Blake LNG Neg

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Eden Prarie Debate Blake LNG NegState 2

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Vagueness


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1NC

The plan is vague the scope of the plan cant be determined because there isnt asingle solvency advocate for increasing investment in transportationinfrastructure in the United States that supports the export of liquefied naturalgas anything could support the export of LNG.Support is defined as:(http://www.thefreedictionary.com/support, [CL])

1. To bear the weight of, especially from below.2. To hold in position so as to keep from falling, sinking, or slipping.3. To be capable of bearing; withstand: "His flaw'd heart . . . too weak the conflict to support" (Shakespeare).

4. To keep from weakening or failing; strengthen : The letter supported him in his grief.

Vote negative A. Ground the wording of the plan shrinks CP ground down to zero the 2ACcould easily spike out of PIC competition by reclarifying which ports, roads,airports or waterways are effected by the plan.B. Limits the 1NC cant produce stable offense because the 1AC doesnt specifythe objects of investment the plan could include a laundry list of things.Like price adjustment.Paisie 13(John, JEA Consulting Group, US LNG EXPORT PROJECTS2 (Conclusion): Projected financial performance supports building at least a few,1.7.13, http://www.ogj.com/articles/print/volume-111/issue-1/transportation/us-lng-export-projects-2-conclusion-projected.html, [CL])

Destination pricing.The differential between US natural gas prices and natural gas prices in Europeand Asia has often been substantial over the past few years. This article's reference scenario

assumes the differential will narrow but remain sufficient to support US exports .

Or anything from building new LNG plants to altering operating expenses and

shipping costs.Paisie 13(John, JEA Consulting Group, US LNG EXPORT PROJECTS2 (Conclusion): Projected financial performance supports building at least a few,1.7.13, http://www.ogj.com/articles/print/volume-111/issue-1/transportation/us-lng-export-projects-2-conclusion-projected.html, [CL])

While results from the financial analysis support building the LNG export plants, the analysis

is not definitive given the level of uncertainty. JEA therefore undertook further analysis addressing each export plant'sfinancial robustness. This evaluation considers the importance of location (East Coast, Gulf Coast, and West Coast),and a range of additional factors affecting financial performance ofgeneric LNG plants. Factors consideredinclude:

Utilization rate, based on throughput as a percentage of design capacity for each liquefaction plant. Operating expenses, based on typical costs of a liquefaction plant; including maintenance andadministrative costs for a medium-sized plant, with adjustments for differences in scale for large and small plants.

Shipping costs, based on the spot rates for each of the most likely routes: East Coast to Europe, Gulf Coast toEurope, Gulf Coast to Asia, and West Coast to Asia. US natural gas prices, based on the reference scenario developed by JEA Consulting Group with adjustments for locations: East Coast,Gulf Coast, West Coast.

Natural gas prices at destination, with Japan as the proxy for Asia and Spain as the proxy for Europe, based on the referencescenario developed by JEA.

Capital expenditures, based on the typical $/ton for a medium-sized plant with adjustments for economies of scale when constructing alarger (advantage) or smaller (disadvantage) plant.

Cost of capital, based on financing arrangements and typical interest rates for project debt and return-on-equity consistent with riskassociated with already active LNG-related sites.
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/supporthttp://www.ogj.com/articles/print/volume-111/issue-1/transportation/us-lng-export-projects-2-conclusion-projected.htmlhttp://www.ogj.com/articles/print/volume-111/issue-1/transportation/us-lng-export-projects-2-conclusion-projected.htmlhttp://www.ogj.com/articles/print/volume-111/issue-1/transportation/us-lng-export-projects-2-conclusion-projected.htmlhttp://www.ogj.com/articles/print/volume-111/issue-1/transportation/us-lng-export-projects-2-conclusion-projected.htmlhttp://www.thefreedictionary.com/support


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Exchange rates, based on 2013 outlook provided by the OECD for rates between the US dollar and Japanese yen and between the US dollarand euro, including expectations for longer-term trends.


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AT: Reasonability

Reasonability is an arbitrary standard the affirmatives interpretation isntreasonable if it results in loss of core negative ground or mystifies the concretedetails of the plan.

It causes judge intervention there is no objective metric of reasonableness youshould prefer material comparison of interpretations that can change how wedebate the topic.

It doesnt solve a race to the bottom only competing interpretations can producea race to the middle, which is a pre-requisite to reasonable interpretations of thetopic.

It produces lazy theory debates you should force debaters to compareinterpretations of the topic by thinking critically about the best ways to engage theresolution instead of just justifying what theyve already done in the 1AC. Key to

creative thinking.


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AT: 2AC Re-Spec

Specifying in the 2AC doesnt solve any of our ground arguments obviously youllhave a different story to tell in each 2AC depending on what the 1NC said thedamage was done in the 1AC because the negative cant produce stable andpredictable offense in the 1NC.

Its more abusive this is a textbook example of a link spiking strategy it makesdebating smart counterplans impossible and forces reliance on generic disads andcase arguments - we lose 100% of PIC ground and cant read offense againstparticular types of investment because the plan effects a broad array ofunspecified forms of infrastructure like roads, bridges, airports, seaports and

waterways.


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Jordan Cove PIC


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1NC

The United States federal government should substantially increase itstransportation infrastructure investment in the United States that supports theexport of liquefied natural gas except for the Jordan Cove Energy Project.

If theres one thing thats certain after reading the plan its that the plan will resultin port dredging in Jordan Cove that leads to ballast releases in the North PacificLearn 12(Scott, writer for the Oregonian, 1.18.12, Environmentalists appeal Coos Bay project that could fuel exports of coal and liquefied natural gas,http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2012/01/environmentalists_appeal_coos.html, [CL])

Environmental groups Wednesday appealed a state dredging permit that could allow the Port of

Coos Bayto export coal and l iquefied n atural g as to Asia. The Oregon Department of State Lands approved the permit last

month, nearly five years after the port first filed it. The port wants to dredge more than 5 million cubic yards for anaccess channel and a new two-slip marine terminal on the bay's North Spit . It estimates the terminal wouldgenerate from 26 to 280 long-term jobs. Five environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and Greenpeace, filed the appeal. The appeal

letter from Earthjustice argues that the state should have considered the likely use of the newberths when evaluating the impact of the dredging project. Potential problems include increasedship traffic and pollution generated from ship loading, rainwater runoff from storage facilities

and ballast water releases . The state also didn't adequately evaluate the environmental damage from dredging, the appeal argues.

The dredging permit is instrumental to building the Jordan Cove liquefied natural gas

terminal and its associated Pacific Connector pipeline . The port is also negotiating with an

undisclosed party for exports of coal, part of a push by Powder River Basin coal companies in Wyoming and Montana to add coalexport terminals across the Northwest. Environmental groups question why the permit was approved at the same time Oregon's attorney general is

making the case before federal regulators that the Jordan Cove export project isn't in Oregon's interest. RichardWhitman, Gov. John Kitzhaber's natural resources advisor, said last month that the state has never tied its approval of port facilities to specific uses

and needs to consistently apply its review standards. Other regulatory approvals are required before an LNGproject could go forward, Whitman noted.

Ballast water exchanges between Oregon ports and Asia result in the introductionof Invasive Aquatic Species that shocks local food webs, threatens marine

biodiversity and collapses fisheriesVinograd and Sytsma 2(Jordan and Mark, Center for Lakes and Reservoirs, Portland State University, in cooperation with The Oregon Ballast Water Ta sk Force, Report onthe Oregon Ballast Water Management Program in 2002, [CL])

Impacts of Aquatic Invasive Species InvasionAccording to SB 895, Aquatic Nuisance Species (ANS) are any species or other viable biological material that enters an ecosys tem beyond its historicrange. Various other terms are used to describe nuisance species including: introduced, foreign, exotic, alien, nonindigenous, non-native, immigrant

and transplants. The Oregon Aquatic Nuisance Species Management Plan defines ANS as plant oranimal species that threatens the diversity or abundance of native species, the ecologicalstability of infested waters, or commercial, agricultural, aqua-cultural, or recreational activities dependenton such waters.ANS invasions cause economic, ecological, or public health damage . Ecological impacts

include degradation of habitat, alteration of water quality, predation, hybridization, andcompetition with native species. They cause economic impacts when they clog water intake pipes forindustrial water users, power plants, or municipal water supplies and block flow in drainage andirrigation canals. Invasive species can also transmit diseases that could pose health risks to native species and evenhumans.

