It looks like Canadian oil expediter Enbridge may want to rethink its strategy for moving tar sands oil to east coast refineries.  

Despite widespread objections from groups both north and south of the border, the company  had planned on reversing the flow on existing pipeline in order to move tar sands oil eastward to Montreal.  

Despite early denials, it was generally believed that, in a later phase, the company would most certainly attempt the same reverse flow in order to direct oil southeast from Montreal,  passing through Vermont and New Hampshire on its way to Portland, Maine and U.S. coastal refineries.

Anticipating that possibility, Jim Murphy, senior counsel for the National Wildlife Federation said in a statement last March:

“A spill would have a devastating impact on our water supplies, wildlife habitat and tourism industry. And any transport of tar sands through Vermont would encourage growth of an industry that contradicts all of our state’s leadership and hard work on moving toward cleaner sources of energy.”

Reversing pipeline flow may prove to be a much tougher sell now.   PHMSA,  the Federal regulatory body that overseas pipeline transport  has just released a bulletin cautioning pipeline operators about the risk of environmental spills  associated with the practice of reversing flow in an existing pipeline.

This does not come as news to pipeline opponents who have insisted that the redirected pipelines would be vulnerable to leaks, both for mechanical reasons and because the composition of tar sands oil makes it far more corrosive than the oil that these pipelines have customarily carried. The PHMSA findings confirm that they have been right all along.

PHMSA said the advisory was triggered in part by last year’s oil spills involving two reversed pipelines, ExxonMobil’s Pegasus tar sands line in Arkansas and the Tesoro Logistics line in North Dakota. Those accidents, as well as “other information PHMSA has become aware of” led the agency to issue the alert, the bulletin said.

Although the advisory was not accompanied by new regulations, it did lay out a list of “tests, precautions and adjustments”  that the pipeline operators would be expected to observe if they undertake to use existing pipeline in this manner.

Anyone familiar with the current practices of federal regulatory bodies knows that they almost universally maintain an exceedingly light touch on the industries they are charged with overseeing.  It is therefore all the more alarming that the PHMSA would be so emphatic in its expression of concern.

In another time, before politics made any hint of regulatory zeal taboo, the practice of reversing pipeline flow might have been banned outright.

If it is not sufficient cause to deny pipeline passage across Vermont’s vulnerable landscapes simply because of our state’s commitment to clean energy, this latest finding should raise enough immediate concern about the practice to allow even our least heroic political leaders to get on board with a ban.

When I woke up this morning to crisp air and sunshine; first, I thanked God that I don’t live in Buffalo; then I reflected on the fact that in barely the time since my grandfather was born we have managed to screw up the planet so badly that it may never  recover.

Of course that rather melodramatic framing of big-snow-before-Thanksgiving was largely a product of having spent yesterday steeped in forums on environmental challenges.  

In the morning, I accompanied departing Enosburg Rep. Cindy Weed to the UVM hosted Legislative Policy Summit on Climate Change.  We did a little election post-mortem on the drive, and I will share some of that in a later diary, but my takeaway from symposium sessions was to hope and work for the best, but plan in any case for the worst.

We are no longer looking at that magic ceiling of 350 parts per million that just a few short years ago still represented an achievable limit.  Now it’s 500 parts per million and, with characters like climate change denying SenatorJames Inhofe holding the controls, it seems less and less likely that the EPA will be given funding necessary to pursue even the insufficient limits agreed upon by President Obama in his recent pact with China.

The Summit was a great opportunity to learn how the State of Vermont is girding itself for the challenges that lie ahead, so my choice was to attend workshops re: planning for impacts on vulnerable populations and understanding Vermont’s Climate Assessment.

The Climate Assessment is a project of the Gund Institute for Ecological Economics and the University of Vermont, with contributions from a number of partners, including the Agency of Natural Resources.  The VCA is sort of a tool box for building a 3-dimensional understanding of climate change as it impacts our little state.

Vermont is the first state to undertake such an assessment.  After an introduction to the VCA resource by Gillian Galford,  ANR Secretary Deb Markowitz shared her perspective on how this new resource can be used to shape Vermont’s path through the unfolding climate challenges that lie ahead.

I realized that I have never before had the opportunity to listen to Secy. Markowitz when she was not campaigning for office.  That is a real shame because I discovered an energetic, articulate, highly intelligent agency head who is still passionate about her commitment to the environment but nimble enough

to make the practical case that could recruit even some doubters.

