No Gas Caverns in Larne Lough.
That was the resounding message from over 200 people who took part in ‘Boots on the Beach’ at Browns Bay, Islandmagee to protest the project.
A community organisation and Friends of the Earth Northern Ireland are taking court action against the Department for Agriculture, the Environment and Rural Affairs over former Minister Edwin Poots’ decision to give the project a marine licence.
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Harland and Wolff, formerly Infrastrata, are behind the plans to hollow out seven large caverns under Larne Lough to store fossil fuel gas through subsidiary Islandmagee Energy.
Thousands of tonnes of the hot, salty liquid they have to remove to create them will then pumped into the sea.
The developers’ own environmental impact assessments outline how it will create what campaigners fear will be a 100m dead zone on the sea bed, killing benthic fauna and sediment dwellers like sea anemones, sponges, corals, sea stars, sea urchins, worms, bivalves, crabs and more.
Locals fear the impact this will have on the protected Isle of Muck Nature nature reserve and protected species like the harbour porpoise, grey seal and a range of sea birds. They also worry about the impact industrialisation will have on tourism.
Over ground work linked to the project has already started on the lough shore opposite Magheramorne Quarry, where Castle Black and key battle scenes were filmed for HBO hit Game of Thrones.
The community is supported in their views by The Northern Ireland Marine Taskforce - a coalition of environmental NGOs, including RSPB NI, Ulster Wildlife, National Trust, WWF, Keep Northern Ireland Beautiful, the Irish Whale and Dolphin Group and Friends of the Earth - who advised against it over food web concerns.
The company asserts the work will have a “minimum impact to resident species and the environment”.
Alliance MLA Stewart Dickson joined the No Gas Caverns solidarity walk on Sunday, April 2.
He told us he joined them to “bring attention to the environmental disaster that is coming at us at great speed”.
“We’re here to protect the environment in Island Magee and for the whole of Northern Ireland,” he added.
“We do not want these gas caverns, they pose a real and present danger to this community.
“It’s unacceptable to me as a human being and it’s unacceptable for this environment.”
No Gas Caverns spokesperson Julia O’Brien added: “There’s a great deal of people here. Lot’s of vibes, lot’s of excitement.
“We are all here to object to a massive fossil fuel infrastructure project which is planned for this area.
“It’s a travesty we don’t want here in Northern Ireland, it’s going to have a huge impact on the already existing climate crisis but also the nature crisis as well.”
Friends of the Earth campaigner, Declan Allison, said: “It’s a shocking proposal so we want to support the local people in their fight against it... to take a judicial review against the Department for Agriculture, the Environment and Rural Affairs who have approved a marine licence to discharge that toxic waste into the sea.
“That’s an expensive undertaking, it’s a very daunting undertaking so we have come in behind them.
“The case is up in May, so fingers crossed for that.”
Local diver, Peter Christian, is worried the brine solution “won’t wash away as they said it will do”.
“I’m a diver in the local area and I’ve been working here commercially and for fun. I know the spot very well right on the seabed, 25 metres down, so it’s out of sight, out of mind.
“We know that will not just dissolve and just float away with the tide because of the very formation of our shoreline there.
“There’s continual eddy currents [closed loops] that keep twisting, turning and coming back again no matter what state the tide is in whether it’s on an out flow or coming in again. Those eddy currents will just keep everything going round in circles.
“I think it’s going to affect the whole coastline here - that’s my fear.
“Once that starts to happen the damage is done.”
The community is fundraising for legal fees here.
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