Secrets of Maine’s Sea-Run Brook Trout
by Tom Seymour

D. Smith, owner of Quoddy Bay LNG. Fishermen’s Voice photo

The Oklahoma based Quoddy Bay LNG company has been sued for non-payment of outstanding bills by a Massachusetts engineering contractor. Over the last several years has attempted to become the broker for a Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) offloading facility in Eastport, Maine Quoddy Bay is owned by Donald Smith. It is alleged that Quoddy Bay has little capital and may be insolvent.. It has been estimated Quoddy Bay may owe other creditors more than $2 million.

The Quoddy Bay company wanted to build an LNG pipeline from a proposed terminal at Pleasant point to a connection with the Maritimes & Northeast Pipeline in Princeton.

FERC had submitted technical questions to Quoddy Bay LNG But they went unanswered for a year and FERC ejected Quoddy Bay from the process. They are also out of all the other permitting processes that they were required to be in.

Robert Godfrey of Eastport said the LNG plan was a “goofy idea from the beginning.” He said Smith at one point said the cultural activities of the Native Americans, across whose land the gas facility would cross, could continue after the project is completed. One of these cultural activities is a large monthly full moon bonfire, which would be perilously close to the LNG.

Building an underwater and underground pipeline for the frozen gas is extremely expensive. According to Godfrey all the LNG projects in Maine have been in violation of the LNG industry’s best practices for siting.

Further undermining the credibility of Quoddy Bay LNG owner Smith are reports that he has had financial transactions that have been funneled through the tax-free haven of Turks and Caicos in the Caribbean, he has suspended quarterly lease payments to the Pleasant Point tribal council, and had been involved with Ken Lay’s Enron International company. The Federal Energy Regulation Commission (FERC) dismissed Quoddy Bay LNG’s application to construct a terminal, and their application to the Maine Board of Environmental Protection has been placed on hold.

This is the latest of several attempts to build an LNG terminal in Maine. Both Harpswell and Gouldsboro were considered earlier by other companies. Another group is attempting to site an LNG facility at Calais, Maine. Boston rejected a terminal on the grounds that the highly explosive gas would pose an unacceptably high risk in the densely populated area.