A federal lawsuit filed Tuesday aims to keep one of the world's biggest methanol refineries from being built along the Columbia River in Washington state.
Plans for the $2 billion refinery, shipping terminal and pipeline project in the small city of Kalama are already stalled after a state board required further environmental review.
Conservation and public health groups, including Columbia Riverkeeper, the Sierra Club and Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility, sued in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to invalidate key federal permits as well.
FILE - This Feb. 18, 2016, file photo shows a public notice sign marking the site of a proposed methanol plant at the Port of Tacoma in Tacoma, Wash. A new federal lawsuit filed Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2019, aims to kill plans to build one of the world's biggest methanol refineries along the Columbia River. (AP PhotoTed S. Warren, File)
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which issued the permits, did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
"The urgency of our climate crisis demands the highest level of scrutiny, and we cannot allow massive new fracked gas projects to move forward based on outdated science and flawed evaluation," Joan Crooks, chief executive of Washington Environmental Council, said in a news release announcing the lawsuit.
The refinery is billed as a facility that would turn fracked natural gas from Canada into methanol for shipment to China to make plastics. But a report by Oregon Public Broadcasting earlier this year revealed that the company behind the project had suggested to investors the methanol could be burned as fuel. That would make for a worse impact on the planet, environmental groups say.
FILE - This Sept. 5, 2012, aerial photo provided by the Port of Tacoma shows the site of a proposed methanol plant at the Port of Tacoma, seen at right in Tacoma, Wash. A new federal lawsuit filed Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2019, aims to kill plans to build one of the world's biggest methanol refineries along the Columbia River. (Port of Tacoma via AP, File)
The project is backed by Northwest Innovation Works, a U.S. company owned by the Chinese government. The company did not immediately return an email seeking comment Tuesday, but it has argued that its facility would provide a cleaner source of methanol for plastics than coal.
A study conducted for the company suggested that if the plant is not built, methanol derived from coal would continue to supply the growing Chinese market, resulting in worse greenhouse gas emissions.
"If your goal is to dramatically reduce global greenhouse gas emissions, you want this facility to be built," Kent Caputo, general counsel for Northwest Innovation Works, said in a news release in August.
Kristen Boyles, an attorney for the plaintiffs with the environmental law firm Earthjustice, called that ludicrous.
"If there was evidence that building this project would cause other plants to shut down, then maybe that would be worth considering," she said Tuesday. "It's unsupported and entirely speculative."
The groups said the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers did not properly consider the huge amount of greenhouse gases the project would emit — more than 1 million tons per year, an amount that would increase Washington's greenhouse gas emissions by 1 percent.
Instead, they said, the agency conducted a more cursory review and issued a finding that issuing permits would have "no significant impact" on the environment.
They also said federal reviews had failed to properly consider the project's effects on threatened salmon runs and on endangered orcas.
Local officials have supported the project, noting it would bring about 1,000 construction jobs and 190 longer-term positions to the region.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee used to support it, saying it would help clean up China's plastics industry. He changed his mind last May amid his short-lived presidential run, which centered on combatting climate change. He said that because of the urgency of the threat from global warming, he could no longer support launching massive new fossil-fuel infrastructure in the state.
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United States vetoed a widely backed U.N. resolution Thursday that would have paved the way for full United Nations membership for Palestine, a goal the Palestinians have long sought and Israel has worked to prevent.
The vote in the 15-member Security Council was 12 in favor, the United States opposed and two abstentions, from the United Kingdom and Switzerland. U.S. allies France, Japan and South Korea supported the resolution.
The strong support the Palestinians received reflects not only the growing number of countries recognizing their statehood but almost certainly the global support for Palestinians facing a humanitarian crisis caused by the war in Gaza, now in its seventh month.
The resolution would have recommended that the 193-member U.N. General Assembly, where there are no vetoes, approve Palestine becoming the 194th member of the United Nations. Some 140 countries have already recognized Palestine, so its admission would have been approved, likely by a much higher number of countries.
U.S. deputy ambassador Robert Wood told the Security Council that the veto “does not reflect opposition to Palestinian statehood but instead is an acknowledgment that it will only come from direct negotiations between the parties."
The United States has “been very clear consistently that premature actions in New York — even with the best intentions — will not achieve statehood for the Palestinian people,” deputy State Department spokesman Vedant Patel said.