I was impressed and wondered later to Cindy where that Deb Markowitz had been hiding in the 2010 gubernatorial campaign.  Certainly, others had seen it even when I had not.  The serious money was on Markowitz in the early days of the primary race.

You’ve got to wonder if having her public persona micro-managed by campaign strategists didn’t have the opposite of the desired effect, muffling her authentic capability with a lot of over-disciplined message control.

She often sounded canned in those stump speeches, and even a little doubtful.  That is not what I heard yesterday.

I think she could be our next governor.

But I digress…

In the afternoon, Cindy and I returned to St. Albans to attend the two hour public meeting held in the Bliss Auditorium by the EPA and the State to discuss  new TMDL  standards (Total Maximum Daily Load) for Lake Champlain and how those standards might be achieved.  David Mears, commissioner of the Vermont Dept. of Environmental Conservation was on hand to anchor the conversation.

It was encouraging to see the auditorium packed to the hilt, and that the audience was engaged and respectful. There was none of the blamesmanship that has occasionally erupted at meetings where regulatory issues concerning the lake have been discussed.

In fact,  the most recent blue-green algae bloom was so threatening to lake home owners, farmers and the local economy…all contributors to the problem… that everyone seems to be getting on board with the idea that discharges must be strictly regulated.

So all in all, it was a mixed-news day with the overarching message that inaction to protect the environment from human impacts is no longer an option.

Well, this comes as no surprise.

TEPCO,  the energy giant that already came dangerously close to obliterating northern Japan, is now announcing delays in its plans for removing melted fuel from Fukushima Daiichi reactor #1.  We’re talking about clean-up of a meltdown that they initially denied had even happened.

Now, instead of tackling that dangerous mess in 2020, as promised, the company is  pushing back the start date for the effort to 2025.

You may recall that contaminated groundwater surrounding the facility is an ongoing dilemma, with more and more of it finding its way to the Pacific Ocean every day.  I wonder whether anyone has done an estimate on what additional volume of Pacific contamination will result from the delay?

Also delayed by two years are the plans for removing fuel assemblies from the spent fuel pool.  Like the spent fuel pool at Vermont Yankee, that at Unit 1 of Fukushima sits high atop the reactor, leaving it vulnerable both to attack from above and structural failure from below.

The change in plans no doubt reflects equal parts financial reluctance (or inability?) and technical challenge, both of which factors seem likely to worsen the longer the situation remains unresolved.

Nice for TEPCO that they enjoy the privilege of progressing at their own pace.

Former residents of  the Evacuation Zone haven’t had that luxury.  As a group, they are beginning to understand that their homes may never be returned to them.  Even if they are declared once again habitable, why would anyone believe this to be true after such a history of official lies and deceptions?  

Filmmaker Atsushi Funahashi has documented the plight of one small town, Futaba whose residents once could be grateful to Fukushima Daiichi for the economic vitality of their town.  Evacuated in the aftermath of the disaster, they waited and hoped for the “all-clear” that would send them back home, only to learn that Futaba has been slated to become a nuclear waste dump.

“I think this is almost a human rights violation,” said Atsushi Funahashi, director of “Nuclear Nation 2”…”(They) are forced to live in this temporary housing without hope for the future,”

Central to Mr. Funahashi’s film and to the tragedy unfolding in small chapters all over the Evacuation Zone, is the cultural blow that is dealt to any community so abruptly and irreversibly displaced from its foundations.  

In a country where identity and even purpose are engraved so deeply with tradition and a sense of place, the impact of this nuclear diaspora cannot be underestimated. 150,000 people were displaced by the disaster.  

Official efforts at providing emergency housing are now subject to annual review, adding further uncertainty to already disrupted lives.

Some evacuees are tempted with “incentives” offered by TEPCO to return to their former homes.  Even though they doubt the current safety of the area, many will have little choice but to accept the incentives and return to their former homes.

The alternative is to risk losing even temporary shelter,

should the contracts for emergency housing not be renewed.

Even if the political infrastructure can survive all of the environmental challenges that lie ahead, it is difficult to believe that the events that occurred at Fukushima in 2011, due to human mismanagement, have not already permanently altered the social fabric of one of the great civilizations of our era.

As all in the environmental community awaken to the new political realities that we are facing, Vermont Conservation Voters (on whose board I proudly serve) is wasting no time dwelling on a cup half-empty.

