education teacher and community organizer in both South Providence and Washington Park; and teach courses at Providence College (and previously at Brown) on city politics and environmental policy.”

Without CRMC members who cared about South Providence communities facing environmental injustice or members who cared about the environment and climate change, National Grid was free to present their case to build a new liquefaction facility in the Port of Providence to a quasi-judicial state agency that was now very friendly to fossil fuel interests and indifferent to the health and safety of the low-income BIPOC communities in the surrounding areas. [For detailed exposition and timeline about the CRMC membership changes, see here.]

Starting as early as February 2017, the CRMC was taking up National Grid’s proposed liquefaction facility, but after certain members raised objections to the plan, the discussions were put on hold in May. In July, Governor Raimondo made changes to the CRMC membership and by December the liquefaction facility was approved to the satisfaction of National Grid.

Never mind that it was later revealed that the CRMC had withheld information from the public about the nature and scope of the approval process. Never mind that community members called for the resignation of CRMC Chair Cervenka after she attempted to have a mother arrested during public testimony because she called the CRMC members cowards. Never mind that Cervenka had obvious conflicts of interest given that she used to work for the Northern Rhode Island Chamber of Commerce and her former boss was one of the few people to testify in favor of National Grid’s proposal.

When she finally answered a question from a journalist about these issues, Governor Raimondo played innocent.

Ignoring the obvious problems with the CRMC, the State Senate reapproved Cervenka and other CRMC members twice, despite residents who live near the Port twice presenting evidence that she was unfit and possibly corrupt. [See here, here, and here.] At Uprise RI I prepared a short video demonstrating the lies told by Chair Cervenka and Councilmember Raymond Coia to the Senate Environmental Committee in 2021, to no avail. [Raymond Coia is now the Chair of the CRMC!]

During the Senate Committee hearing, held remotely due to Covid, several people called in to complain about the CRMC’s process in approving the Champlin Marina expansion on Block Island.

But then, suddenly, things changed.

When the CRMC screwed over the mostly low-income BIPOC community around the Port of Providence, few people noticed or cared. When the CRMC attempted to screw over the mostly white, upper-middle-class, and rich residents of Block Island, it became front-page news and the Attorney General became involved.

Less than two weeks after Cervenka’s second reappointment, the Office of the Attorney General decided to intervene in the Champlin Marina expansion case.

In October 2022, the case was resolved with justice for the residents of Block Island.

But there was no justice for the residents of South Providence, only disrespect, bullying, lies, continued environmental racism, and worsening health outcomes.

Gina Raimondo is now Secretary of Commerce under President Biden.