‘High-power escort tugs’ proposed for shipments
Recommendations call for two pilots and tugs that will be tethered to ship
Ships visiting a planned LNG terminal at Tilbury Island in Delta would employ two B.C. pilots and up to three tethered “high-power escort tugs” — the strongest such safety measures to date on the Fraser River and a reflection of concerns over movement of the product.
California-based WesPac Midstream is not planning to submit its formal application to the province’s Environmental Assessment Office until at least this fall, but has already conducted extensive discussions and computerized bridge simulations with Fraser River Pilots.
The $175-million project expects up to 122 ships, carrying up to 90,000 cubic metres of LNG, and 90 barges a year, carrying 4,000 cubic metres, for export and domestic use. The terminal would be next to the Fortis LNG facility, which is undergoing a $400-million expansion.
Port of Vancouver spokeswoman Danielle Jang said currently there are about 550 visits a year of large, ocean-going vessels to the lower Fraser “of similar size to those proposed by WesPac.”
The WesPac Midstream proposal has received little attention compared with LNG projects on the B.C. north coast and Woodfibre near Squamish, but would change the face of shipping in the lower Fraser and ramp up human and environmental concerns.
Currently, large ocean-going ships on the lower Fraser have one B.C. pilot on board and employ one to three tugs during docking only — none for tethered escort along the river. The LNG ships are expected to range up to about 250 metres in length, with the potential for them also to be powered by LNG.
Capt. Mike Armstrong, chairman of Fraser River Pilots, said there are larger vessels already plying the lower Fraser but that the LNG ships deserve “extra layers of safety, considering their high-profile cargo.”
The recommendation for two pilots allows one to give instructions while the second ensures the ship’s crew accurately carries them out.
The recommendation for a “minimum two high-power escort tugs tethered to the ship at all times in the river” might be expanded to three depending on final design of the LNG ships. That would be comparable with regulations for oil carriers in Burrard Inlet.
“They are there purely to eliminate risk to extremely low levels,” Armstrong said. “At this point they are recommendations only, but there should be no doubt that if the project moves ahead they will be compulsory practice.”
The LNG industry has an excellent safety record, but there have also been some high-profile events.
In March 2014, six workers were injured in an explosion at the Williams Northwest Pipeline facility in Plymouth, Wash.
Scott Gardner, senior vice-president with WesPac Midstream, said the planned stronger measures for the lower Fraser are a “fairly extreme requirement that is designed to enhance safety” and evidence of the company taking all steps necessary.
Gardner noted that LNG is “not flammable in all circumstances” and “if there is a spill, the LNG vaporizes and doesn’t cause harmful effects to the marine environment. We want to be careful how it is characterized. A spill has a lot different implications for an LNG carrier than an oil tanker — a lot lower and less-severe implications.”
Delta Mayor Lois Jackson said she is not “diametrically opposed” to the project, given that natural gas is a cleaner fuel, but that she’ll withhold her decision until the formal environmental assessment process.
She noted that Fortis’s Tilbury LNG facility has been in operation for more than 45 years without a problem. At the facility, natural gas is bought at low prices in summer, then stored for use in winter when costs are higher.
A position paper by Voters Taking Action on Climate Change says, in part, that the environmental assessment should extend beyond the Fraser River to include the effects of ocean-going vessels on aquatic species and their habitat and the “atmosphere from the combustion of fossil fuels by marine traffic and the end use combustion of the exported LNG.”
The project’s impact on property values in the lower Fraser, including residences along the Richmond waterfront, should also be considered, the group said.
The LNG terminal project remains contingent on finding purchase contracts for the gas.
Hopes to export LNG to Hawaii have been dashed, but other markets are being explored all along the west coast, including bunkering of ships that switch to natural gas as fuel.