One notable ballast water-mediated invasion was by the zebra mussel (Dreissena polymorpha) in the GreatLakes. Since their introduction in 1986 in ballast water from the Caspian Sea, zebra mussels have quickly
http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2012/01/environmentalists_appeal_coos.htmlhttp://www.oregon.gov/DSL/PERMITS/docs/fact_sheet_port_of_coos_bay.pdf?ga=thttp://www.portofcoosbay.com/http://www.portofcoosbay.com/http://www.oregon.gov/DSL/http://oregon.sierraclub.org/http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/http://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/coos-bay-notice.pdfhttp://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/coos-bay-notice.pdfhttp://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/09/coos_bay_lng_backers_to_apply.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/09/coos_bay_lng_backers_to_apply.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2012/01/two_coal_companies_want_to_exp.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2012/01/two_coal_companies_want_to_exp.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/12/oregon_asks_feds_to_revoke_lic.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/12/oregon_asks_feds_to_revoke_lic.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/12/coos_bay_liquefied_natural_gas.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/12/coos_bay_liquefied_natural_gas.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/12/oregon_asks_feds_to_revoke_lic.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2012/01/two_coal_companies_want_to_exp.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2012/01/two_coal_companies_want_to_exp.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/09/coos_bay_lng_backers_to_apply.htmlhttp://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/09/coos_bay_lng_backers_to_apply.htmlhttp://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/coos-bay-notice.pdfhttp://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/coos-bay-notice.pdfhttp://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/http://oregon.sierraclub.org/http://www.oregon.gov/DSL/http://www.portofcoosbay.com/http://www.portofcoosbay.com/http://www.oregon.gov/DSL/PERMITS/docs/fact_sheet_port_of_coos_bay.pdf?ga=thttp://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2012/01/environmentalists_appeal_coos.html


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spread and are now found in at least twenty states and two Canadian Provinces. Great Lakes water users spend tens of millions ofdollars on zebra mussel control every year (Clean Water Trust, 1999). Municipalities and industries that use large volumes of Great Lakes water expendan average of $360,000 per year for zebra mussel control. Smaller municipalities spend an average of $20,000 per year. Nuclear power plants incur anaverage of $825,000 per year in additional costs because of fouling by zebra mussels. As the zebra mussel spreads to inland lakes and rivers acrossNorth America, and additional water users are impacted, the costs of zebra mussel control will escalate (ANS Task Force, 2002).

The zebra mussels rapid reproduction, coupled with it high filtration and consumption rates ofmicroscopic plants and animals, alters the aquatic food web and places valuable commercial and

sport fisheries at risk. Blooms of potentially toxic cyanobacteria have been noted in zebra mussel-infested waters, such as Saginaw Bay ofLake Huron and the western basin of Lake Erie.When multiple species introductions occur, unexpected ecological impacts can result. The roundgoby, Neogobius melanostomus,was introduced to the Great Lakes in ballast water from the Black andCaspian Seas. First discovered in 1990 near Detroit, they quickly spread and by 1995 had been reported in all five of the Great Lakes withpopulation numbers reaching high densities in many areas in Lake Erie and Lake Michigan (Manz, 1998). Round gobies feed on zebramussels, but not at rates that can control zebra mussel abundance. Zebra mussel-infested waters tend to be conduciveto the growth of the botulism causing bacteria, clostridium botulinum. The poison produced by this

bacteria causes type E avian botulism. The current theory suggests that the zebra mussels acquire the type Ebotulism as they filter the lake water. Then the gobies eat scores of the zebra mussels and alsoacquire type E (Daneman, 2002). Within hours of ingesting the goby, manyloons, mergansers and other fish-eating

birds, along with sheepshead, smallmouth bass and other fish, die. In this way, the goby is suspected of contributing to this outbreak of avianbotulism in the Great Lakes.

An example of a West Coast invader i s the Asian clam, Potamocorbula amurensi. The Asian clam was introduced into SanFrancisco Bay, probablyin ballast water, from tropical to cold temperate Asian waters where it is

native. First found in San Francisco Bay in 1986, the Asian clam took only two years to spread throughout

the bay estuary. It colonized a variety of habitats with differing sediment type, water depth and salinity, reaching

densities of greater than 10,000 individuals per square meter . Within one year the

composition of the soft substrate community had changed dramatically, withP. amurensis

comprising more than 95% of its biomass. The clam forms a benthic monoculture in San

Francisco Bay, displacing the former benthic community and causing sediment disturbance. Like the freshwater zebramussel, the Asian clam is a suspension feeder that consumes large quantities of phytoplankton.

It has altered the phytoplankton community in San Francisco Bay, which is suspected of causing the collapse of some

fisheres in the area (Carlton et al., 1990). The Asian clam is a good example of the type of organism

that could be transported into Oregon waters in coastal shipping.

ExtinctionDiner 94(Judge Advocates Generals Corps of US Army, David N., MilitaryLaw Review, Winter, 143 Mil. L. Rev. 161, Lexis)

No species has ever dominated its fellow species as man has. In most cases, people have assumed the God-like power of life and death -- extinction orsurvival -- over the plants and animals of the world. For most of history, mankind pursued this domination with a single-minded determination to

master the world, tame the wilderness, and exploit nature for the maximum benefit of the human race. n67 In past mass extinctionepisodes, as many as ninety percent of the existing species perished, and yet the world movedforward, and new species replaced the old. So why should the world be concerned now? Theprime reason is theworld's survival. Like all animal life, humans live off of other species. Atsome point, the number of species could decline to the point at which the ecosystem fails, and

then humans also would become extinct. No one knows how many [*171] species the world needs to support human life, and tofind out -- by allowing certain species to become extinct -- would not be sound policy. In addition to food, species offermany direct and indirect benefits to mankind. n68 2. Ecological Value. -- Ecological value is the value that species have in maintaining the environment. Pest, n69 erosion, and flood control are prime benefitscertain species provide to man. Plants and animals also provide additional ecological services -- pollution control, n70 oxygen production, sewage treatment, and biodegradation. n71 3. S cientific and UtilitarianValue. -- Scientific value is the use of species for research into the physical processes of the world. n72 Without plants and animals, a large portion of basic scientific research would be impossible. Utilitarian valueis the direct utility humans draw from plants and animals. n73 Only a fraction of the [*172] earth's species have been examined, and mankind may someday desperately need the species that it is exterminatingtoday. To accept that the snail darter, harelip sucker, or Dismal Swamp southeastern shrew n74 could save mankind may be difficult for some. Many, if not most, species are useless to man in a direct utilitariansense. Nonetheless, they may be critical in an indirect role, because their extirpations could affect a directly useful species negatively. In a closely interconnected ecosystem, the loss of a species affects other speciesdependent on it. n75 Moreover, as the number of species decline, the effect of each new extinction on the remaining species increases dramatically. n76 4. Biological Diversity. -- The main premise of speciespreservation is that diversity is better than simplicity. n77 As the current mass extinction has progressed, the world's biological diversity generally has decreased. This trend occurs within ecosystems by reducing

the number of species, and within species by reducing the number of individuals. Both trends carry serious future implications.Biologically diverse ecosystems arecharacterized by a large number ofspecialist species, filling narrow ecological niches. Theseecosystems inherently are more stable than less diverse systems. "The more complex the


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ecosystem, the more successfully it can resist a stress. . . . [l]ike a net, in which each knot is connected to others byseveral strands, such a fabric can resist collapse better than a simple, unbranched circle of threads -- which if cut anywhere breaks down as a whole."

n79 By causingwidespread extinctions, humans have artificially simplified many ecosystems. As biologicsimplicity increases, so does the risk of ecosystem failure. The spreading Sahara Desert in Africa, and thedustbowl conditions of the 1930s in the United States are relatively mild examples of what might

be expected if this trend continues. Theoretically,each new animal or plant extinction, with all its

dimly perceived and intertwined affects, could cause total ecosystem collapse andhuman extinction. Each new extinction increases the risk of disaster. Like a mechanic

removing, one by one, the rivets from an aircraft's wings, [hu]mankind may be edging closer tothe abyss.


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2NC CP Solves

CP solves 100% of the case there isnt a piece of 1AC evidence that indicates thatthe Jordan Cove port is key to Asian exports OR a piece of evidence that says that

Asian exports in particular are key to the solve the advantage.

The 1AC Palti evidence is barely a paragraph, and only indicates that gas exportswould allow the US to transition away from dependence on the Middle East, whichallows a regional Asian focus. The CP solves the internal link it increases netLNG exports and creates a market boom.

The risk of a solvency deficit never rises above 1% -you shouldnt assume that anyparticular port is key without evidence.

