Ecology Global Network takes interest in terminal expansion

Four part series by Betsy Crowfoot (Ecology.com) exploring the potential impact of NuStar Energy’s proposed oil terminal expansion on the Caribbean island of St. Eustatius on Ecology's website

Well written and based on extensive research this series is a must read for everybody.

1. Part I: Tarnish on the Golden Rock: Will the Tiny Caribbean Isle of St. Eustatius Surrender to Oil Multinationals?
2. Part II: St. Eustatius Residents Fear Losing Their Island to Expanded Oil Terminal
3. Part III: How ‘Green’ is the Golden Rock?
4. Part IV: New Worries About Oil Terminal Risks on St. Eustatius Island

Holland to benefit from NuStar's expansion

As stated on several occasions, the St. Eustatius government is in favor of NuStar expansions plans. Economical development of the island is the main argument. Commissioner Van Putten in The Daily Herald of September 9, 2011: "The island must see a significant contribution in order for the Executive Council to give its fiat to any expansion plan".  Van Putten was on a working visit in the Netherlands to discuss the NuStar proposal with the Dutch Ministries.

The Dutch Minister of Kingdom Affairs made it very clear that St. Eustatius government is the one to decide on the expansion. Given that fact, it is very interesting to follow NuStar's lobby in The Hague. NuStar seems to pay frequent visits to members of parliament in The Hague, and former Minister of foreign affairs, Ben Bot himself is one of the lobbyist trying to win them over.

So what's in it for the Dutch?

NuStar and its predecessors always paid very low taxes on the island. Since 10 October 2010, the island of St. Eustatius no longer is part of the Netherlands Antilles, but became a public entity of the Netherlands. One of the first things the Dutch changed in St. Eustatius was the tax system. The main increase in tax revenue of NuStar will go directly to The Hague, as a local council member states in Statia News. 

St. Eustatius got extra funding from Holland for education and health care. In other important areas, local government is very much on its own. The government faces huge problems according to the same council member:

• "Government cannot pay decent salaries, which makes it very hard to attract quality personnel. Also many of our locals don’t want to come back home because of this.
•  Government buildings are almost beyond repair and not suitable to work in. There is no money on the budget for maintenance.
• All our roads and other infrastructure are in a deplorable state and need urgent attention.
• There is not one cent for investment. Instead there is a multi-million dollar investment deficit with their roads, electricity supply system."

With an annual "free resource" of 7,4 million dollar coming from Holland, it is impossible for St. Eustatius government to get the island's infrastructure on an acceptable level.

So this is actually a very smart move of Dutch government. They collect the money and leave local government to deal with angry citizens, ravaged eco-systems and destroyed archeological sites.

Open letter to NuStar Board of Directors

Dear Sirs,

This letter serves to inform you about current developments involving NuStar Energy L.P. (NYSE: NS). NuStar Energy L.P. is the second largest oil terminal operator in the USA and the fourth largest in the world. Their largest facility by far is located on the Dutch Caribbean island of St. Eustatius. With its capacity of 13 million barrels the terminal on St. Eustatius alone can hold as much as 25 per cent of all NuStar's terminals in the USA combined (50.6 million barrels). The operation on this island is therefore a key factor in NuStar Energy's overall results.

At the NAPTP MLP Investor Conference in May 2011, NuStarGP Holdings, LLC (NYSE: NSH), which owns general partner interests in NuStar Energy L.P. and manages the business affairs of NuStar Energy L.P., stated that they were constructing another million barrels capacity on St. Eustatius. However, these plans have generated considerable unrest amongst the population of the island. Petitions against the current plans have been organized. Protests against the proposed expansion have led to repeated questions being asked to the relevant Ministers in the Dutch Parliament. Interest groups have also appealed to UNESCO.

The concerns and protests are about the proposed location of NuStar's additional tanks and associated new jetty. Their proximity to residential areas, schools, the island's only swimming beach, recreational areas and the airport is considered a threath to the inhabitants' health, safety and general quality of life. Unique eco systems and coral reefs will be damaged and limit the chances to get on the UNESCO World Heritage list.

In addition, unique cultural heritage will be affected or even destroyed by the current plans as the site includes extensive 18th century slave cemeteries and a private colonial plantation cemetery dating back to 1719. The destruction of slave cemeteries is a particularly sensitive issue on an island of which the population predominantly descends from enslaved Africans.

