The response, posted on the Department of Environment’s website this week, stated that a number of items in the agreed terms of reference for the draft study had not been addressed and there was no explanation as to why.
The board found that the impact study had not employed “internationally recognised methodology for assessing the impacts of the proposed works… and therefore make it impossible for the reader to decipher the impact analysis as presented, which should be objective wherever possible.”
The Environmental Advisory Board was chaired by Director of the Department of Environment Gina Ebanks-Petrie, and made up of members of the Planning Department, National Roads Authority and the Water Authority.
The board’s report stated that its concerns “require addressing prior to finalising its comprehensive review of the environmental impacts”.
Draft legislation regarding the development that was supposed to be attached to the draft environmental impact report was missing and the Department of Environment had not been given a copy.
The draft environmental impact report into the proposed seaport, which will include a commercial cargo port, cruise ship home port, luxury mega yacht marina, hydrocarbon storage facility and transhipment of cargo containers, was released in May.
Because the 516-acre project lies within a 1,500-acre Port Development Zone, the board said it wished to highlight concerns about potential wider cumulative impacts of the development. These included the water lens, terrestrial resources and existing and planned road corridors and associated infrastructures.
The environmental impact assessment report, prepared by South Florida-based Hesperides Group, therefore would need to be extended to assess the impacts of the development based on proposals for the zone, which remained unknown to the board.
The board’s report said no modelling of normal and worst case wave energy as a result of the project, including storm surge evaluation, had been undertaken as stipulated in the terms of reference. It said the omission of modelling scenarios was a “fundamental flaw, particularly given the highly contentious nature of this issue in the public’s perception”.
The board recommended that, since the impact the project would have on wave energy would likely be a key decision point, a third party should carry out an assessment of the modelling done, again as per the agreed terms of reference.
Arden McLean, the Member of the Legislative Assembly for North Side who has been vocally opposed to the East End port proposal, told legislators Thursday that government’s Environmental Advisory Board’s report on the environmental impact study showed the study was “not worth the paper it was written on”.
“It is not a thorough study,” said Mr. McLean.
For more on this story, read Monday’s Caymanian Compass
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