Focusing on the positive in state election results, VCV points out that twenty of the thirty newly elected Senate members, and at least 87 of the 150 House members, received VCV endorsements for their strong environmental voting records and for the opinions they expressed in a pre-election questionnaire.

As analysts and commentators continue to sort out what this election means for health care and property taxes, a deeper look reveals that Vermonters clearly continue to support candidates who value a clean, healthy environment,” said Lauren Hierl, political director of the Vermont Conservation Voters (VCV).

The VCV press release draws particular attention to new senators,  Becca Balint (Windham), Brian Campion (Bennington); as well as to new house representatives,  Amy Sheldon (Addison-1), Robin Chesnut-Tangerman (Rutland-Bennington), Steve Berry (Bennington-4), Chip Troiano (Caledonia-2), Mary Sullivan (Chittenden-6-5), Martin LaLonde (Chittenden-7-1), and Avram Patt (Lamoille-Washington).

All of the above happen to be Democrats, Progressives or Independents, but the non-partisan VCV does not focus on affiliations in its salutory announcement.  

It does, however, single out one new Republican senator for special mention, my next-door neighbor in St. Albans, Dustin Degree:

Dustin Degree, a newly-elected Franklin County GOP senator, said he would support increased funding to clean up waterways in his district. “I pledge…that if elected I will not support a budget that does not set aside funding to clean up St. Albans Bay, Missisqoui Bay and Lake Carmi…We have the money to pay for things that matter – we just need leaders willing to fight to make the priorities of the people the priorities of state government. A healthy Lake Champlain and Lake Carmi are priorities for me, and if given the honor of serving you in the State Senate, I’ll get our waters their day in the State House, and look forward to the day we all swim in the Bay again.”

It is a shame that we have lost three valued voices for environmental responsibility in defeated Franklin County Democrats, Sara Kittell and Mike McCarthy, and Progressive Cindy Weed, but if we gain a new Republican voice for clean water, that will be genuine cause for celebration.

All eyes are on you, Dustin.  Don’t let us down.

What were we just saying about the attendant risks to removing fuel assemblies from the spent fuel pool at Vermont Yankee?

Here’s another twist to keep VY watchers worried.

The NRC has stepped-in to nix some impromptu modification to VY’s heavy duty fuel lifting crane.

The next-to-last quarterly safety inspection at Vermont Yankee has turned up three low-level safety violations, including a plan by Entergy to change the crane’s electrical controls…The NRC said the change would have compromised the “independence of the redundant upper travel limits” of the crane.

Reprising its performance as the clueless innocent, one last time, Entergy maintains that it was just trying to improve the crane and didn’t think the changes required NRC approval.  

Thankfully, the NRC inspection happened upon the modification before the crane was engaged to relocate spent fuel.

In the wake of this latest test of confidence some may recall a 2008 incident at VY (during the first off-loading of spent fuel to dry cask storage), in which the brakes on the crane failed to engage properly causing it to come dangerously close to dropping a load of high level radioactive waste.

It’s difficult to believe that the attempted “modification” isn’t symptomatic of a bailing wire and duct-tape approach to problem solving at the geriatric plant that will only worsen in the months and years between shut-down and full decommissioning.

NRC Spokesman Neil Sheehan downplays the seriousness of the situation, pointing out that the modified crane had not yet been engaged to move spent fuel.

However, Sheehan did acknowledge that

‘Entergy implemented the change to the crane control system that removed redundancy, increasing the likelihood of occurrence of a malfunction that could result in damage to spent fuel”….(with) “more than a minimal increase in the likelihood of occurrence of a malfunction of a system, structure or component important to safety.”

Commissioner of Public Service, Chris Recchia was considerably less sanguine about all of the violations.

“We just want to get to the end of December,” he said. “I am concerned when these things happen, and this is fundamentally why we want the plant to close,” he said. “It’s just another indication it needs to just close.”

All the more reason why Entergy should not get the Emergency Planning waiver it has recently requested.

___________________________________________________________________________________

As always, despite my ongoing work with Fairewinds Energy Education (in a non-technical capacity), whatever I write on Green Mountain Daily reflects my own personal opinion and observations.  These do not necessarily coincide with those of my Fairewinds co-workers.

This story just gets more and more entertaining.  It seems that, in attempting to prove that he actually does something in his part-time job,  Lt. Governor Phil Scott, claims ownership of security at Monday’s protest.