And, Jordan Cove will barely break even and thats assuming that it only exports.Imports will offset and we wont feel benefits until 2045.ECONorthwest 12(Economics, Finance and Planning conglomerate, Effect of the Jordan Cove Energy Projects LNG Exports on United States Balance of Trade 2018-2045, report prepared for the Jordan Cove Energy Project, L.P., 2.28.12,http://www.jordancoveenergy.com/pdf/Trade_Balance.pdf, [CL])

The Jordan CoveEnergy Project (JCEP) expects to export domestic natural gas in the form of liquefied naturalgas (LNG) from its terminal in Coos County, Oregon. These exports would also increase gas field byproduct output, whichare substitutes for imported crude oil. The combination of these two effects would improve the U.S. balance of trade. The balance of trade is thedifference in the values of exports from the United States and imports into the country. Improving the balance of trade (i.e., exporting more and/or

importing less) raises national income and stimulates employment. In 2010, President Obama stated a policy goal of doublingU.S. exports as part of his National Export Initiative. Citing that every $1 billion increase in exports supports more than6,000 jobs in the United States, the President noted that [i]n a time when millions of Americans are out of work, boosting our exports is a short term

imperative and doing so is also critical for our long-term prosperity.ECONorthwest analyzed the trade impacts of theJCEP for th0.

1e years 2018 through 2045 under the assumption the terminal would only export

LNG (it has the ability to import as well). This report summarizes the findings of that analysis. The JCEP will receive

natural gas from Canada, as well as from domestic gas fields in the Rocky Mountain basins. The value of the Canadian

gas imports has a negative impact of the U.S. balance of trade . However, this is offset by the

value of LNG exports from Coos Countyand of natural gas liquids (NGLs), a byproduct of domestic natural gas output, which is adirect substitute for imported crude oil. This analysis shows thatthe impacts vary by year as prices and the domestic-import mix of natural gas purchases change.
http://www.jordancoveenergy.com/pdf/Trade_Balance.pdfhttp://www.jordancoveenergy.com/pdf/Trade_Balance.pdfhttp://www.jordancoveenergy.com/pdf/Trade_Balance.pdf


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2NC Net Benefit

Extend Learn 12 the Jordan Cove dredging project is instrumental to supportingUS LNG exports the plan would result in ship pollution in Oregon watersthrough the release of ballast water thats carried between Coos Bay and Asianharbors the Vinograd and Sytsma evidence indicates that these kinds of ballastexchanges result in the introduction of Aquatic Invasive Species it cites a litanyof historical examples like the Zebra mussel or the Asian clam, which formmonocultures on the ocean floor that collapse local marine ecosystems andirreversibly alter food webs. Prefer our evidence its specific to the exchange of

ballast between Asia and Oregon and cites local marine biology studies thetimeframe for full ecosystem collapse is 2 years.

The impact is extinction Diner indicates that every instance of ecosystemsimplification has to be rejected because there are unpredictable interactions thatpop the rivets off of the ecosystem and increase risk of total collapse. Only ourevidence speaks to the risk of human extinction. The Asian clam will become a

monoculture, erasing whole species in the span of 2 years and drasticallysimplifying ecosystems.No defense every species matters as insurance value resiliency only makessense in a diverse ecosystemPerrings 95(Charles, Prof. at U. of NY, Biological Loss)

The contributors to this volume have argued that the fundamental goal of biodiversity conservation is not species preservation for its own sake, but theprotection of the productive potential of those ecosystems on which human activity depends. This, it has been argued, is a function of the resilience of

such ecosystems. Ecosystem resilience has been shown to be a measure of the limits of the localstability of the self- organization of the system. Hence a system may be said to be resilient withrespect to exogenous stress or shocks of a given magnitude if it is able to respond without losingself- organization. Where species or population deletion jeopardizes the resilience of anecosystem providing essential services, then protection of ecosystem resilience implies speciespreservation. This is not to say that we should dismiss arguments for species preservation for its own sake. The identification ofexistence or nonuse value in contingent valuation exercises indicates that people do think insuch terms. But it does make it clear that there is both an economically and ecologically soundrationale for ensuring the conservation of species that are not currently in use. Moreparticularly, species which are not now keystone species but may become keystone speciesunder different environmental conditions have insurance value, and this insurance valuedepends on their contribution to ecosystem resilience.

You should err negative on the precautionary principle invasive species changerisk calculus inaction out of a lack of certainty amounts to complacencyMiller and Fabian 4(Marc L., Dean at the UofArizona College of Law, and Robert N., Harmful Invasive Species: Legal Responses, 2004, pg. 14, [CL])

Ifthe precautionary principle highlights invasive species policy as an area where there may begreater levels of uncertaintythan in other areas, given the complexity of invasion biology, the timedelays, and the other barriers to perception, this is a useful principle, but should not be highly controversial. However, theprecautionary principle has not merely highlighted that important decisions must sometimes (and

perhaps always)be made on incomplete information,andbased on assessments of probabilities and risk,

surely it is correct, but says little that is worthy of the controversy this concept has generated. The precautionary principle makessense to the extent it rejects the requirement of an unrealistic and rigid perfectionism (scientificcertainty) as a basis for policy or action. A sound reading of the precautionary principle should also reject an equally dangerous


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AT: PICs Bad

Counter-interpretation: the negative gets to test the functional competition of theplan.-- THE OFFENSE

A. Key to good plan writing that eliminates most unpredictable counterplans.Functional competition is a key limit we exclude PICing out of words like theand stupid artificially competitive CPs that only change words in the plan text.

B. Burden of Rejoinder - allowing the negative to test the whole plan text is key todetermine the desirability of the plan. Their interpretation crushes negative CPground.

C. Research it encourages better plan-specific research over generic 50 Statesarguments, which produces more predictable education outside the debate.

-- THE DEFENSE

Vague plan text justifies the PIC we cant determine the scope of actionmandated by the plan PICs are a counterweight to unfair plan writing that makesit harder to stick the link to topic disads.

We have evidence that links the plan to the net benefit that means weveessentially just read a disad and a CP thats plan minus to avoid the link thatscore negative ground.

Reasonability means you should weigh comparative in-round abuse and if itdoesnt rise to a high threshold you should ignore theoretical objections competing interpretations equates to evaluating a hypothetical disad and votingaff on it.

Reject the argument not the team no strategy skew means no durable impact ifthe CP isnt in the 2NR.


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Module Fisheries

Fishery collapse causes food wars and global hungerQFFI 3(Quick Frozen Foods International, 2003 [Better gear up more fish farms now or a billion people may go hungry by 2020, 1/1, Global Seafood

Magazine, lexis])

A billion people in developing countries who depend on fish as their most important sourceof protein may face hunger within 20 years,because there just won't be enough fish to feed thegrowing population. According to an analysis released by the Malaysia-based WorldFish Center and the International Food PolicyResearch Institute, only strong growth in fish farms can save the world from an even morecritical situation. The study estimates that fish currently accounts for approximatelyseven percent of global food supplies and is theprimary source of animal protein for one-sixth of the world's six billion people. Yet overfishing could wipe out some species, and reduce the qualityas wellas the amount of other catches. Fish and seafood production would have to double to meet increased demand, and that isn't likely. With 90million more mouths to feed a year, fish stocks could not cope after 50 years in which average per capita consumption of fish has almost doubled.

Even with fish farming, chances are that growth in supply would be limited to 1.5% a year. " Fish is the fastest growing sourceof food in the developing world, yet demand greatly exceeds supply and the problem isgrowing," said Dr. Meryl Williams, director-general of the think tank. Economists estimatethat the deepening shortage

will result in prices rising anywhere from four to 16 percent by 2020 at best, and in a worst case scenario 26- 70%. Released on theeve of an international conference in Penang, Malaysia, Nov. 3, theWorld Fish report also predicted increasingdisputes between countries over fishing grounds, in addition to its serious impact on foodsecurity, nutrition and income in the next two decades. The conference was attended by policy makers, scientists, industry leaders and non-government organizations from 40 countries.

Overfishing is a key precondition for your alt causesBerger et al 1(Review Historical Overfishing and the Recent Collapse of Coastal Ecosystems Jeremy B. C. Jackson,12* Michael X. Kirby,3 Wolfgang H. Berger,1Karen A. Bjorndal,4 Louis W. Botsford,5 Bruce J. Bourque,6 Roger H. Bradbury,7 Richard Cooke,2 Jon Erlandson,8 James A. Estes,9 Terence P.

