Maintain the long-standing moratorium on Liquefied Natural Gas infrastructure that has protected the people of New York State since a horrific explosion on Staten Island killed 40 people in 1973.

Dear New York MoveOn member,

I'm Sandra Steingraber, a MoveOn member in Trumansburg, New York, and I started a petition to Governor Andrew Cuomo  and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, which says:

Maintain the long-standing moratorium on Liquefied Natural Gas infrastructure that has protected the people of New York State since a horrific explosion on Staten Island killed 40 people in 1973. Withdraw the fatally flawed draft LNG regulations. 

I am a biologist, mother, and co-founder of New Yorkers Against Fracking. It is from all these identities that I am calling on Governor Cuomo and his Department of Environmental Conservation to withdraw a set of draft regulations that would overturn New York's long-standing ban on Liquified Natural Gas facilities. If adopted, these fatally flawed rules will encourage fracking, enable gas exports, and endanger our communities.

Click here to add your name to this petition, and then pass it along to your friends. 

I will personally deliver this petition to the Department of Environmental Conservation on Thursday, December 4.

Here are six reasons to add your name to this petition:

1) LNG is a climate-killing fossil fuel.LNG is created by super-chilling natural gas. This cryogenic process requires enormous amounts of energy. To maintain the ultra-low temperatures via evaporative cooling, LNG facilities routinely vent methane—straight into the atmosphere. The carbon footprint of Liquefied Natural Gas is thus about the same as coal. Lifting a 40-year ban on LNG facilities contradicts Governor Cuomo's pledge to lead on climate change.

2) LNG is dangerous. If LNG spills into water, it explodes. If LNG spills on the ground, it rapidly expands into a cloud of gas that can asphyxiate. Drifting in the wind, these vapors, if ignited, transform into a cloud of fire that can't be extinguished. The heat from a large LNG fire can melt steel and burn human skin hundreds of feet away.

3) LNG and fracking are intimately related. LNG facilities aid and abet fracking by creating storage for the glut of gas that fracking has created, by allowing for its long-distance transport, by creating new markets, and by giving fracked gas a passport for export to overseas markets.

4) These regulations are not backed by science. Regulations are supposed to be based on thorough scientific study. But the only study cited in these draft regulations was written by Expansion Energy, a company involved in both LNG production and fracking. That's not scientific inquiry; that's a scandalous conflict of interest.

5) These regulations are lax, ambiguous, and discriminatory.The Department of Environmental Conservation lauds the benefits of LNG as truck fuel, but the regulations themselves are not limited to filling stations and impose no limits on the type or size of facilities that may be built. Indeed, the fine print describes large-scale LNG production plants and import/export terminals. These regulations place no limits on air, water, noise, or light pollution. They don't require operators to post bonds or carry liability for human injury. They provide lesser protections for unzoned, rural areas. They fail to ensure that first responders receive necessary training. And maybe most alarming for New Yorkers: even though the Congressional Research Service has warned that LNG facilities are a vulnerable terrorist target, no consideration of terrorism appears anywhere in the draft regulations.

6) Public comments are a powerful tool of citizen action. By signing this petition, you submit a comment to Governor Cuomo's Department of Environmental Conservation during the LNG public comment period. Last year, New Yorkers made their voices heard in 204,000 comments to the DEC about its proposed fatally flawed regulations for fracking. We won; the regulations expired. Let's speak truth to power once again! I will personally deliver this petition to the DEC on December 4. 

Click here to add your name to this petition, and then pass it along to your friends.

Thanks!

–Sandra Steingraber

This petition was created on MoveOn's online petition site, where anyone can start their own online petitions. Sandra Steingraber didn't pay us to send this email—we never rent or sell the MoveOn.orglist.

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This email was sent to Suzannah Troy on November 29, 2013. To change your email address or update your contact info, click here. To remove yourself from this list,click here.