 

What affects the inhabitant's perception of NuStar Energy as a responsible corporate citizen is the fact that alternatives are available. However, these will involve higher investments and NuStar is therefore consistently turning them down. This leads to the notion that in the eyes of NuStar Energy, the people of St. Eustatius - the island that contributes more to NuStar Energy's profits than any other of their sites - are not worth spending more money for. This negative perception of NuStar Energy has already started to spread - to the Dutch politcal arena and internationally.
http://no-to-nustar-expansion-steustatius.blogspot.com/

 

Good corporate citizenship has rightly become an important part of a company's sustainability. NuStar Energy L.P. is currently putting theirs at risk by not showing respect to the community that harbors the biggest contributor to their profits.

 

Sincerely 

Schools within 'blast distance' of planned oil tankers?

Contribution of Menno Walther, St. Eustatius

Nustar is working hard on their extension project. Different people expressed their opinion, questions have been asked. Some answers have been given, but not many. Lately, Nustar described the project in the Daily Herald. Based on what was written, I have to ask myself if we – people living in Statia – will be safe…

Accidents are always possible. In the past, people warned of disasters but have not been taken seriously. Chernobyl,  WTC New York 9/11, Bophal, Seveso, and most recently Fukushima, etc…

Nustar's plan is to build 31 additional storage tanks at the location known as The Farm. This location is our backyard. In the event of an accident, we will not just be the audience, we will be part of the problem. Some distances for all of us to consider:

From the Farm to the Golden Rock Quarter, 700 meters (less than half a mile)

From the Farm to the Golden Rock school, the GWP school and the playground, 500 meters (1/3 of a mile)

From the Farm to the airport runway, 700 meters (less than half a mile)

From the Farm to the center of Oranjestad, 1'000 meters (2/3 of a mile)

People of Statia should be aware that storage tanks fires or explosions happen every year somewhere in the World. An interesting study shows that between 1960 and 2003, 64 storage accidents occurred worldwide. More than one per year in average. http://xa.yimg.com/kq/groups/3862917/1523127472/name/StorageTankFiresStudy.pdf.

Interestingly, Nustar rejected another option for a location. They said the location is too close to their office, inside the so called "blast distance". What about our children at school just next to the Farm (500 meters - 1/3 of a mile) ? Is the school located outside the "blast distance" ?

Let's have a look at two examples of recent oil storage disasters :

On December 11, 2005, the Buncefield oil storage terminal near London exploded and caught fire. The blast was audible at a distance of 200 km (125 miles), and all the windows were blown out within a radius of 8 km (5 miles). Entire buildings have been destroyed within a radius of 2 km (1 1/4 mile, see picture below). By the way, Oranjestad is within such a radius from the Farm. The fire fighting efforts required 45 vehicles and 180 firefighters. The fire was finally extinguished on December 15th…, 5 days later. More details (for instance the impact of the fire fighting on the environment) on  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buncefield_fire. The description of this disaster made by wikipedia is very interesting. Lots of questions are coming up by them selves… This happened in the UK, not even six years ago.

"Buncefield can never happen again" they said… The picture below was taken not far from here, and in a recent past. On October 25th 2009, the Caribbean Petroleum Corp. (CAPECO) facility in San Juan Puerto Rico caught fire. At least 17 of the 40 tanks burned down. Nobody was hurt, apparently thanks to the "buffer zones" (distance between the facility and the areas where people are living). Nevertheless, 1'500 people have been evacuated from a neighborhood. But in case of such a fire, the entire island of Statia would not be big enough to protect our lives, our homes and our businesses. Maybe a stupid question: where to and how would we evacuate? The airport will not be usable, nor would the route to the harbor. What about our medical capacity ?  http://www.dominicantoday.com/dr/world/2009/10/24/33655/Hundreds-evacuated-as-Puerto-Rico-oil-blaze-burns-on.

On top of the "normal" risks, the chosen location by Nustar is exposed to an additional threat. As visible on the map, the Farm (and therefore the storage tanks) is located in the prolongation of the runway of the airport. More than 80% of all aircraft accidents take place during take off or landing. Imagine if there was a plane accident on top of those tanks.

Based on all those facts, and based on the fact that we need to consider the worth case scenario in this matter, my questions are very simple:

• Would Statia be able to manage such a disaster ? Consider how little fire and emergency equipment exists on the island.
• Would Nustar be able to provide the necessary means within no time to fight this kind of catastrophe?
• And last but not least, is the risk acceptable for the people living in Statia?

Some of us are parents. I don't think we want to leave a time bomb to the next generation !

My suggestion, it would be wise and responsible to appoint an independent safety expert. I hope our representatives in the government will do so.