Hughes,10 Susan Kidwell,11 Carina B. Lange,1 Hunter S. Lenihan,12 John M. Pandolfi,13 Charles H. Peterson,12 Robert S. Steneck,14 Mia J. Tegner,1Robert R. Warner1Science 27 July 2001: Vol. 293. no. 5530, pp. 629 637, [CL])

The second important corollary is that overfishing may often be a necessary precondition for eutrophication,

outbreaks of disease, or species introductions to occur (27 ). For example, eutrophication and hypoxiadid not occur in Chesapeake Bay until the 1930s, nearly two centuries after clearing of land foragriculture greatlyincreased runoff of sediments and nutrients into the estuary(77 ). Suspensionfeeding by still enormous populations of oysters was sufficient to remove most of the increasedproduction of phytoplankton and enhanced turbidity until me- chanical harvesting progressivelydecimated oyster beds from the 1870s to the 1920s. The third important corollary is that changes in climateare unlikely to be the primary reason for microbial outbreaks and disease. The rise of microbeshas occurred at different times and under different climatic conditions in different places, asexemplified by the time lag between events in Chesapeake Bayand Pamlico Sound (77, 79, 80, 84 ). Anthropogenicclimate change may now be an important confounding factor, but it was not the original cause. Rapid expansion of introduced species in recent decades

(95) may have a similar explanation, in addition to increase in frequency and modes of transport. Massive removal of suspensionfeeders, grazers, and predators must inevitably leave marine ecosystems more vulnerable to

invasion (96, 97 ).


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Advantage CP


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1NC

The United States Department of Energy should approve pending applications forproduction facilities to export natural gas to non-FTA countries and refrain fromplacing statutory restrictions on LNG exports.

CP solves 100% of the case key to facilitate natural gas exportsLevi 12(Michael Levi is David M. Rubenstein Senior Fellow for Energy and the Environment @ CFR and Director of the CFR program on energy security andclimate change, A Strategy for U.S. Natural Gas Exports, June 13, 2012, http://www.brookings.-edu/~/media/research/files/papers/2012/6/13%20exports%20levi/06_exports_levi, Accessed date: 9-10-12 y2k)

I thus propose that, to facilitate potential natural gas exports, the DOE should approve applicationsfor LNG exports to non-FTA countries that are pending before it, barring specific concerns about individualapplications that are not related to the broader wisdom of allowing LNG exports. In doing so, the DOE is required to find that allowing exports is in thepublic interest. The framework outlined in this paper provides one way of presenting such an assessment. The FERC must also approve modificationsto terminals in order for exports to be allowed (Ebinger et al. 2012). I propose that it approve any applications to operate export terminals that havebeen approved by the DOE, barring problems with individual applications that are unrelated to the broader wisdom of allowing LNG exports.

Implementing these steps will not require anynew staffing, funding, or action by

Congress, which has already put in place the legislative framework needed to approve andmonitor LNG exports. Congress need only refrain from placing new statutory restrictions onLNG exports.

And it solves trade the signal is keyplan cant solve status quo restrictionsOlson 12(Ryan Olson is a Research Assistant at The Heritage Foundation. How to Boost U.S. Exports: Legalize Them, 9-26-12, http://blog.heritage.org/2012/09/26/how-to-boost-u-s-exports-legalize-them/Accessed date: 9-29-12 y2k)

The Obama Administration appears to bepicking winners and losers again. The President has said hewants todouble our exportsover the next five years through his National Export Initiative.Apparently, those exportsdont includenatural gas, a booming and vibrant sector of the national economy. Currently, liquefied natural gas (LNG)exports are restrictedto countries withfree trade agreements with the United States. Producers wishing to

export to countries without U.S. free trade agreements must first get approvalfrom the Department of Energy (DOE). Withproven reserves ofnatural gas in the U.S. atan all-time high, companies have been flocking

to export LNG to foreign markets. However, the DOE is stonewalling , approving only one of

the 13 requests to export to non-free trade agreement countries and staking furtherexports on the release of a report that has beendelayed until early next year. These types of

bureaucratic hoops onlyhurt American companies and bring into question thePresidents commitment to increasing exports.The Administration appears to be listening to economic advicefrom interest groups (including environmental groups) who oppose natural gas exports. They argue that free trade in the LNG field will disadvantageU.S. consumers, claiming that as the spread between the international price and the domestic price closes, U.S. prices will rise. In fact, maintainingartificially low prices in the U.S. by limiting exports and protecting domestic industry discourages firms from entering the market for natural gasextraction, reducing supply and ultimately increasing prices. Chesapeake Energy, for example, has suffered from low natural gas prices in the U.S.,hurting profits and forcing it to sell assets. Recent studies have shown that exporting natural gas could make U.S. producers up to $3 billion per year,creating much-needed jobs for Americans. Reducing burdensome trade restrictions will also make U.S. firms more efficient, encouraging competition

and reducing pricesultimately helping consumers and spurring innovation. The Presidents erratic policy of promoting

trade in some areas while restricting it in others is hypocritical . Even worse, it sends mixedmessages that increase uncertainty, hurt investment and job growth, and threaten Americans

economic competitiveness.

[Net benefit Politics/Topic DA]
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2NC CP Solves

The CP solves the advantages each internal link is ONLY based on the increase ofLNG exports, which doesnt require transportation investment lifting non-FTArestrictions would break down a DoE stonewall on the export of LNG and correctthe erratic signal sent by the Obama administration thats chilling trade in thestatus quo.

CP is key to solve 96% of exports aff cant solve those restrictionsEbinger et al 12(Liquid Markets: Assessing the Case for U.S. Exports of Liquefied Natural Gas, MAY 2012, Charles Ebinger is a senior fellowand director of theEnergy Security Initiative at Brookings. Kevin Massy is Assistant Director of the Energy Security Initiative at Brookings where he man- ages researchinto international energy relations and domestic energy policy. Govinda Avasarala is a Senior Research Assistant in the Energy Security Initiative atBrookings.)

From the perspective of the U.S. federal government , the issue of implications is viewed in terms of public interest. Under existing legislation, ex-ports of natural gas to countries with a free trade agreement (FTA) with the United States are, by law, deemed to be in the public interest and autho-

rization is required to be given without modification or delay. Projects looking for authorization to export

LNG to countries without an FTA , which account for roughly 96 percent of

current global LNG demand,are required to be approved by the Secretary ofEnergy unless, after public hearing, the Department of Energy finds that such exports arenot in the public interest.80

And it solves trade the status quo is blatantly protectionist CP solves the tradeadvantage independentlyKemp 12(John Kemp is Reuters market analyst. U.S. should resist protectionism in gas: Kemp,, Jan 20, 2012,http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/20/column-us-gas-exports-idUSL6E8CK1KK20120120)

Critics will seize on a government report, showing U.S. natural gas exports could raise prices for domestic users, to press the Department of Energy to

withhold permission for a string of new LNG export terminals. But restricting gas exports to ensure a captivesupply of cheap energyfor U.S. chemical companies and other manufacturerswould constitute a crude form of

protectionism.It is not consistent with U.S. policies favouring free trade abroadand free markets at home. Restrictions would send a terrible signal to tradingpartners at a time when the United States is pressing for better access to markets

in China and across the developing world, and would discourage investment bydomestic energy producers. The Department should stick to current guidelines

which state that "the market, not government, should determine the price and other

terms for imported or exported natural gas. The federal government's primary responsibility... will be toevaluate the need for the gas and whether the import or export arrangement will provide the gas on a competitively priced basis ... while

minimising regulatory impediments to a freely operating market". REQUEST FOR EIA STUDYThe Natural Gas Act requires any person wanting to export or import natural gasto obtain prior permission from the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of FossilFuels (DOE/FE). The Department must authorise transactions unless it finds they are not in the public interest (15 USC 717b(a)). Exports to

countries with which the United States has concluded free trade agreements (FTAs) are automatically deemed to be in the public interest and must begranted without modification or delay (15 USC 717b(c)). The Department has already granted approval for seven liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects to

export up to 9.5 billion cubic feet (bcf) of natural gas to free-trade partners such as Canada, Mexico and Chile. Most FTA partnersare small or are themselves energy exporters, limiting their attractiveness for U.S.gas companies. But a deal is pending with South Korea, which is a big gas importerand could be a significant customer in future. In contrast, exports to non-FTA countriesremain subject to the public interest test. DOE/FE has approved only one application, from Cheniere Energy's SabinePass LLC to export up to 2.2 bcf to non-FTA customers. DOE/FE accepted the company's own analysis that " the ability to exportnatural gas as LNG will greatly expand the market scope and access for domestic


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natural gas producers and thus serve to encourage domestic production when lowdomestic gas prices might not otherwise do so".


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AT: Permutation

Any risk of the DA is a reason to reject the permutation obviously permutationsare possible but they are not desirable because the permutation links to the net

benefit.

We only need a 1% risk of the net benefit linking to the permutation if we win theCP solves the case there isnt a net benefit to the permutation but there IS adisadvantage, which is [____].


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AT: Add-On

Plan solves increased LNG and natural gas energy production if the plan solves itso does the CP.Kuykendall 12(Lawmakers: Boost natural gas prices with exports, Jul 02, 2012, Taylor Kuykendall, http://www.statejournal.com/story/18933748/lawmakers-boost-natural-gas-prices-with-exports)

"However, despite these exciting developments, the number of rigs drilling for natural gas today is at its lowest point in 13 years," the letter states.

