ACTOR PIERCE Brosnan has written to Kerry County Council to express his reservations about the country's first liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal proposed for a land bank alongside Tarbert on the Shannon Estuary.
The €500 million terminal proposal by a subsidiary of the US Hess corporation was granted permission in March, and an oral hearing into a pipeline to link the facility with the national gas network near Foynes in Co Limerick was held in Listowel last week.
Both parts were deemed strategic infrastructure and went straight to An Bord Pleanála for consideration. Brosnan, who has objected to a similar proposal in California, was born in Navan, Co Meath, and has links with Kerry.
He said he and his wife Keely were supporting the Safety Before LNG campaign against the proposed Shannon LNG terminal.
The LNG proposal had been "fast-tracked and 'piecemealed' " by separating the terminal itself from its associated pipeline and "no coherent assessment of the serious and significant risks to public health and safety has been undertaken", he claimed.
Brosnan and his wife were supporting the challenge to permission to Kerry County Council on the basis that the project had been split, he said.
The couple had participated in the review of an LNG terminal proposal for offshore California proposed by the largest mining company in the world, BHP Billiton.
"What we found was a massive, industrial facility that would have polluted our community in violation of existing air-quality laws and that posed serious long-term risks to public safety and security.
"We strongly support Safety Before LNG's request that the planning department find that this project and its associated pipeline must be thoroughly reviewed for the serious cumulative risks it poses for the local population and the environment," the Brosnans wrote.