Toplines & Key Facts:

• Environmental Justice Request for Information is open until the end of July
• Gulf Coast organizations ask for extension, due to Hurricane Beryl recovery
• Progress Texas believes their voices and concerns are most valuable

LNG Limbo

Back in January, President Biden paused Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) export decisions, heeding the calls of young people and frontline communities demanding action. Yet, a Trump appointed, Louisiana federal judge blocked the White House’s measure and requested that the DOE start the climate-crisis-inducing considerations again. This developed after Republican and even some Democrat opposition to the pause, namely those who receive exorbitant oil and gas campaign donations.

While many believe the LNG export process is now in limbo, it’s important to note the DOE is not required to approve facilities, but instead must update the court on how it will consider the projects left on last year’s docket. We note, if approved and completed, these projects would increase domestic energy bills and continue spewing hazardous waste in air and water at home and abroad. Since the injunction went into effect, many environmental organizations are now stuck pondering whether the pause will ever receive a public comment period, and just this month, many of those same organizers were also stuck in the rain and mud after Hurricane Beryl landed along the Texas Gulf Coast. 

Public Citizen

DOE’s Environmental Justice Strategic Plan

With these new facts in play and the assumption that the current comment period on the DOE’s Environmental Justice Strategic Plan will likely be your last chance to give feedback to the agency this year, Progress Texas and our environmental coalition signed a letter asking the Request for Information period be extended. But don’t hesitate, below you will find our Advocacy Manager’s testimony for reference, and a link to send in your own comments.

Above all, fence-line and frontline communities must be heard.

Department of Energy Testimony given on July 11, 2024:

“My name is Councilmember Reagan Stone from Alpine, in Far West Texas.

Thank you DOE staff for your willingness to prepare a new strategy to encompass the growing needs of environmental justice for the people and our future generations. 

With that, y’all know there’s a lot of work to be done.

From the Permian Basin to the Texas Gulf Coast, communities have been left out of the conversation leading to the most well-funded voices having rubber stamped passes to marginalize, devalue, and poison the people of this state. Your office has prioritized those with investments at stake – big oil and gas profits over the people.

So, how do we take a 180 degree shift and garner trust from those that were ignored?

First, the people’s voices must be amplified in your halls of power. Please get to know frontline communities. One recent instance where this was ignored was in Van Horn, Texas. When the Saguaro Pipeline was being planned, no notices were given in Spanish. So just like that, 70% of the population was left out. 

Two, environmental interest must have just as much power as industry. Elected officials and governing bodies are awash in campaign donations and the revolving door. This has made the regulatory systems so colluded that we now have publicly-funded gaslighting and a total farce called certified clean (methane) gas. Additionally, oil and gas associations are saying they can lower emissions while extracting more. This is a complete lie. Also, carbon capture is 50 years too late and will take 100 years till its benefits can be fully utilized.

It’s like y’all are pointing at the problem and handing a magic wand to the corporations that created it, waiting for solutions from the culprits until they deem it profitable.

Last, the climate crisis is here. My friends on the Gulf Coast need to be seen, heard, and listened to. When you visit Corpus, Port Arthur, the Rio Grande Valley or Lousisiana, our most disadvantaged Americans don’t only live next door to what’s making them get higher rates of cancer and their kids asthma, they also only have a few decades before their generational communities cannot physically exist there. They are going underwater.

Y’all know the oil and gas companies know this too. LNG export facilities are being built on hills because they know rising sea levels are coming. In fact, it has also been proven these companies have lied to Americans for decades – buying segments on Good Morning America when I was a kid to show a windmill and then say LNG (methane) is clean and green. 

So, in order to fix one of humanity's biggest problems, my constituents think it’s pretty simple. It starts with phasing out oil and gas interests, their influence, their monopoly on energy, and ultimately their deadly products. We must track progress to less production, lower pollution, better health outcomes, and price transparency.

Thank you again for your service in bringing democratic principles to this righteous endeavor.”
 

Reagan M. Stone

Councilmember Ward 1

Alpine, Texas
 

Next Steps:

Do you have something to say? Send your environmental justice comments to the DOE.

Learn more about President Biden’s pause on LNG export decisions.

Support our work, lifting up organizers and allies from Brownsville to Beaumont!