" Production is outpacing demand and depressing prices below the break-even point

for some producers." The representatives say that if demand for natural gas doesn't increase,drillers will pull back and move their rigs to more profitable oil fields. Australian andCanadian governments, the letter writers say, are already doing their part to encourage development."Meanwhile in the U.S., the approval process for companies wishing to expand their market overseas is stalled," the letter states."We are aware that the Department is conducting a macro-economic studyof the potential impacts of exporting naturalgas. However, that study was supposed to have been completed by the end of the first quarter of 2012and it still appears to be months away from completion." According to the letter, the Department of Energy is carefullywatching natural gas exports to ensure that exports do not lead to a reduction in domestic supplies. The lawmakers wrote that if businesses

are prevented from competing in export markets, other countries will step forward to doso.


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AT: Agriculture Add-On

CP solves price volatilityBass and Pickerning 12(Richard Bass and Gordon Pickering are directors in Navigants energy practice. The U.S. Has A Natural Gas Glut; Why Exporting It As LNG Is A Good

Idea, 6/13/2012, http://www.forbes.com/sites/energysource/2012/06/13/the-u-s-has-a-natural-gas-glut-why-exporting-it-as-lng-is-a-good-idea/print/Accessed date: 10-1-12 y2k)

The emergence of shale gas has caused natural gas prices in North America to drop to the

lowest levels seen in decades . Shale gasresources elsewhere in the world , however,

have not yet been developed to the same extentcreating a sustainable arbitrage

opportunity. Given the potential profitability of liquefying surplus North American gas

production and exporting it as Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), a number ofcompanies are now willing to

develop capital-intensive natural gas export projects . LNG exports will help to

providebetter balance between supply and demand in the market, dampening price

volatilityin North America,

and providing circumstances in which industrial gasinvestments and feedstocknatural gas purchases can be made with greater confidence

in long-term natural gas pricing. As recently as 2007, North America was looking at a significant gas shortage and morethan sixty LNG import projects were proposed. Just five years later, the implementation of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing has led North

America to a sizable excess of gas supply. The latest figures from the U.S. EnergyInformationAgency (EIA) indicate

that natural gas supply could exceed demand by2016, enabling North America to become a net exporter of LNG.

The rapid increase in natural gas productionhas had a substantial impact on gas

pricing in North America. While gas prices in North America are not directly correlated to oil prices, up until late 2008, natural gas pricesgenerally matched oil price trends. Since the increase in shale gas production was first identified in Navigants groundbreaking North American NaturalGas Supply Assessment in 2008, natural gas prices have headed downwards from $5.00 per million British thermal units (mmBtu) to approximately$2.50 per mmBtu in May 2012. However, although natural gas prices decreased, crude oil prices increased during the same period. While the EIA

indicates that long term North American natural gas prices will rise to $4.00 to $6.00 per mmBtu, natural gas will continue totrade at a sizable discount to oil on an energy equivalent basis. Unlike crude oil, there is not yet alarge tradable global market for natural gas and consequently, prices vary across the world. In Asia, prices for major LNG importers closely correlate to

oil prices, and LNG is currently priced over $17.00 per mmBtu. In Europe, prices are lower at $12.00 to $14.00 per mmBtu.For North Americanproducers to benefit from higher global prices they must successfullyconstruct costlyandcomplex LNG facilities and related infrastructure costing billions of dollars.Assuming a long-term North Americannatural gas price of $4.00 to $6.00 per mmBtu, liquefaction and shipping costs will add

approximately $4.00 per mmBtu. This offers an attractive $3.00 to $5.00 per

mmBtu arbitrage opportunity to the $13.00 per mmBtu price currently

achievable at Europes LNG terminals . The real prize, however,would be realizing LNG

exports to Asia .While shipping costs would be higher (due to the much greater distance to Asia than to

Europe), the current Asian LNG price of $17 per mmBtu provides the prospect of a much

greater arbitrage opportunity. What are the risks to the current export strategy? Shale gas production has increased rapidly,offsetting a steady decline in conventional gas production across North America. While more natural gas can be produced from what is largely agreedupon as an abundant gas resource, the pace of future development is subject to factors such as changing environmental legis lation. Competition forthe Asian markets, notably from the large number of Australian-based LNG projects in development, is expected to be fierce. LNG project costs are onthe increase, due in part to the considerable number of projects seeking to be developed in a short period of time. Finally, shale gas resources are notexclusive to North America. Europe and Asia both have significant shale gas potential; however, the pace at which shale gas resources will be developed

in these regions has yet to become clear. Overall, North American natural gas exports are a very positive

development for both North American and global natural gas markets . In a market of surplus

supply, access to large export marketswill serve to balance supply and demand , thereby
http://www.forbes.com/sites/energysource/2012/06/13/the-u-s-has-a-natural-gas-glut-why-exporting-it-as-lng-is-a-good-idea/print/http://www.forbes.com/sites/energysource/2012/06/13/the-u-s-has-a-natural-gas-glut-why-exporting-it-as-lng-is-a-good-idea/print/http://www.forbes.com/sites/energysource/2012/06/13/the-u-s-has-a-natural-gas-glut-why-exporting-it-as-lng-is-a-good-idea/print/http://www.forbes.com/sites/energysource/2012/06/13/the-u-s-has-a-natural-gas-glut-why-exporting-it-as-lng-is-a-good-idea/print/http://www.forbes.com/sites/energysource/2012/06/13/the-u-s-has-a-natural-gas-glut-why-exporting-it-as-lng-is-a-good-idea/print/


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dampening price volatility, increasing natural gas prices moderately, and , over the long-term, providing a

sustainable natural gas market in North America the stability of supply and price needed by NorthAmerican industrial markets. In this sense, it would seem that industrial-community opposition to exports based on perception of price impact is short-sighted. Meanwhile, for natural gas consumers in Asia and Europe, North American export projects will provide another competitive supply option. In

the long run, companies with experience, fortitude, capital, and a healthy risk appetite

may find themselves in the right placeand at the right time

to capitalize

onNorth American

LNGexport projects.


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K


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1NC

Energy sources like LNG are snake oil peddled by petrocapitalism as a method ofsating the appetite of globalization but lurking behind the ever-increasing rate ofenergy consumption lies the specter of economic decline and the resource crunch nothing can stop the death of globalization its just a question of how long wekeep it on life support the impact is extinctionEhrenfeld 5(David, Dept. of Ecology, Evolution, and Natural Resources @ Rutgers University, The Environmental Limits to Globalization, Conservation BiologyVol. 19 No. 2 April 2005, [CL])

Among the environmental impacts of globalization, perhaps the most significant is its fostering of the excessiveuse of energy, with the attendant consequences. This surge in energy use was inevitable, once theundeveloped four-fifths of theworld adopted the energy-wasting industrialization model of the developed fifth, andas goods that once were made locally began to be transported around the world at a tremendous cost of energy. Chinas booming production,largely the result of its surging global exports, has caused a huge increase in the mining and burning of coal and the building of giant dams for

more electric power, an increase of power that in only the first 8 months of 2003 amounted to 16% (Bradsher 2003; Guo 2004). The manyenvironmental effects of the coal burning include, most importantly, global warming.Fossil-fuel-

driven climate change seems likely to result in a rise in sea level, massive extinction ofspecies, agricultural losses from regional shifts in temperature and rainfall, and, possibly, alteration of major oceancurrents, with secondary Climatic change. Other side effects of coal burning are forest deCline, especially from increased nitrogen deposition;acidification of freshwater and terrestrial ecosystems from nitrogen and sulfur compounds; and a major impact on human health from polluted air.