“Command center?”  “Gone South?”  He may not have gotten the Chicken Little memo, but he’s down with the lingo.

_____________________________________________________________________

On Monday Governor Shumlin had an up-close and personal visit from some pretty unhappy constituents.

According to the Freeps, roughly eighty pipeline protesters, representing 350.org, the Vermont Workers’ Center, Rising Tide Vermont and Just Power, entered the Pavillion Building in Montpelier, making their way to the Governor’s office on the fifth floor where they peacefully conducted a sit-in for several hours.  At 8PM the remaining 64 protesters were cited by the police and then released.

It was all very civilized and companionable.  This is Vermont, after all.  There was music, storytelling; even pizza, courtesy of Administration staffers.  The peaceful invasion appears to have taken no one particularly by surprise.

These were, in fact, many of the same people from the environmental activist community whose hard work won back the Governor’s seat for the Democrats and Governor Shumlin four short years ago.  

Disappointed and annoyed with the Governor, as they may be for his failure to fully uphold the commitments he made to  Climate Change initiatives before the election, these are not folks who represent any kind of a physical threat to his person.

But, in the spirit of Team Chicken Little, questions are now being raised as to how the heck all those people made it to the fifth floor without interference.

The lackadaisical roll-out of this question has to make you smile.  

Vermont is a marvel in many ways.  The most liberal state in the Union, it has no gun control whatsoever.

First-time visitors to the State House are often shocked to discover that they can walk right in through one of the main entrances; then wander freely all the way upstairs, in and out of nearly every room in the place, without question or interception.

I once stood behind then-Governor Madeline Kunin in a line-up of weary air travelers.  We were all waiting endlessly for the agent to deal with each of us in turn after our flight had been bumped.  She had the same slightly disheveled, footsore look as we did.  

The Governor waited her turn like the rest of us, happy to chat with a couple of kids from home.  No flashy clothes, no entourage, no VIP line-jumping.

That’s our brand.

So is environmental responsibility.  

All that those folks in Monday’s demonstration were doing was reminding the Governor of his obligation to uphold that brand by standing with them against a pipeline that would undermine his own stated commitment to clean energy.

I rather think whomever was responsible for the “security breach” at the Pavillion was operating under Part Three of the Vermont brand: Simple Common Sense.

Seems like it’s about time we check in on Vermont Yankee again.  Entergy is reporting that VY is ramping down for it’s final curtain at the start of 2015, but at 90% of capacity, it’s still working considerably harder than it was designed to do.

Remember, as nuclear economics began to go south, it wasn’t long ago that Entergy asked for and received permission to exceed that designed-for capacity.

These are the same guys who have once more appealed to the NRC for relief from some required emergency planning soon after the reactor shuts down.  This time the NRC is not being quite so accommodating, calling attention to misrepresentationsin Entergy’s filing.

The NRC staff said Entergy was “inaccurate” when it claimed that there were no accidents “that would result in dose consequences that are large enough to require off-site emergency planning.”

And the staff also said Entergy “inaccurately” stated the analysis of the potential radiological impact of an accident once the plant’s fuel is removed from the reactor core, or “defueled.”

Of course, it all comes down to dollars and cents and Entergy could save a bundle if excused from this responsibility,  but as critics have pointed out time and again, breach of the spent fuel pool though unlikely to occur, is far from impossible.

The NRC appears ready to acknowledge that, if the worst were to happen, there could be a release of radioactive material necessitating emergency response, possibly including evacuation of the affected region.

There is more than one way for an emergency situation to be triggered at the dormant site.  The NRC has already approved a “certified fuel handler program” for VY, so that a second storage pad can be built and fuel moved from the spent fuel pool into dry cask storage.

There are attendant risks even to that move, as the dry casks, when fully loaded weigh as much as 40 tons. They must be lifted, lowered by crane into the spent fuel pool in order to be filled and sealed; then raised again.

This is a complex operation and any failure of mechanical and human coordination might drop all that weight onto the fuel assemblies, damaging them in the spent fuel pool and triggering disaster.

Entergy’s cost cutting initiatives elsewhere are being criticized, as well.  Lax security has raised concern at Pilgrim in Massachusetts; and failure to replace an aging cooling system condenser at the FitzPatrick plant in Scribna, NY may have exposed workers to excess radiation.

We all remember the collapsing cooling tower and tritium leaks from “non-existent” pipes that punctuated VY’s latter years, so we are not strangers to Entergy’s safety fictions.

