The Conflicting Interests Spinning in the Oakland Estuary Turning Basin
Plans to dredge the Oakland Estuary’s inner and outer turning basins in order to accommodate larger ships face conflicting environmental and economic interests. Port officials and the Army Corps of Engineers say that container ships — which are steadily growing in size in the hopes of reducing costs — struggle to change directions in the dense Port of Oakland. This leads to some close-quarter maneuvering for Estuary traffic, as well as so-called traffic jams for ships, which disrupted fragile global supply chains through the pandemic. The Port and Corps of Engineers want to widen the Port of Oakland’s inner- and outer-harbor turning basins by about 20 acres, according to KQED.
The Port of Oakland, Corps of Engineers and organizations representing the marine trades say that the estimated $400 million project to widen the basins is necessary for the Port of Oakland to remain competitive. Local environmental groups have bemoaned the proposed project’s impacts to air and water quality, and say that community engagement on the issue has been poor.
Today is the last day to weigh in on the draft environmental report for the turning-basin expansion. Click here to comment.
Last year, when the City of Oakland was considering building a new ball park at Howard Terminal for the Oakland A’s, the team’s ownership of port property, and the Bay Conservation and Development Commission’s (BCDC’s) changing the Port’s designation were seen as potential impediments to the expansion of the turning basins, especially the inner harbor, which lies next to Howard Terminal. Now that the A’s have decided to move to Las Vegas, the turning-basin project seems to be “gathering steam,” according to KQED.
“They have done a poor job on community engagement,” said a director of the West Oakland Environmental Indicators Project, noting that there has been only one virtual call between the group and the agencies working on the project. “All they want to talk about is the plans for construction and not the emissions from ongoing operations.”
An attorney with Earthjustice has called for the Corps to redo their environmental review, “arguing that the current version focuses only on construction and dredging and neglects to consider potential harms associated with ongoing operations after the project is complete.” Environmental justice advocates have long said that the emissions from the Port, which includes a single diesel semi-trailer truck per container that comes off a ship, inundates the predominantly low-income neighborhood of West Oakland.
Advocates of the turning-basin expansion said that the widening will “improve transit efficiency, help modernize the waterway, and potentially even reduce emissions by allowing ships to plug into electricity from land rather than burning dirty diesel fuel while idle.”
In 2022, the Port of Oakland, along with groups representing merchant mariners, proposed a “new offshore queuing process” that was meant to reduce ship congestion and minimize air-quality impacts. It’s not clear how much of this plan has been implemented. While there are lots of exciting plans for greener ships, it will likely be at least a decade before a demonstrable change in emissions is seen in ports and on the high seas.
Again we are back to “not in my back yard”. Many of the products we use in the Bay area come from
overseas on container ships. So why should Oakland port not be a place for these products to come into? Folks that feel Oakland port should not be expanded to handle larger container ships, should also stop using any products that come in on container ships anywhere in the Americas. Thess folks should get rid of all their electronic stuff, watch what they eat, forget putting new tires on your car or the busses, the list goes on and on. There is a way for ships to help cut their carbon footprint, use ammonia. If as much money as is going into EV’s, was spent on using ammonia, any ICE gas or diesel could be converted to ammonia.
The X 1500 rocket used ammonia as fuel as well as all ICE in Belgium during WW II. The exhaust is water and nitrogen.
You’re correct that it’s hypocritical to consume things from overseas, then complain about projects like this. The proper solution is to stop consuming these things so we can stop all the environmental harms and destruction. I realize that no one is going to give up everything at once, nor could they. But there are substantial things that we all can do. For example, I gave up my car 24 years ago. Americans consume far too much, we need to reverse this and all make an effort instead of making excuses.