His voice breaking at times, Palestinian U.N. Ambassador Riyad Mansour told the council after the vote: “The fact that this resolution did not pass will not break our will and it will not defeat our determination.”
“We will not stop in our effort,” he said. “The state of Palestine is inevitable. It is real. Perhaps they see it as far away, but we see it as near.”
This is the second Palestinian attempt for full membership and comes as the war in Gaza has put the more than 75-year-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict at center stage.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas first delivered the Palestinian Authority’s application for U.N. membership in 2011. It failed because the Palestinians didn’t get the required minimum support of nine of the Security Council’s 15 members.
They went to the General Assembly and succeeded by more than a two-thirds majority in having their status raised from a U.N. observer to a non-member observer state in 2012. That opened the door for the Palestinian territories to join U.N. and other international organizations, including the International Criminal Court.
Algerian U.N. Ambassador Amar Bendjama, the Arab representative on the council who introduced the resolution, called Palestine’s admission “a critical step toward rectifying a longstanding injustice" and said that “peace will come from Palestine’s inclusion, not from its exclusion.”
In explaining the U.S. veto, Wood said there are “unresolved questions” on whether Palestine meets the criteria to be considered a state. He pointed to Hamas still exerting power and influence in the Gaza Strip, which is a key part of the state envisioned by the Palestinians.
Wood stressed that the U.S. commitment to a two-state solution, where Israel and Palestine live side-by-side in peace, is the only path for security for both sides and for Israel to establish relations with all its Arab neighbors, including Saudi Arabia.
“The United States is committed to intensifying its engagement with the Palestinians and the rest of the region, not only to address the current crisis in Gaza, but to advance a political settlement that will create a path to Palestinian statehood and membership in the United Nations,” he said.
Mansour, the Palestinian U.N. ambassador, reiterated the commitment to a two-state solution but asserted that Israel believes Palestine "is a permanent strategic threat."
"Israel will do its best to block the sovereignty of a Palestinian state and to make sure that the Palestinian people are exiled away from their homeland or remain under its occupation forever,” he said.
He demanded of the council and diplomats crowded in the chamber: “What will the international community do? What will you do?”
Israeli-Palestinian negotiations have been stalled for years, and Israel’s right-wing government is dominated by hard-liners who oppose Palestinian statehood.
Israeli U.N. Ambassador Gilad Erdan called the resolution “disconnected to the reality on the ground” and warned that it “will cause only destruction for years to come and harm any chance for future dialogue.”
Six months after the Oct. 7 attack by the Hamas militant group, which controlled Gaza, and the killing of 1,200 people in “the most brutal massacre of Jews since the Holocaust,” he accused the Security Council of seeking “to reward the perpetrators of these atrocities with statehood.”
Israel’s military offensive in response has killed over 32,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health ministry, and destroyed much of the territory, which speaker after speaker denounced Thursday.
After the vote, Erdan thanked the United States and particularly President Joe Biden “for standing up for truth and morality in the face of hypocrisy and politics.”
He called the Palestinian Authority — which controls the West Bank and the U.S. wants to see take over Gaza where Hamas still has sway — “a terror supporting entity.”
The Israeli U.N. ambassador referred to the requirements for U.N. membership – accepting the obligations in the U.N. Charter and being a “peace-loving” state.
“How can you say seriously that the Palestinians are peace loving? How?” Erdan asked. “The Palestinians are paying terrorists, paying them to slaughter us. None of their leaders condemns terrorism, nor the Oct. 7 massacre. They call Hamas their brothers.”
Despite the Palestinian failure to meet the criteria for U.N. membership, Erdan said most council members supported it.
“It’s very sad because your vote will only embolden Palestinian rejectionism every more and make peace almost impossible,” he said.
Algeria's Permanent Ambassador to the United Nations Amar Bendjama speaks during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Gilad Erdan speaks during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Palestinian Ambassador to the United Nations Riyad Mansour holds tears while speaking during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Representatives of member countries take votes during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Palestinian Ambassador to the United Nations Riyad Mansour, left, and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speak before a Security Council meeting at the United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Palestinian Ambassador to the United Nations Riyad Mansour speaks during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Representatives of member countries take votes during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Gilad Erdan speaks during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Palestinian Ambassador to the United Nations Riyad Mansour speaks during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
U.S. Deputy Ambassador Robert Wood votes against resolution during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Thursday, April 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
