BANGOR - A contentious proposal to expand and deepen the cargo ship channel in Searsport harbor drew around 150 people to the Cross Insurance Center for a public information meeting with federal and state officials, Monday night. Many traveled from towns in the Midcoast and the islands of Penobscot Bay. The majority of those who addressed the panel in the later portion of the meeting raised concerns and outright objections to the project.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers hopes to extend the existing channel, widen it at its narrowest point, add a turning basin, and make it five feet deeper than its nominal depth today of 35 feet.

“Nominal” because a small portion of the project designated as “maintenance” is widely supported. What many find objectionable, and also puzzling, is the larger “improvement” portion of the project, which would require scooping out 892,000 cubic yards in addition to the 37,000 cubic yards needed to simply maintain the existing channel .

According to USACE documentation, the purpose of the improvement is to reduce transportation costs for shippers due to tidal delays and the practice of “light loading” cargo ships to keep them higher in the water. Irving Oil and Sprague Energy, both with facilities located at Mack Point, are listed by USACE as potential beneficiaries of the work, as are shippers of aggregates, forestry products and bulk cargo.

Opponents of “improvement” dredging have expressed two major concerns about expanding the channel:

• Current ship traffic does not warrant it, while projections of increased traffic are speculative and historically unsupported.

• Removing large amounts of dredging spoils could stir up contaminants; disposing of it could cause environmental problems and disturb lobster fishing grounds.

The environmental impact

Steve Wolf of USACE gave a presentation of how dredging practices have evolved, particularly in the 40 years since the passage of the Clean Water Act and other federal laws that regulated dredging and disposal. Today, he said, dredged material can be placed with relative accuracy on top of areas of similar composition.

Of three disposal locations considered for the Searsport project, USACE chose a site within the cargo ship navigation channel on the northwest side of Islesboro — another site at the mouth of Belfast Harbor was deemed too small, while one in Rockland was considered too far away, given the amount of material to be moved.

Bathymetric images of the so-called “Penobscot site” presented Monday night showed deep pits in the sea floor there. Wolf said sediment removed from Searsport Harbor could be “orchestrated” to fill these pits where it would not be easily affected by currents.

“We’ve got a lot of reports that once you put that material down, if you’ve got your site right, it can be very stable,” he said.

Wolf said long-term monitoring at disposal sites has been standard practice for decades and has only improved with advances in technology.

“What that means is we have 40 years of records,” he said. “That’s the body of information we use when we’re approaching this project.”

Some opponents of the dredging have raised concerns that the channel bed may have layers of contaminants from industries that used to dump hazardous materials into the bay. This view was given significance last week when the Department of Marine Resources closed a portion of the Penobscot River to lobstering due to high mercury levels traced to a company in Orrington that made chemicals for the paper industry.

Wolf acknowledged concerns about contaminants, but said core samples from the area to be dredged were found to be clean enough not to need special treatment. The relatively slow rate of deposits in the area meant contaminants were near the top of the clay and glacial till bed, and that levels were comparable to those at the proposed disposal site, he said.

Not everyone was convinced, including Ron Huber of the Searsport-based environmental advocacy group Penobscot Bay Watch. Huber cited several past examples when he felt the public was mislead, including in the lead up to the construction of the Sears Island causeway.

“We’re very worried that you all are saying it’s very wonderful, it’s fine, it’s clean, it’s cool. We’ve heard that before,” he said, “You guys really have a long way to go to gain our trust back,” he said.

Islesboro Selectman Archibald Gillies was one of several speakers who asked the Army Corps to undertake an Environmental Impact Study in the interest of getting as much information as possible. Ten other towns have made the same request, he said, which would entail more exhaustive than the current Environmental Assessment. 

Former MDOT Commissioner, David Cole presented an alternative view. The relatively small scale of Searsport dredging compared with other projects down the East Coast was well below the threshold typical for an EIS, he said. Cole said the larger study would not add new information, it would only set the completion date back at a time when certain industries, including wood pellet manufacturing, would benefit from expansion of the port.

If Portland can get by ...

Several attendants from Searsport and Stockton Springs asked why the Searsport channel needs to be 40-feet deep when the one in Portland, which serves significantly more ships, can get by at 35-feet. Similarly, the need was disputed based on a recent determination by USACE that the deep-draft ships expected to serve a proposed LPG terminal at Mack Point did not warrant a deeper channel.

[Editor’s note: An inaccurate comparison between the number of cargo ship calls at Mack Point and the Port of Portland that appeared in an earlier version of this article has been removed. The USACE feasibility report and environmental assessment for Searsport, released April 2013, cites a four-year average of 165 vessel calls per year in Searsport from 2005 to 2008. Portland received an average of 766 vessel calls during the same period, according to port statistics.]

With regard to Portland, Mark Hable of USACE said it was up to the U.S. Congress. Maine DOT asked Congress to look at Searsport Harbor, he said. A previous application was made for Portland years ago, but Hable said USACE told Congress to revisit the issue after the replacement of a bridge that barred larger ships from entering the inner harbor. 

“Nobody’s come back to us to look at Portland again,” he said, “but we did have a request to look at Searsport, so that’s what we did.”

John Henshaw, executive director of Maine Port Authority, said the dredging was necessary to keep up with progressively larger classes of cargo ships that require deeper channels and more maneuvering room.

He added that there is “potentially some new traffic coming in,” that would be similar to the vessels using the port today, specifically the Handymax and Supramax classes.

Opponents have cited a disparity between the state’s hopes for Searsport and the reality, which has included a number of non-starter projects and a relatively small volume of freight traffic today.

Attorney Steve Hinchman, who represented opponents of the recently-defeated LPG terminal proposal in Searsport, likened MDOT’s rationale of reduced waiting times for a handful of ships to widening the roads on his route to work into four-lane highways. 

“What level of transportation efficiency upgrade warrants that?” he said. “You can’t justify this project by looking narrowly at your dream level of commerce.”

Inland prospects

John Porter, executive director of the Bangor Region Chamber of Commerce, was one of several attendants who said the dredging would bring economic benefits to inland businesses, particularly a “resurgent forest products industry.” 

“We can’t survive as a region doing each others laundry,” he said. “We need value-added jobs, and we can’t have value-added jobs if we don’t have a way to connect to the rest of the world.”

Others saw the “improvement” dredging as favoring large corporations over existing local concerns in the vicinity of the bay, including lobstering and businesses catering to tourism.

Dumping on lobsters

In response to statistics presented by USACE showing a steady increase in lobster landings, Patrice McCarron, executive director of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association, said the overall area may do well, but certain fishermen may be particularly affected.

Speaking before the meeting, Belfast lobsterman Mike Dassatt corroborated this view in relation to the proposed disposal site near Islesboro. “For those of us who fish in that area, it’s going to wipe us out,” he said. Dassatt said it took five or six years for the fishery to recover after the last dredging of Belfast Harbor.

Wolf of USACE showed maps indicating that the disposal site was a very small part of the bay and anticipated a quick recovery for aquatic life there. The site is also located in the shipping channel, making it an unlikely location for lobster traps.

Officials noted that the Searsport dredging project is still in the early planning stages. Becky Bartovics, who traveled from North Haven to attend the meeting, urged the panel to have subsequent meetings closer to Searsport, and to provide better notice to the surrounding communities. The comment got a strong affirmation from the crowd.

Ethan Andrews can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com