Dams, Chinas alternative method of producing electricity without burning fossil fuels, themselves cause massiveenvironmental changes. These changes inClude fragmentation of river channels; loss of floodplains, riparian zones, and adjacentwetlands; deterioration of irrigated terrestrial environments and their surface waters; deterioration and loss of riverdeltas and estuaries; aging and reduction of continental freshwater runoff to oceans; changes in nutrient cyCling; impacts on

biodiversity; methyl mercurycontamination of food webs; and greenhouse gas emissions fromreservoirs. The impoundment of water in reservoirs at high latitudes in the northern hemisphere has even caused a small but measurableincrease in the speed of the earths rotation and a change in the planets axis (Rosenberg et al. 2000; Vo ro smarty & Sahagian 2000). Moreover,

the millions of people displaced by reservoirssuch as the one behind Chinas Three Gorges Dam have their ownenvironmental impacts as they struggle to survive in unfamiliar and often unsuitable places. Despite the importance of coal and

hydropower in Chinas booming economy, the major factor that enables globalization to flourish around the worldeven in Chinais still cheap oil. Cheap oil runs the ships, planes, trucks, cars, tractors, harvesters, earth-movingequipment, and chain saws that globalization needs; cheap oil lifts the giant containers with their global cargos off the

container ships onto the waiting flatbeds; cheap oil even mines and processes the coal, grows and distills thebiofuels, drills the gas wells, and builds the nuclear power plants while digging and refining the uranium orethat keeps them operating. Paradoxically, the global warming caused by this excessive burning of oil isexerting negative feedback on the search for more oil to replace dwindling supplies. The search for Arctic oil hasbeen slowed by recent changes in the Arctic Climate. Arctic tundra has to be frozen and snow-covered t o allow the heavy seismic vehiCles to

prospect for underground oil reserves, or long-lasting damage to the landscape results. The recent Arctic warming trend hasreduced the number of days that vehicles can safely explore: from 187 in 1969 to 103 in 2002 (Revkin 2004).Globalization affects so many environmental systems in so many ways that negative interactions ofthis sort are frequent and usuallyunpredictable. Looming over the global economy is the imminentdisappearance of cheap oil. There is some debate about when global oil production will peakmany of the leading petroleum

geologists predict the peak will occur in this decade, possibly in the next two or three years (Campbell 1997; Kerr 1998; Duncan & Youngquist1999; Holmes & Jones 2003; Appenzeller 2004; ASPO 2004; Bakhtiari 2004; Gerth 2004)but it is abundantly clear that theremaining untapped reserves and alternatives such as oil shale, tar sands, heavy oil, and biofuels areeconomically and energetically no substitute for the cheap oil that comes pouring out of the ground in the ArabianPeninsula and a comparatively few other places on Earth (Youngquist 1997). Moreover, the hydrogen economy and otherhigh-tech solutions to the loss of cheap oil are clouded by serious, emerging technological doubts aboutfeasibility and safety, and a realistic fear that, if they can work, they will not arrive in time to rescue ourglobalized industrial civilization (Grant 2003; Tromp et al. 2003; Romm 2004). Even energy conservation, which we already knowhow to implement both technologically and as part of an abstemious lifestyle, is likely to be no friend to globalization,


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because it reduces consumptionof all kinds, and consumption is what globalization is all about. In akeynote address to the American Geological Society, a noted expert on electric power networks, Richard Duncan (2001), predicted widespread,

permanent electric blackouts by 2012, and the end of industrial, globalized civilization by 2030.The energy crunch is occurringnow. According to Duncan, per capita energy production in the world has already peakedthat happened in 1979and has deClined since thatdate. In a more restrained evaluation of the energy crisis, Charles Hall and colleagues (2003) state that: The world is not about to run out ofhydrocarbons, and perhaps it is not going to run out of oil from unconventional sources any time soon. What will be difficult to obtain is cheappetroleum, because what is left is an enormous amount of low-grade hydrocarbons, which are likely to be much more expensive financially,

energetically, politically and especially environmentally. Nuclear power still has important. . .technological, economic,environmental and public safetyproblems, they continue, and at the moment renewable energies present a mixedbag of opportunities. Their solution? Forget about the more expensive and dirtier hydrocarbons such as tar sands.We need a majorpublic policy intervention to foster a crash program of public and private investment in research on renewable energy technologies. Perhaps this

will happennecessity does occasionally bring about change. But I do not see renewable energy coming in time orin sufficient magnitude to save globalization. Sunlight, wind, geothermal energy, and biofuels,necessary as they are to develop, cannot replace cheap oil at the current rate of use without disastrousenvironmental side effects. These renewable alternatives can only power a nonglobalizedcivilization that consumes less energy(Ehrenfeld 2003b). Already, as the output of the giant Saudi oil reserves has started tofall (Gerth 2004) and extraction of the remaining oil is becoming increasingly costly, oil prices are climbing and the strain is

being felt by other energy sources. For example, the production of natural gas, which fuels more than half ofU.S. homes, is declining in the United States, Canada, and Mexico as wells are exhausted. In both the United States and Canada,intensive new drilling is being offset by high depletion rates, and gas consumption increases

yearly. In 2002 the United States imported 15% of its gas from Canada, more than half of Canadas total gas production. However,with Canadasgas production decreasing and with the stranded gas reserves in the United States and Canadian Arctic regions unavailable u ntil pipelines arebuilt 510 years from now, the United States is likely to become more dependent on imported liquid natural gas ( LNG). Here are some facts toconsider. Imports of LNG in the United States increased from 39 billion cubic feet in 1990 to 169 billion cubic feet in 2002, which was still


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development of LNG terminals in North America has successfully challenged the installation ofsome LNG infrastructure on the West Coast.2 These movements stress that the investment required to build the globalgas industry displaces investment in renewables. A key limitation on natural gas usage is the difficulty of transportation, particularlyacross oceans and over long distances. LNG is natural gas that has been cooled for purposes of transportation to approximately 163C (260F), changing it from a gas to aliquid 1/600th its original volume. It is shipped in double-hulled seagoing vessels known as LNG carriers designed specifically to handle the low temperature of LNG. There are

currently now more than 130 such ocean carriers in operation worldwide. Receiving or gasification terminals take the form of specially constructed ports devoted exClusively tothe importing and exporting of LNG. Once it reaches its destination it is stored in insulated tanks built specifically to hold LNG. When there is demand for fuel the LNG is heatedto return it to its gaseous state and delivered via pipelines as natural gas to customers. LNG is exported by countries with large natural gas reserves such as Algeria, Australia,

Brunei, Indonesia, Libya, Malaysia, Nigeria, Oman, Qatar, and Trinidad and Tobago. There are some sixty LNG receiving terminalsworldwide, mainly in high-income consuming nations such as Japan, Korea, the United States,and some European countries.As the cleaner hydrocarbon, natural gas has been promoted as apartial solution to the problem of global warming. As the ecological critique of carbon-based fuelconsumption grows louder, with supply concerns prompting energy price increases and OPECmembers claiming greater sovereignty over petroleum assets, natural gas appears increasinglyattractive both financially and environmentally. Multinationals displace lost oil reserves withgas, while they market themselves as greener energy companies (the most notable being BPsnew moniker: Beyond Petroleum). Daniel Yergin, Pulitzer-winning author of the book The Prize on the oil industry, referred to natural gas as TheNext Prize in a 2004 artiCle in Foreign Affairs. Making it prize-worthy, however, depends on LNG development that is high-risk, costly, and inefficient. David Harveystheorization ofthe spatial fix provides insight into the formation of the global LNG market,since it is by nature a global industry, associated with overseas transport of fossil fuel. Although technically difficult, LNG

development helps the oil and gas industry address some of fossil capitalisms

contradictions while creating others . The investment of surplus in LNG infrastructure allows

for the use of excess capital in specific sites. Concurrently, certain social contradictions of the state-tied resource curse are avoided,transferring the product out of relatively insecure settings and into more profitable ones. Given rising criticism of the oil and gasindustry, however,the promotion and connection ofLNG to the North American power grid must beaccomplished. So industryaims to persuade legislators and the public that LNG has someintrinsic value in terms of conservation, the environment, and energy security. But providing a convincingargument for LNG could become increasingly difficult with recent assertions that drilling for shale gas in the United States could preClude the need for these imports. The

analysis below examines howthe LNG industry is commonly conceived as a partial, stop-gap solution to theecological and economic crises arising from fossil-fuel dependence. By looking at the overseas transfer ofLNG from Nigeria to Mexico in order to power the U.S. energy grid , this artiCle seeks to explain ongoingspatial transfers associated with ecological imperialism. Mexicos first LNG terminal, operational since 2006, is a Shell project inTamaulipas State, which borders Texas, sourcing gas from its Nigerian LNG facility in Bonny Island. LNG development in the two sites inNigeria and Mexico has interfaced with varying social conflicts and positions in the globalpolitical economy of oilin the Nigerian case, highly volatile, in the Mexican relatively stable. Fostered by corporate subsidies,the gas ultimatelyenters the more lucrative U.S. market, servicing that countrys hydrocarbon-accumulation model.3

The plan is the necessary mechanism that enables a global form of racistexploitation that drains resources from the South and uses them to assuage thecontradictions and crises of capitalism in the North the plan is a linkZalik 2008(Anna, Faculty of the Environmental Studies at York University in Toronto, Liquefied Natural Gas and Fossil Capitalism, 2008, Volume 60 ofMonthly Review, Issue 06, http://monthlyreview.org/2008/11/01/liquefied-natural-gas-and-fossil-capitalism, [CL])

