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Letter to the Editor of SCMP - Response to the the issues raised by Mr John Schofield in his letter entitled "Council's Scope Limited" in SCMP (23 March 2007)
Mr John Schofield's letter entitled "Council's Scope Limited" (March 23) suggested that the Advisory Council on the Environment (ACE), in its deliberations of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) report on "Liquefied Natural Gas Receiving Terminal and Associated Facilities", had not given due consideration to a number of environmental issues. This is plainly not true.
In considering any EIA report, the ACE may give any comments it has on the report to the Director of Environmental Protection. The Council's EIA Subcommittee and the full Council examined the EIA report of the above project in great detail at their respective meetings on 19 January 2007 and 12 February 2007. A wide range of environmental and related issues were properly looked into by Members of the Subcommittee on 19 January 2007, including the background of the project, site selection, risk assessment (in particular the marine transit of the Black Point option), ecological impacts (including impacts of the project on the functions of the potential marine park and cumulative impacts), water quality impacts, landscape and visual impacts, waste management, construction and operational impacts, archeological and cultural heritage, environmental monitoring and environmental enhancement plan. The issues of landscape and visual impacts, land use compatibility, noise impacts on marine mammals, impacts of the cooling water system, heavy metals in water, hazard to life, environmental enhancement plan were further considered in detail by the full Council on 12 February 2007.
It was only after very careful consideration and lengthy discussion of all these relevant environmental issues that the ACE endorsed the EIA report "insofar as the environmental impact of the project is concerned" subject to a number of conditions set out in the minutes of the relevant meeting. The minutes of the meetings of ACE and the EIA Subcommittee have been uploaded on the website of the Environmental Protection Department (www.epd.gov.hk).
(Professor Lam Kin-che)
Chairman
Advisory Council on the Environment
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