Natural gas will produce significantly less nitrous oxides and almost no sulphur dioxides when burnt as compared to other fuels, according to an architect who coordinated the studies for the new gas power station.
Architect Paul Gauci said natural gas would also produce a third less carbon dioxide than heavy fuel oil.
He was speaking at a public consultation meeting organised by Mepa in Marsaxlokk this afternoon.
Mr Gauci kicked off the well-attended meeting by giving an overview of the 15 studies that were conducted to analyse the impact of the new plant and the related gas storage facility.
The most contentious part of the project is the storage facility, which will be a ship permanently berthed beneath Delimara cliffs converted to store liquefied natural gas.
In their submissions to the EIA, the Marsaxlokk and Birzebbuga councils questioned the validity of the risk study given it was based on data obtained from the Spanish port of Cartagena. They called for the storage ship to be berthed outside Marsaxlokk bay.
Mr Gauci said the location of the ship ensured that in a worst-case scenario where a gas cloud escaped the storage facility, the cloud would not reach the power plants because it would have dispersed. He insisted that with LNG and natural gas one could not speak of explosion risk but fire.
The power station will have three chimneys of 75 metres and another three chimneys of 30 metres.
Mr Gauci said a more detailed risk analysis, including those linked to shipping movements, will be conducted at a later stage when Mepa will consider the environmental permit.
Reactions
The questions put forward by people in the hall concerned the risks associated with the floating storage facility and its visual impact.
Marsaxlokk council consultant Arthur Ciantar, an engineer, said he was not happy with the use of wind patterns from the Spanish port of Cartagena instead of actual wind patterns of Marsaxlokk bay. He insisted that even if the risk of major accident was one in 10,000 years, it did not mean that this could not happen and the EIA simply skirted this issue.
Mr Ciantar said the EIA did say that an accident could compromise the power station itself. "Do we want to compromise our security of supply? What about the impact on residents and their property?"
Marsaxlokk mayor Edric Micallef said the council wanted the storage facility to be berthed outside the port.
Marsaxlokk resident Dominic Azzopardi asked whether the storage ship could be located on the backside of Delimara at Il-Hofra iz-Zghira - the area is where the power station cooling water is discharged through an underground pipe that crosses the peninsula.
Mr Azzopardi also questioned the length of the 30 metre chimneys because the last chimneys built for the BWSC plant at 45 metres were below the skyline of Marsaxlokk residences on top of the hill in the area at Tas-Silg.
Hans Passman, a Dutch expert on LNG, who was presented as a consultant for Din l-Art Helwa, a heritage organisation, also raised question marks on the risk analysis of the storage facility. He called for the floating storage unit to be located outside the port.
His call was reiterated by former resources minister and Nationalist Party MP George Pullicino.
Mr Pullicino asked whether the Committee of Major Accidents, which includes the Civil Protection Department, was asked for its opinion on the development.
He also asked whether a cost-benefit-analysis was conducted to determine whether the country would benefit from cheaper electricity given that the interconnector would be underutilised as a result of the long-term agreement between Enemalta and the gas power plant operators.
Mr Pullicino said it made no sense to conduct detailed risk assessments at a later stage because the permit for land use was determined by whether the project was feasible or not from a risk perspective.
He insisted that the studies should have also taken into consideration the impact of any accident in nearby facilities on the gas storage facility.
PN executive president Anne Fenech said the consultation process was "premature" since no maritime risk study was conducted to determine whether the safety of ship movements in the port would be compromised by the large LNG storage ship.
But PN representatives had a hard time at the meeting despite voicing the same concerns as the people.
A group of Marsaxlokk residents said the Opposition representatives were in no position to criticise this project, which they said would give them cleaner air, when it was a PN government that built the power station at Delimara and more recently a new plant that ran on heavy fuel oil.
A man also questioned the concerns raised, insisting that for the past two decades gas used for households had been offloaded in the middle of Marsaxlokk Bay with nobody ever expressing concern that this might explode.
Replying to the general concern David Galea, an Enemalta official, said locating the storage facility outside the port risked compromising the security of supply because of bad weather. However, he also acknowledged that it would be more costly and take more time - two things Enemalta did not have the luxury to afford.
This prompted Mr Ciantar to ask whether the public consultation exercise was a futile exercise if the authorities were not ready to consider the principle concern residents had.
When asked by a journalist whether a political decision had already been taken for the location of the ship inside the port, Mepa chairman Vince Cassar insisted no decision had been taken yet by the authority. "Every board member can vote as he deems fit," he said.