Posted on 10/16/2006 10:40:29 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
Sacramento -- Just a few months after the November election, the governor of California will make a decision that could answer a long-simmering question about the state's energy future.
While it's barely been discussed during this year's gubernatorial campaign, whoever is governor will have the power early next year to approve or deny a bid by the world's largest mining company to build a liquefied natural gas terminal off the Southern California coast. The decision will help settle a continuing debate about liquefied natural gas among environmentalists, big business and local activists that touches on cornerstone issues in California, ranging from coastal protections to electricity supply.
And because state Treasurer Phil Angelides and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger have staked out very different positions, who wins in November could determine whether the project is built or not.
"The governor's role is critical,'' said Susan Jordan, director of the California Coastal Protection Network and a liquefied natural gas critic.
Last month, Angelides, the Democrat who is trailing Schwarzenegger in recent statewide polls, announced his opposition to the plan by Australian giant BHP Billiton to import liquefied natural gas from western Australia to a terminal 14 miles off the Ventura County coast near Oxnard and then pipe it into the state's natural gas supply. Angelides also has called for greater evaluation of whether the state needs liquefied natural gas at all.
The Schwarzenegger administration, however, has consistently supported liquefied natural gas, and the governor has hinted that he would support the BHP Billiton project. The company has paid more than $2.3 million in the last two years to a lobbying firm headed by a Los Angeles lawyer who is a co-chairman of Schwarzenegger's re-election campaign.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
Last year, it hired the law firm Manatt, Phelps & Phillips as its lobbyist in the state for the project. A partner in the firm, George Kieffer, once worked as first lady Maria Shriver's personal attorney, and Kieffer is a co-chairman of Schwarzenegger's re-election committee.Talk about a Rat law firm. Charles Manatt... ex-chairman of the Democratic National Committee, etc.
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