The Council of State announced on Friday that it had rejected the request of Europe Ecologie les Verts and an association from Le Havre against the project of a methane terminal in Le Havre, arguing that the latter “are not founded” to make this request.
“The association Ecologie pour Le Havre and others are not entitled to ask for the cancellation of the decree they are attacking”, we read in this decision, “the request of Ecologie pour Le Havre and others” being therefore “rejected”. This association and several members of the EELV party, including the deputy Julien Bayou, had asked in November “the cancellation for excess of power of the decree” authorizing the project. They considered that the argument of a “serious threat” to gas supply to justify this terminal was not valid.
Moored in the port of Le Havre, the “Cape Ann” will be able to inject about 10% of France’s annual gas consumption from LNG carriers that will supply it with gas from Norway, Algeria, Qatar, the United States, Nigeria, Angola and Egypt. “We have attacked before several courts, and we are above all reassured by the order of the judge of the administrative court of Rouen saying that a decision on the merits will be made in July before the opening of the terminal, scheduled for mid-September,” said Bayou to AFP.
The elected environmentalist recalled his arguments on the substance of the case, explaining that “the serious threat to the gas supply is removed in France: the supply has been diversified, consumption has fallen, prices too. The regional co-secretary of EELV Stéphane Martot complained that “the Seine-Maritime is sacrificed on the altar of the productivist economy with the nuclear, Seveso sites. Gas is a 20th century energy”.
“Our department is losing inhabitants while those of western Normandy, which have chosen the transition, are gaining” detailed Mr. Martot, “we can see that the Lubrizol fire (where nearly 10,000 tons of chemicals had burned on September 26, 2019 editor’s note) has destroyed the attractiveness of our territory.”
In January, the Rouen administrative court rejected two summary applications filed by EELV to obtain the suspension of two building permits granted to TotalEnergies and GRTgaz for this floating LNG port project in Le Havre.
