By Seattle Times staff: The Associated Press: 6 October 2016
ANACORTES — Shell Puget Sound Refinery announced Thursday it has terminated plans for a proposed oil-by-rail project at its refinery in Washington state.
Under the plan, trains would have brought crude oil from the Bakken fields of North Dakota to replace some of the supply Shell gets from Alaska’s North Slope.
Refinery general manager Shirley Yap told the Skagit Valley Herald on Thursday that recent low oil prices and abundant production elsewhere have slowed Midwest production, making it less of a good investment.
“At today’s prices, even if I had a (rail) facility, I would not be buying Bakken,” Yap said.
The proposal had been in the works for years, with Skagit County officials concluding there weren’t significant impacts from the project in Anacortes. But conservation groups appealed, and a county hearing examiner ruled a full project review was needed.
Shell’s appeal of that decision was dismissed last year, and a draft environmental-impact statement regarding the project was released this week by state and local officials.
The release of the environmental statement was a good milestone at which to make the refinery’s announcement, Yap said. She was confident, she said, the facility could have been built following the environmental statement’s guidelines.
The announcement was news to Skagit County Planning Director Dale Pernula.
“They’ve been working so hard, and we’ve been working so diligently on this. It just really surprised us,” he said.
Kristen Boyles, an attorney at Earthjustice who represented conservation groups in their legal challenge of the project, called the decision to stop the project an extraordinary victory for the people of Skagit County and Washington state.
“Having a full and transparent public process exposed everyone — including apparently Shell itself — to the risks and harms of this project,” Boyles said in an email.
The refinery will continue receiving crude from Alaska by ship and from Canada by pipeline and will also examine other potential sources.
“There will be other opportunities for us to invest in,” refinery spokesman Cory Ertel told the newspaper. “This just isn’t a good investment at this time anymore.”
Seattle Times staff
This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
