PORT ANGELES — The City Council affirmed Tuesday its Dec. 6 decision supporting a permit for a $71 million biomass cogeneration project by unanimously approving written findings of fact and conclusions of law.
The Port Angeles City Council considered the written document at an eight-minute special meeting.
The council had voted 5-1 on Dec. 6, with council member Max Mania dissenting, to uphold the Planning Commission’s Sept. 21 decision to grant Nippon Paper Industries USA a shoreline substantial development permit for the biomass project.
Seven environmental groups had appealed the commission’s decision to the City Council. The groups were Port Townsend AirWatchers, Olympic Forest Coalition, Olympic Environmental Council, No Biomass Burn of Seattle, the Center for Environmental Law and Policy of Spokane, the World Temperate Rainforest Network and the Cascade Chapter of the Sierra Club.
The Nippon project would upgrade an existing biomass boiler. It would double the amount of wood waste burned to produce steam to make telephone book paper and newsprint.
It also would generate up to 20 megawatts of electrical power. The company then could sell credits for the electrical power.
Follow-up action
In its follow-up action Tuesday to the Dec. 6 decision, the council voted 5-0 to validate the permit by approving 27 written findings of fact and 25 conclusions of law emanating from the Dec. 6 session.
Voting for the 27 findings and 25 conclusions were Mayor Dan Di Guilio, Deputy Mayor Don Perry and council members Cherie Kidd, Patrick Downie and Mania.
In his earlier vote, Mania had disagreed with categorizing the biomass facility as an accessory to the mill.
The appellants had said that the project should have been evaluated as an electrical utility, meaning it would have needed a more rigorous shoreline conditional-use permit.
Not voting Tuesday were council members Brooke Nelson, who was stuck in an East Coast blizzard, and Brian Collins.
Collins recused himself because he was not present at the Dec. 6 meeting because of a death in his family, City Manager Kent Myers said.
Reservations
Mania, in joining the majority, expressed reservations about the process, noting a Planning Commission member had “asked for more time to consider relevant facts and issues.”
In doing so, Mania questioned Finding 18, which asserted “the Planning Commission was fully advised on the relevant facts and issues, and that its decision was supported by substantial evidence on the record.”
But Perry had a different take.
“I’m quite happy with it,” he said of the 11-page document.
Di Guilio echoed Perry’s assessment of the findings and conclusions.
“I feel that they accurately portray what took place that evening and what the council did,” Di Guilio said.
Diana Somerville, who represents the groups that appealed the Planning Commission’s decision, said in an interview that project opponents are still mulling an appeal of the City Council’s decision.
“We haven’t given up,” Somerville said.
No public comment was taken at the meeting, but Somerville submitted a 1 ½-page statement to the City Council calling for the enactment of a moratorium “on Nippon’s proposed incinerator” for a minimum of one year.
“Port Angeles has spent more time and efforts to get public comment on new signage downtown than on informing citizens about a $70-plus-million-dollar project that threatens our personal health and the long-term health of our environment for decades to come,” the statement said.
‘Legal conclusion’
In an interview after the meeting, Nippon mill manager Harold Norlund described the City Council’s decision as “the legal conclusion for this particular procedure.”
Norlund said he next expects to hear from the Olympic Region Clean Air Agency on whether Nippon has submitted enough information for the agency to consider an air emissions permit for the facility.
Nippon also needs waste discharge, stormwater and building permits from the city.
The seven environmental groups that appealed the planning commission’s decision also plan to appeal a 286-page environmental impact statement to the state Pollution Control Hearings Board in the spring.
Five of the groups — excluding the Center for Environmental Law and Policy of Spokane and the Cascade Chapter of the Sierra Club — have filed an appeal with that state board challenging a state permit for a proposed upgrade of a biomass facility at the Port Townsend Paper mill.
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Senior staff writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-417-3536 or at paul.gottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.