The construction of a global gas market , complete with dedicated LNG terminals,requires that legislators and a public wary of energy companies must first be

convinced of its economic and environmental benefits . Moreover, particular technology must be put intoplace to move it trans-oceanically. As described by Gavin Bridge, the properties of gas as an ethereal substance shape a stubbornly anachronistic

geography of commodity supply.Where terrestrial pipelines cannot be installed, overseas shipmentdemands liquefaction at extremely cold temperatures, allowing its transport on special tankers to distant terminals. Once it arrives at itsdestination, the substance is regasified and linked into domestic power grids. Whether piped or shipped, this is an expensive undertaking and, until the

recent upsurge in energy prices, much gas was considered stranded since the process was considered too
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costly to be viable.8 Todaythe context has changed, with concerns regarding a global fuel shortageprompting rising prices on gas futures markets that are beneficial for the promotion of LNGdevelopment. In the last ten years the international oil industry has placed a major emphasis on thedevelopment of LNG terminals and infrastructural connections in North America. Although there iswidespread consensus that natural gas i s preferable to coal burning for electricity generation, LNG is a doubtful candidate for an overall reduction incarbon emissions. Recent studies suggest that the carbon footprint of LNG transported long distances may be substantial.9 Building a North Americandomestic LNG infrastructure will also shape a set of commercial and worker interests tied to this industry, which may further postpone and/or create

obstaCles to non-hydrocarbon sources as a substitute. Although LNG currently accounts for only about 30 percent of the inter-regional trade in gas, theInternational Energy Agency estimates that the figure may rise to 50 percent by 2030. National oil companies play a large rolein gas liquefaction, with Indonesian and Brazilian parastatals among the most important. But Shell also figures in the topthree for liquefaction capacity, and private energy companies primarily run LNG receivingterminals.10 LNG in Nigeria and Mexico and Capitals Spatial Fix The Nigerian LNG project at Bonny Islanda joint venture between theNigerian National Petroleum Company, Shell, ENI (Agip) Italy, and Total was first proposed in 1989, and became operational a decade later. Theliquefaction and export of natural gas is the Nigerian oil industrys external solution to theproblem of flaring in the Niger Deltawhere 7080 percent of gas extracted alongside petroleum (known as associated gas) is burned, the highest rate in the worldleading to acid rain and erosion that effectsfishing and local wildlife. Huge surface flares light up the night sky. Since the Ogoni mobilization and Ken Saro-Wiwas execution in the 1990s, theseflares have become symbolic of the impunity with which environmental and human rightsnorms are disregarded by the global oil industryin Nigeria.11 Flaring occurs at a rate of at least 2.5 billion cubic feet per daywith many riverine villages never knowing a dark night.12 Shell Nigeria is the largest single flarer. Unsurprisingly, after fifty years of ongoing flaring,

this industrial form of waste elimination is an indelible part of the regions socio-ecology. Condemned by the Ogoni, Ijaw, and other Nigerian oilminorities as a violation of indigenous rights, flaring in the Delta is seen as a clear manifestation ofenvironmental racism, or global apartheid, as applied to the exploitation of natural resources.In protest against oil extraction in the Delta in 1999, Ijaw youth initiated Operation Climate Change whose aim was to extinguish the flares. Inthe context ofa history of harsh repression of protests and blockades, and the increasedpresence of militia groups acting as both security and threat to the oil industry, resistance in theDelta has been radicalized. In the last two years media reports on precarious oil supplies inClude references to the violent Deltancrisis.13 In addition to the release of toxic chemicals into the atmosphere, attention to global Climate change makes flari ng practices in the Delta afurther target of criticism: The World Bank estimates that, due to flaring, Nigeria had contributed more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere than allother Sub-Saharan African countries combined by 2002. Environmental advocates inside and outside Nigeria have condemned the possibility of usingflaring elimination to gain carbon credits (i.e., World Bank Clean Development Mechanism financing) under Kyoto, employing a recent Nigerian High

Court ruling defining flaring as a violation of human/environmental rights and illegal on that basis. The actual site of the LNG plant,Bonny Island,was a key port for the Trans-Atlantic slave tradethe lasting impact of which sometheorists believe helps explain the salience of tribal divisions in the contemporary Nigerian

state.14 On Bonny Island itself, an ecologically protected area at Finima was established as a requirement of the Nigerian LNG EnvironmentalImpact Assessment. This protected area is administered by a Nigerian environmental NGO.15 The Nigerian LNG project and the public affairsprograms it has advanced are today deployed as industry-community models, departing from divisive host-community policies which stoked inter-communal violence, and promoting improved social and environmental performance. However, the harsh reality is that competitive violence over oilindustry access payments and piracy (or contraband oil trade) in the Bonny region has continued, inCluding kidnappings of Nigerian and expatriateoil workers. The marketing of the product elsewhere allows it to escape a region marked as too risky for domestic infrastructural investment.

Concurrently the transfer of LNG allows capital an opportunity to engage in a kind of spatialfix, overcoming an over-exploited socio-nature/resource base, and a regime of overaccumulation ofcapital through the sale of LNG abroad. The shipment overseas of LNG from Nigeria to Mexico allows the oil industry to benefitfrom the latters stability as well as its proximity to the largest domestic market in the world. Shells Altamira terminal in Tamaulipas State, of which itholds 50 percentwith Total and Mitsubishi holding another 25 perce nt eachis Mexicos first regasification plant, operational prior to theSempra/Shell terminal at Costa Azul. The port at Tampico, just South of Altamira, is a historical pivot in Mexican oil extraction. The broader Huastecaregion of which it forms a part became famous for its gushers and was at once a huge source of wealth and environmental destruction. Its workerswere central to the push for the 1938 expropriation of the former Shell and Standard Oil subsidiary companiesEl Aguila and Huasteca. Building onartiCle 27 of Mexicos revolutionary 1917 constitution, the 1938 oil expropriation put into practice the national exploitation of sub-soil resources.Through worker mobilization, and spurring major conflicts with the U.S. and UK governments, this expropriation was finally accepted, as it served U.S.financial interests. It provided Mexico the collateral to take out loans for industrial and infrastructural development. Not only did the expropriation

express labor control over the means of production but, as Myrna Santiago demonstrates, it gave rise to an important conservationist sensibilityaiming to protect the resource for use by future generations of Mexicans.16 The Mexican expropriation marked a global turning point, the first case of aSouthern oil exporter expelling multinational oil companies from its territory, over three decades prior to the creation of OPEC. But where OPEC wouldseek to control global prices of the commodity, Mexicos expropriation expressed what would become a key tenet of Latin American import-substitutionindustrialization, the use of primary resources for national development rather than foreign exchange. As LNG terminals are a prime strategicinvestment for foreign industry, they are also a target for contemporary protests against the denationalization of the Mexican oil industry. Since theSalinas de Gortari presidency, portions of the Mexican national oil company have been decentralized and in some cases privatized. These shiftsoccurred in a general economic Climate that committed Mexican energy sources to rapid development, a condition of the U.S. financial bailout to thecountry following the 1994 peso crash that trailed the implementation of NAFTA and the Zapatista uprising. The marketization of LNG as non-extractive is in fact an important arena in the current debate concerning the creeping denationalization and privatization of the Mexican oil and gassectorwhich has deepened in the aftermath of the highly contentious 2006 presidential elections t aken by the conservative PAN in dubiouscircumstances. The Mexican Constitution continues to prohibit foreign or private firms from extraction and production of energy although notmarketing. Thus the legality of LNG projects in Mexico has been challenged by various national groups, inCluding coalitions of professional staff and


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democratic workers associations of the Mexican national oil company (Pemex), as a threat to energy sovereignty.17 The movement of

LNG from Nigeria to a terminal in Mexico provides us with a window on the socio-

ecological crises of hydrocarbon consumption and the industrys contradictory attempt

to resolve these crises. In Nigeria,industry and government frames LNG as a solution to

social and ecological ills more easily than in the North American context. The infrastructural and socialmarginalization of the Delta region and the country as a whole makes its domestic energy sector unappealing for investorsdespite a considerably

underserved domestic market in natural gas. The violence that has become an indelible part of the Nigerianoperating environment, attributable in part to the community affairs practices of the oil industry, is avoided while theoutcry associated with the flaring of the regions gas is discursively countered. Shipping the gas out ofNigeria and into Mexico is Clearly a more lucrative option for an industry that purports to address the curse associated with hydrocarbon dependencynationally and globally.

