Comment on Ambrose Deepwater Port

Since I took some time this morning on the federal .gov site http://www.regulations.gov/#!submitComment;D=USCG-2013-0363-0181 asking for comments on the development of the Ambrose Deepwater Port, I thought I would share them again below:
[comment]

While I am in favor of national and international commerce and the creation of new infrastructure that will bring jobs to local citizens, I am NOT in favor of the proposal to create the Ambrose Deepwater Port and grant a license to Liberty Natural Gas, LLC.
Here are my several reasons:


1. The deepwater port will be located in the middle of a proposed offshore wind area, and among several fishing areas and wildlife migration routes. The offshore wind area should be permitted to go forward, the fishing areas remain and the wildlife migration routes undisturbed by the development of a deepwater port.

2. Liberty Natural Gas, LLC. is a semi-transparent company with unknown stakeholders. Here is what I have read, "Liberty Natural Gas is a foreign energy interest -- the corporation may be licensed in Delaware with an office in New York City, but it is managed by an investment group in Toronto, Canada, and entirely owned by a bank account in the Cayman Islands." The LLC distances the individual investors from any liability in development, maintenance, operation and eventual decommission of the deepwater port. Simply put, for a small risk Liberty Natural Gas, LLC. gets easy profits and NYC, NYS and the community get too small a return on this investment. I would prefer an applicant of a completely transparent company and this should be a requirement in all future applications.

3. This deepwater port indirectly promotes hydrofracking for shale gas using an undisputed short term method for extracting natural gas BUT an unknown long term damage to aquifers. The deepwater port is an obvious high profit money making scheme that will benefit the few investors while directly and indirectly doing tremendous harm to the aquifers and local environment.

Therefore, I propose this application be suspended for at least 5 years to better understand the overall impact of the deepwater port on NYS, NYC and the local region.

However, I would be in favor of a less ambitious proposal integrating a smaller port with smaller shipping vessels as a part of a broader plan that includes development of offshore wind power electric generation, and of course, promotes sensible acknowledgement and preservation of the local environment.

Thank you,
Stephen Medaris Bull