The NRC says it is “reviewing the petitions” of concern groups about safety issues surrounding the three Entergy facilities, but if it’s past record is anything to go by, we must expect that the agency will bend over backwards to accommodate corporate interest.

Meanwhile, Entergy’s unsurprising choice of “SAFSTOR” for Vermont Yankee means that clean-up of the site could take as much as 60 years.  By then, the cost of clean-up, now estimated at $1.24 billion could rise considerably and it seems highly unlikely that Entergy will pony up more than a fraction of that amount no matter how fortunate the investment landscape might remain in the interim.  

Even after sixty years, if (as seems increasingly likely) no permanent national storage site has been agreed upon and constructed, those two pads stacked with dry casks could stick around for much, much longer.  So long, in fact, that the need to move the fuel assemblies into new casks may become necessary, a task for which no protocols have yet been considered.

Think about that while you eat your morning cornflakes and look at your children and grandchildren across the table.  

All that, just to keep the lights burning and the air-conditioning on high for a mere forty years.

_______________________________________________________________

As always, even though I am pleased to be involved with Fairewinds Energy Education in a non-technical capacity, my diaries on GMD reflect my own personal views and not those of Fairewinds.

I just caught the story on ‘Digger of Lynn Monty’s layoff from the Freeps.

For anyone who isn’t aware, in a particularly ham-handed management move, the Gannett News controlled Burlington Free Press is making most of its veteran editorial staff re-interview for their own jobs.

Sam Hemingway conveniently retired in time to miss out on this new low, but Ms. Monty, a six year veteran, simply refused to interview so they showed her the door.

It leaves me wondering what else the ethically challenged media giant can do to further alienate its increasingly disenchanted readership.

They had already pared down their local talent so far that Ms. Monty reports having to serve as a jack-of-all-trades on Saturdays when, all alone, she manned the newsroom:

For the past two years, she said, she was the only reporter in the newsroom on Saturdays. As such, she simultaneously served as web editor, social media manager and editor that day of the week.

Even that demonstration of loyal service didn’t excuse her from the humiliation of a re-interview!

As almost anyone who publishes in the blogosphere rather than in print media can tell you, it’s gotten more and more difficult to earn a living as a writer of non-entertainment material.  It would seem that Gannett takes this development as a license to abuse both its paid staff and its sad readership.

Instead of the locally diverse and relevant paper we alternately wrestled with and took for granted over the decades, today’s Burlington Free Press is a sorry repackaging of U.S.A. Today, a paper most of us won’t even pick-up for free during a plane delay.  Local content is very limited and treated as a “feature;” kind of like parsley on a mountain of mashed potatoes.

Ms. Lyn was wise to take her leave now.  These interviews can only mean that more local staff “edits” are about to take place.  It won’t be long before every day looks like Saturday in the newsroom.

Don’t forget to turn the lights out and shut the door when you leave.

Cue closing scene from of The Last Picture Show.

“Americans will vote against their own best interests.”

These days, we hear that often enough.  It has certainly been true in recent elections as Republicans cornered the House and now seem poised to close on the Senate.

Statistics tell a different story, however.  In 2008, only 64% of eligible voters cast ballots.  Almost one in four eligible individuals is not even registered to vote, and these are overwhelmingly represented by minorities and the poor.

Gerrymandering and voter restrictions seem the only means by which Republicans can maintain their relevance in national office, but the impact of this false majority is destined to be overwhelmed by the forces of attrition.  

Demographics are rapidly shifting in the U.S., turning ethnic minorities into what will comprise the actual majority of the future.  

Sooner or later short-sighted Republicans will regret their callous disinterest in that looming majority.  With income inequality at an all-time high for us, American tolerance for crushing capitalism and gross injustice is wearing thin.

The Occupy movement  was one sign that we are reaching that tipping point.  The rise of populist Independent Bernie Sanders to national prominence is another.

Last night in St. Albans, at a rally for his Democratic allies, the man most people feel comfortable addressing simply as “Bernie” demonstrated once again the electricity he is capable of generating even in a long familiar crowd.

It never ceases to amaze me that his delivery is pitch perfect and his message evergreen.  

Despite years now passed amid the gridlock of Congress, Bernie has somehow held on to his passion.  His outrage still sounds genuine, lacking the dog whistle tin which damages so many politicians when they enter the arena of skeptics.

