Automated opinion undermines discourse and too often overwhelms legitimate public concern about energy projects.
Pressure groups routinely clog project permitting with mass-produced submissions during public-comment periods.
The tactic is obstructionist—and undemocratic.
Sure, pressure groups have the right to submit as many comments as they like.
But repetition doesn’t validate message. And repetition aimed at swamping commentary is pernicious.
Meridian Energy Group Inc. has usefully deconstructed a flood of comments submitted about the 55,000-b/sd refinery it wants to build in two phases in the Bakken shale region of North Dakota.
The state Department of Health’s division of air quality issued a draft permit-to-construct for the proposed Davis refinery in December and accepted public comments for 45 days.
When the comment period closed on Jan. 26, 2018, the division had received nearly 11,000 submissions.
Meridian responded to all of them. It also analyzed the sources.
In a Mar. 20 press release, the company reported that 97.5% of the comments were form letters, “essentially email blasts from several different member-based websites.”
One organization with 1.3 million members submitted 10,068 form letters via email through its website.
According to Meridian, none of the form emails contained comments relevant to the technical or legal basis for the draft permit issued in December.
“While 1.8% of the comments received were from North Dakota respondents,” Meridian said, “over 22% were from the West Coast, specifically Oregon, Washington, and California.”
William Prentice, Meridian chief executive officer, said reviewing and analyzing the comments were “almost as exhausting as the application review process itself.”
He credited work by the health department for depriving opponents of a “substantive basis” for their resistance to the project.
Especially interesting is Meridian’s observation that the form emails didn’t address technical or legal underpinnings of the draft permit.
Apparently, senders were interested more in numerical spectacle than genuine issues, more in jamming a system than actuating persuasion.
Meridian said only 2.5% of all comments received were unique. But they deserve 100% of official attention.
(From the subscription area of www.ogj.com, posted Mar. 23, 2018; author’s email: [email protected])