This map from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission shows planned locations for CP2, a a giant liquefied natural gas export terminal on the Gulf Coast of Louisiana and an associated pipeline. FERC issued crucial approvals for the projects Thursday. (Photo courtesy of FERC)

A massive and contentious liquefied natural gas export project in coastal Louisiana and an associated pipeline got a key approval from federal regulators Thursday.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission issued an order granting permission for Venture Global to build and operate the CP2 terminal in Cameron Parish along the Gulf Coast and construct and operate the CP Express Pipeline connecting the terminal to the gas pipeline network in east Texas and southwest Louisiana. Earthjustice, an environmental law group, said the terminal would “export more liquefied methane gas than any U.S. terminal ever approved.”

Commissioner Allison Clements, who was taking part in her last meeting on the commission after she opted not to seek another term, was the lone dissent. Clements has consistently urged the commission to more fully vet greenhouse gas emissions from natural gas projects.

“The commission has not adequately addressed the project’s environmental and socioeconomic impacts, including adverse impacts on environmental justice communities,” Clements said.

“These projects will have enormous emissions of greenhouse gasses equivalent to putting more than 1.8 million new gas fueled cars on the road each year. The order does not meaningfully assess those emissions.”

The project will still need an air permit from the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality and other permits, and it cannot begin exporting gas to countries lacking free-trade agreements (which constitute about 90% of the global liquified natural gas market) without authorization from the U.S. Department of Energy, the Sierra Club noted.

President Joe Biden’s administration implemented a pause on LNG export approvals in January in order to allow the DOE to update its authorization analyses.

“Today, we have an evolving understanding of the market need for LNG, the long-term supply of LNG, and the perilous impacts of methane on our planet,” the White House said at the time. “We also must adequately guard against risks to the health of our communities, especially frontline communities in the United States who disproportionately shoulder the burden of pollution from new export facilities.”

In April, 25 Republican governors called on the administration to end the freeze.

“It creates instability and threatens future energy security throughout the world at a time when our allies need us the most. It sends a message that the U.S. is not a reliable energy partner,” they said in a statement released by the Republican Governors Association.

In a statement reported by an industry publication, Venture Global’s CEO applauded “the commission and FERC staff for their independent and thorough review and approval of CP2 LNG.”

Friends of the Earth, an environmental group, called the CP2 terminal a “carbon bomb” and the Sierra Club said CP2 is a “disastrous project that puts polluters over people.”

The terminal is planned next to the existing Venture Global Calcasieu Pass LNG facility that has already racked up air pollution violations and about two miles from the proposed Commonwealth LNG facility. The Sierra Club noted that the area “has more low-income residents than 88% of the country.”

In a news conference after the FERC meeting, Chairman Willie Phillips, who voted to approve the project, said he’s made environmental justice, which aims to protect low income and minority communities from polluting infrastructure projects, a priority.

“I believe we have a duty to those communities. We also have a duty to abide by the law,” Phillips said, adding that FERC’s evaluation of environmental impact goes “above and beyond” what’s required by the National Environmental Policy Act. The order, he said, has “over 130 conditions regarding public safety, engineering and environmental impacts.”

The Sierra Club said that while FERC has acknowledged the need to do more to protect overburdened communities from environmental injustices, “it will take more than lip service, and this approval is a clear step in the wrong direction.”