A matter of proportion

When you use your common sense, it's very obvious why another NuStar terminal on St. Eustatius is just an outrageous idea. Picture this: 

• Statia is an island of 22 sq. km (8 sq. miles) with 2886 inhabitants. To give you an idea: that's the size of Dutch city Leiden or 1 third of Manhattan.
• NuStar already built 67 tanks, and wants to add another 31 (source Nustar website). Total amount of tanks would then be 98. So we have 1 oil tank on every 30 inhabitants. That must be a Guiness World Record.
• Two third of the island is mountain area, one third is where people live, work, go to school and relax. The proposed expansion area is within 1 km of all that.
• Statia is an island. That means it is isolated. It has no regular sea ferries and only 5 outgoing air flights a day. Statia has 1 fire department and 1 small hospital not equipped for trauma treatment. 

Imagine

• .. within the city borders of Leiden almost 100 oil tanks are present
• .. something happens that is not suppose to happen, and a major fire breaks out. Remember Bonaire? (13 times bigger than Statia)

 Our point? NuStar's presence on the island is out of proportion and far too risky.

UNESCO Nomination File: St. Eustatius as World Heritage Site

Why we think St. Eustatius is of "outstanding universal value" and can meet the cultural and natural criteria of UNESCO:

• Cultural: "Bears a unique or exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition or to a civilization which is living or which has disappeared"(UNESCO 3rd criteria)
  See blog entry "Heritage Trail"

• Natural: "Contains the most important and significant natural habitats for in-situ conservation of biological diversity, including those containing threatened species of outstanding universal value from the point of view of science or conservation." (UNESCO 10th criteria) 
  See blog entry "Statia: 'Ecological wonder of nature'"

Statia is also of great value to UNESCO's Slave Route Project

SEAD wrote a letter to UNESCO to help us protect our outstanding universal values. Read the article in The Daily Herald (July 18, 2011)

Destruction of Coral Reefs

In 2007 Stenapa published an impact study that showed that NuStar's oil vessels caused considerable damage to Statia's marine park.

According to the same report, the marine park is one of the top 5 sites in the Caribbean to see healthy coral and fish populations.

A few quotations from the report:

"Anchoring is the main threat to the marine resources caused by the operations of Statia Terminals NV, although pollution is also an important issue with sewage and other wastes including ballast waters entering St Eustatius Marine Park waters from vessels."

"Anchors cause damage to coral reefs during setting, retrieval, and while at anchor;

• Setting: Corals are broken, fragmented, or overturned as the anchor drops into the substratum.
• While at anchor: Once set, further damage occurs by the chain dragging across the substratum or rapping around reef structures
• Retrieval: anchors are dragged along the substrate as the vessel manoeuvres, turning reef into rubble and leaving an anchorage scar.

Coral takes thousands of years to build and the dragging and swinging of large anchor cables and chains destroys coral heads and creates gouges and scars that destabilize the reef structure. The fragile nature of coral reefs also means that they do not provide for stable anchoring. Regeneration of coral reefs from such damage may never occur."

Source: Tanker Anchoring Impact Study and Recommendations St Eustatius Marine Park, by St. Eustatius National Parks (Stenapa), October 2007, page 8. Retrieved August 28, 2011

Statia: 'Ecological wonder of nature'

Photo from Stenapa website

"Statia has special trees, snakes, sea turtles, birds, whales and fish. It is surrounded by coral reefs and meadows of sea grass on which the sea turtle feeds. On the island desert-like areas with cactus gradually make way for rainforest and primeval forest. The entire picture answers to the cliché of a tropical island paradise. There are complete ecosystems and habitats where the most exceptional sorts of plants and animals can be found. Threatened species such as the red-bellied racer snake, the lesser Antillean iguana, the giant queen conch shell and the brown pelican feel at home here. ‘Or species that were believed to have become extinct, such as the Statia morning glory''"  

Fragment from the article "St. Eustatius: A Diamond in the Rough" by Baud Schoenmaeckers in Change Magazine, special issue on Biodiversity on Bonaire, Statia and Saba, 2011, Volume 6 (2010), Issue 3, page 18.

Strong Opposition Against New To Be Built Jetty

Controversial part of NuStar's expansion plan, is the construction of a new, 1,730 meter jetty. The jetty will be located in the Smoke Alley area that is part of the island's main beach. Not only will that part of the beach (including diving spots) no longer be accessible to inhabitants and tourists, it will damage and destroy another part of the coral reef in Statia's marine park.

NuStar responds to the criticism with another one of their famous euphemisms: "The new jetty will have a “transparent” design that will minimize visual impact, and will have specialized low-impact lighting so that it does not create any light hindrance for Lower Town."