2009 CPEO Military List Archive

From: Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>
Date: Fri, 23 Oct 2009 15:59:05 -0700 (PDT)
Reply: cpeo-military
Subject: [CPEO-MEF] [Fwd: RE: SHIPS: Benicia (CA) "ghost fleet" to be scrappd in Texas]
 
From: Saul Bloom <saulbloom@arcecology.org>

Lenny:

The reports in AP and the San Francisco Chronicle paint a rosier picture then is perhaps deserved.

While Arc Ecology and our colleagues the Natural Resources Defense Council and San Francisco Baykeeper who together with the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board are in litigation with the Maritime Administration over its contamination of Suisun Bay (collectively titled Arc Ecology v MARAD) would agree that this is an important first step; the action covered in the article falls far short of addressing our concerns.

What MARAD has done is to agree to clean two vessels (remove falling paint as well as the sea grass and the potentially invasive species that have grown on their hulls) as they are removed from the Suisun Bay non-retention fleet of 55 rotting ships otherwise known as the Mothball or Ghost Fleet prior to towing them to Texas for dismantling. This is important because in the past, MARAD has allowed these vessels to be towed out to sea dirty with the potential for spreading their contamination over the course of their 6,000 mile journey through the Panama Canal to Brownsville Texas.

However we have yet to see a program that adequately addresses the concerns that required us to bring the suit. The federal government has allowed the Ghost Fleet to fall into extreme disrepair. According to the Department of Transportation Inspector General in 2000, the lack of maintenance is causing the fleet to melt into Suisun Bay dropping an estimated 20 tons of heavy metals and other pollutants into the environment.

Michael Wall, the NRDC Lawyer leading our suit stated on his blog:

"Despite today's welcome announcement, MARAD has not yet committed to a concrete and enforceable timetable for cleaning and removing the remaining ships and has not stopped the ongoing pollution. Every day that goes by without an aggressive and comprehensive effort to clean the vessels is another day where paint full of lead and other metals continues to poison the ecosystem. That's a problem that needs to stop. San Francisco Bay cannot remain a dumping ground for toxic waste." You can see the rest of his comments by pasting this link into your browser: http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/mwall/today_the_us_department_of.html

A court hearing is scheduled for Nov. 9.

Saul Bloom
Arc Ecology




-----Original Message-----
From: military-bounces@lists.cpeo.org
[mailto:military-bounces@lists.cpeo.org] On Behalf Of Lenny Siegel
Sent: Thursday, October 22, 2009 11:25 PM
To: Military Environmental Forum
Subject: [CPEO-MEF] SHIPS: Benicia (CA) "ghost fleet" to be scrappd in Texas

Benicia's decaying ships to be scrubbed, sold

Kelly Zito
San Francisco Chronicle
October 22, 2009


Two World War II cargo ships moored among Benicia's fabled "ghost fleet"
since the late 1940s will be towed out of Suisun Bay next month,
scrubbed clean in dry dock and ultimately sent to Texas to be broken up
and sold for scrap.

The move will kick off a new federal effort to dispose of the hulking
ships that are leaching toxic paint and other chemicals into the waterway.

The initiative, announced Thursday in Benicia by U.S. Deputy Secretary
of Transportation John Porcari, marked a thawing of relations between
federal officials and state water quality regulators involved in a
long-running dispute over the maintenance and dismantling of the fleet,
which numbers 72 ships.

...

For the entire article, see
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/10/22/MNVT1A9EFB.DTL

--


Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org



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--


Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org


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