This division of the world into life zones and death zones by the neoliberal order isthe systematic infliction of cruelty onto the mass of humanitythe violence of theperiphery is hidden from the global North through economic neutrality you havean ethical obligation to vote negativeBalibar 4(Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at The University of Paris-X, 2004 [Etienne, also Distinguished Professor of Humanities at University of Californiaat Irvine, We, The People Of Europe?: Reflections On Transnational Citizenship, p. 115-116, 126-129])

With this pretentious title, I want to continue investigating a nexus of problems, both theoretical and phil osophical, that I have already touched upon

several times. The term "cruelty' is chosen by convention (but with some literary references in mind) to indicate thoseforms of extreme violence, whether intentional or systemic, physical or moralalthough such distinctionsbecome questionable precisely when we cross the lines of extremitythat seem to be, as is said,worse than death. It is myhypothesis, generally speaking, that the actual or virtual menace of cruelty represents for politics, and particularly forpolitics today in the context of globalization, a crucial experiment in which the very possibility of politics is atstake. I use the term "civility" (which indeed has many other uses) to designate the speculative idea of apolitics of politics, or a politics in the second degree,which aims at creating, recreating, and conserving theset of conditions within which politics as a collective participation in public affairs is possible, orat least is not made absolutely impossible. "Civility" is certainly an ambiguous term, but I think that its connotations arepreferable to others, such as civilization, socialization, police and policing, politeness, and the like. In particular, "civility" does not necessarily involvethe idea of a suppression of "conflicts" and "antagonisms" in society, as if they were always the harbingers of violence and not the opposite. Much, if not

most, of the extreme violence we are led to discuss in fact results from a blind politicalpreference for "consensus" and "peace," not to speak of the implementation oflaw-and-order policies on a global scale. This, among other reasons, is what leads me to discussthese issues in terms of "topography," by which I understand at the same time a concrete, spatial, geographical, or geopoliticalperspectivefor instance taking into account such shifting distinctions as "North and South," "coreand periphery," "this side of the border or across the border," "global and local"and anabstract, speculative perspective, which implies that the causes and effects of extreme violenceare not produced on one and the same stage, but on different "scenes" or "stages," which can be pictured aseither "real," "virtual," or "imaginary" (but the imaginary and the virtual are probably no less material, no less determining than the real). [CONTINUED

11 PAGES LATER]I am aware of all these difficulties, but I would maintain that a reality lies behind the notion of something"unprecedented." Perhaps it is simply the fact that a number of heterogeneous methods orprocesses ofextermination (by which I mean eliminating masses of individualsinasmuch as they belong to objective or subjective groups) have themselves become

"globalized, that is, operate in a similar manner everywhere in the world at the sametime, and so progressivelyform a chain, giving full reality to what E. P. Thompson anticipated twenty yearsago with the name exterminism. In this series of connected processes, we must include,preciselybecause they are heterogeneousthey do not have one and the same "cause," but they producecumulative effects: 1.Wars(both civil and foreign, a distinction that is not easy to draw in many cases, such asYugoslavia or Chechnya). 2. Communal rioting, with ethnic and/or religious ideologies of cleansing. 3.Famines and other kinds ofabsolute poverty produced by the ruin of traditional andnontraditional economies. 4. Seemingly natural catastrophes, which in fact are killing on a


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mass scale because they are overdetermined by social, economic, and political structures, suchas pandemics (for example, the difference in the distribution of AIDS and the possibilities of treatment between Europe and North America onone side, Africa and some parts of Asia on the other), droughts, floods, or earth-quakes in the absence of developedcivil protection. In the end it would be my suggestion that the "globalization" of various kinds ofextreme

violence has produced a growing division of the "globalized" world into life zonesand death zones. Between these zones (which indeed are intricate and frequently reproduced within the

boundaries of a single country or city) there exists a decisive and fragile superborder, which raisesfears and concerns about the unity and division of[HU]mankindsomething like a global and local enmityline, like the amity line that existed in the beginning of the modern European seizure ofthe world. It is this superborder ,this enmity line, that becomes at the same time an object of permanent show and a hotplace for intervention but also for nonintervention. We might discuss whether the most worrying aspect ofpresent international politics is "humanitarian intervention" or "generalized nonintervention," or one coming after the other. Should We ConsiderExtreme Violence to Be "Rational" or "Functional" from the Point of View of Market Capitalism (the "Liberal Economy")? This is a very difficultquestionin fact, I think it is the most difficult questionbut it cannot be avoided; hence it is also the most intellectually challenging. Again, we shouldwarn against a paralogism that is only t oo obvious but nonetheless frequent: that of mistaking consequences for go als or purposes. (But is it reallypossible to discuss social systems in terms of purposes? On the other hand, can we avoid reflecting on the immanent ends, or "logic," of a structure such

as capitalism?) It seems to me, very schematically, that the difficulty arises from the two opposite "global effects"that derive from the emergence of a chain of mass violence as compared, for example, with what Marx calledprimitive accumulation when he described the creation of the preconditions for capitalist accumulation in terms of the violent suppression of the poor.One kind of effect is simply to generalize material and moral insecurity for millions of potential workers, that is, to induce a massive proletarianizationor reproletarianization (a new phase of proletarianization that crucially involves a return of many to the proletarian condition from which they had

more or less escaped, given that insecurity is precisely the heart of the "proletarian condition"). This process is contemporary withan increased mobility of capital and also humans, and so it takes place across borders. But, seenhistorically, it can. also be distributed among several politicalvarieties: 1. In the North it involves a partial or deepdismantling of the social policies and the institutions of social citizenship created by the welfarestate, what I call the "national social state," and therefore also a violent transition from welfareto workfare, from the social state to the penal state (the United States showing the way in this respect, as was convincinglyargued in a recent essay by Loc Wacquant). 2. In the "South," it involves destroying and inverting the developmental programs and policies, whichadmittedlydid not suffice to produce the desired takeoff but indicated a way to resist impoverishment. 3. In the "semiperiphery," to borrowImmanuel Wallerstein's category, it was connected with the collapse of the dictatorial structure called "real existing socialism," which was based onscarcity and corruption, but again kept the polarization of riches and poverty within certain limits. Let me suggest that a common formal feature of all

these processes resulting in the reproletarianization of the labor force is the fact that they suppress of minimize the forms andpossibilities ofrepresentation of the subaltern within the state apparatus itself, or, if you prefer,the possibilities of more or less effective counterpower. With this remark I want to emphasizethe political aspect of processes that, in the first instance, seem to be mainly "economic."This

political aspect, I think, is even more decisive when we turn to the other scene, the other kind of resultproduced by massive violence, although the mechanism here is extremely mysterious. Mysterious but real, unquestionably. I amthinking of a much more destructive tendency, destructive not of welfare or traditional was of life, but of the social

bond itself and, in the end, of bare life. Let us think of Michel Foucault, who used to oppose two kinds ofpolitics: Let live and let die. In the face of the cumulative effects of different forms ofextreme violence or cruelty that are displayed in what I called the death zones of humanity, weare lead to admit that the current mode of production and reproduction has become a mode of

production for elimination, a reproduction of populations that are not likely to be productivelyused or exploited but are always already superfluous, and therefore can be only eliminatedeither through political or natural meanswhat some Latin American sociologists callproblacion chatarra,garbage humans, to be thrown away, out of the global city. If this is the case, the question arises once again, whatis the rationality of that? Or do we face an absolute triumph of irrationality? My suggestion would be: it is economically irrational

(because it amounts to a limitation of the scale of accumulation),but it is politically rationalor, better said, it can be interpreted inpolitical terms. The fact is that history does not move simply in a circle, the circular pattern of successive phases of accumulation. Economic and

political class struggles have already taken place in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries with theresult of limiting the possibilities of exploitation, creating a balance of forces, and this event remains, so to speak,in the "memory" of the system. The system (and probably also some of its theoreticians and politicians) "knows" thatthere is no exploitation without class struggles, no class struggles without organization andrepresentation of the exploited, no representation and organization without a tendency towardpolitical and social citizenship. This is precisely what current capitalism cannot afford: there is no possibility of a "global social state"corresponding to the "national social states" in some parts of the world during the last century. I mean, there is no politicalpossibility. Therefore thereis political resistance, very violent indeed, to every move in that direction. Technological revolutions provide a positive but insufficient condition for the


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deproletarianization of the actual or potential labor force. This time, direct political repression may also beinsufficient. Elimination or extermination has to take place, "passive" if possible,"active" if necessary; mutual elimination is "best," but it has to be encouraged from outside. This is whatallows me to suggest (and it already takes me to my third question) that if the "economy of global violence" is notfunctional (because its immanent goals are indeed contradictory), it remains in a sense teleological: the "same"populations are massively targeted (or the reverse: those populations that are targeted become progressively assimilated, they look

"the same"). They are qualitatively"deterritorialized,as Gilles Deleuze would say, in an intensive rather than extensive sense:they live on the edge of the city, under permanent threat of elimination , but also,conversely, theylive and are perceived as "nomads," even when they are fixed in their homelands, that is, their mereexistence, their quantity, their movements, their virtual claims of rights and citizenship are perceived as athreat for "civilization."

Vote negative as a point of departure from the 1AC.Voting negative represents a rejection of a politics built around fossil energy. Thealternative must be a poi

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