He is a man speaking directly to the demographics of tomorrow, reminding them of what “America” once was and could be once again.

If, as now seems more and more likely, the junior senator from Vermont acquiesces to the urging of his widely spread admirers and runs for President, he will be a force with which to reckon.  

His presence in the mix will demand attention to issues like climate change, income inequity and social injustice, which barely caught a glance in the 2012 election cycle.

I’m predicting right now that cartoonists will render him as a burly Don Quixote with a razor sharp lance.

It will be most fitting.

The shoe is on the other foot in South Dakota, where his support for introduction of a state run EB-5 program has gotten Republican Senator Mike Rounds into hot water.  

His Democratic opponent, Rick Weiland, and two independent challengers are making it an issue in the current campaign for his Senate seat.

“I don’t think people appreciate that just because you’ve got the money, you can cut to the front of the (immigration) line,” Weiland said. “So I would vote to repeal the program.”

Like South Dakota, the progressive State of Vermont has embraced the EB-5 program as its own and with it come all of the ethical and practical dilemmas attendant on a strictly privileged immigration system.  

Here, by default, ownership goes to our Democratic majority, and most particularly Governor Shumlin who conspicuously trolled for investors overseas, thereby implicitly branding the enterprise with his personal endorsement.

The fact is that legal immigration has mostly been all about money and connections since long before EB-5 status was created.

As anyone who has navigated the troubled waters of U.S. entry through conventional immigration channels will confirm, we haven’t been welcoming the poor, the sick and the huddled masses since at least the1920’s. If you couldn’t claim to be a political refugee and didn’t have distinct economic potential in the way of money or highly desirable skills, you went to the back of the line.

All the EB-5 program added to the mix was the opportunity to target some of the already existing financial discrimination in such a way as to potentially create job opportunities where they were most needed.

I get that, and I understand why everyone was so excited when Bill Stenger announced his big plans to put the program to work for the Northeast Kingdom (and not incidentally, for his own personal enrichment.)

It was a “gift horse.”  

No one – not the good folks in the Northeast Kingdom, nor the would be line-cutters who offered their cash – no one was inclined to check its dental work.

Now come the tears and excuses.

News that Stenger and his partner, Ariel Quiros, had waited nine months after dissolving the partnership that held the Tram House Lodge at Jay Peak before notifying 35 EB-5 investors of the change was not well received; not by the state nor by the investors.

Now, there are allegations that Vermont Regional Center executive director Brent Raymond, charged by the state with oversight of the project, allowed his personal relationship with the developer to undermine his responsibility to the investors.

Developers are speculators, and like all speculators, their rosiest projections cannot always be relied upon. You would think that anyone with half-a-million dollars to invest must be savvy enough to realize that, but it turns out that some of Mr. Stenger’s  investors were not.

Some of those EB-5 “investors” were novices, gambling their entire nest egg without fully understanding the bargain they had made. Whatever the legal truth, an appearance of exploitation is never attractive.

Not only could the state’s investment credibility be damaged by blow-back from disappointed investors, the prestige of Stenger’s “friends in high places,” including Governor Shumlin, is also on the line.

The Governor’s reputation is tied even more closely to Stenger’s changing fortunes by the simple fact that Alexandra Mclean moved almost directly to Stenger’s employ after serving as a close Shumlin aide and campaign manager. In the wake of project reversals, she’s moved on again, but politics has a long memory.

The picture of a Northeast Kingdom renaissance painted by Stenger always sounded a little too good to be true. Even if it had come off without a hitch, it seemed clearly poised to price locals right out of the housing market.

Despite vague promises of retraining “opportunities,” current residents would most likely only qualify for low-paid service jobs while an influx of skilled labor and professionals would fill positions at high-tech businesses that were anticipated to locate there. What would represent a financial boon for the state, might not be so much so for the locals.

The whole thing started to publicly unravel when developer-to-developer relations with Tony Pomerleau soured. In May of this year, Pomerleau declared that he was through waiting to be paid by Stenger for some key waterfront property in Newport that was central to the whole enterprise.

“I’ve been waiting for four years, I can’t wait any longer,” Pomerleau said […] “I haven’t received one dime and we’re talking about a big deal, millions of dollars.”

I guess that’s developer justice for you.

The stakes are high and no one wants to be left holding the bag.

Anyway, as the “renaissance” plan begins more and more to resemble a late-stage game of Jenga, you have to believe the Governor is holding his breath and watching the clock.