On a day when Protect South Portland gathered health officials at a senior-living complex located a half-mile from the Portland Pipe Line Corp. pier to decry the possibility of smoke stacks being built there to burn off chemicals that aid pipeline transport of tar sands, Pipe Line President Larry Wilson announced his company was surrendering an air-quality permit needed for any project to import the petroleum product popularly known as “tar sands.”

Wilson said the permit was the sole remaining enabling document left over from a 2009 project that was never built, for which municipal approvals have since expired.

“The men and women who make up PPLC and our contractors spend every minute of every day hard at work keeping our community and environment safe, while efficiently delivering vital energy supplies. I am honored to serve alongside them at one of America’s premiere pipeline companies,” said Wilson, in a prepared statement released by Jim Merrill of the Bernstein Shur law firm.

“Over the last few months, our community has been involved in a debate over the so-called Waterfront Protection Ordinance, or WPO,” said Wilson. “This is a measure that, if passed, could devastate our working waterfront in South Portland, costing our community good jobs, important economic activity, and tax revenue to pay for vital city services. PPLC has worked diligently at assuring residents in numerous public forums

that there is no current or pending project to bring oil sands or ‘tar sands’ to South Portland. The negative impact of the WPO is too significant for citizens to vote based on an erroneous assumption that PPLC has an imminent project.”

The air permit was originally due to expire in August 2012, but PPL applied for, and was granted, an 18-month extension, to Feb. 2014.

“I trust the citizens of this great community will accept the surrender of our final 2009 project permit as one more good-faith commitment to this city that we do not have a pending or proposed, let alone imminent, ‘tar sands’ project,” said Wilson. “We ask South Portland voters to strongly consider the very real threat and truly damaging impact that the WPO would have on the entire working waterfront, and vote no on the

WPO on Nov. 5.”

Members of Protect South Portland, the grassroots advocacy group that forced the WPO onto the Nov. 5 ballot through a petition drive supported by Mayor Tom Blake, are less than impressed with Wilson’s 11th-hour overture.

“It is way too late for Larry Wilson and Portland Pipe Line to try to win public trust on tar sands,” said group spokesperson Cathy Chapman. “A year ago, Wilson denied they had a tar-sands project. Then in 2012, the company applied to renew its tar-sands air permit, and this spring Wilson told 400 people in South Portland, the Vermont legislature, and many others that the company would ‘love’ to bring tar sands to Maine. Today he is back to denying it.”

“In addition to being the CEO of Portland Pipe Line, Wilson is also the CEO of a Canadian pipeline company,” said Chapman. “He answers to a board of directors that reads like a who’s-who of big oil companies, including many that are heavily invested directly in tar sands. That is the interest Wilson represents, not the people of South Portland.”

At a Thursday morning press conference held at the Betsy Ross House, located on Preble Street Extension, Protect South Portland got area health professionals to address their concerns about tar sands.

Although Natalie West, primary author of the WPO, has acknowledged the zoning regulation, if passed by voters, would also block the possible importation of light and medium crude from Canada, the intent is to block tar sands, for which, according to the 2009 plan, two 70-foot smokestacks would have to be build on the pipeline company’s pier located near Bug Light Park.

The smokestacks would burn off toxic chemical additives needed to reduce the sludge-like tar-sands product to a viscosity that will allow it to be pumped through PPL’s 236-mile pipeline. In an Oct. 14 meeting with the Current’s editorial board, Wilson refused to say exactly what chemicals are added to the tar sands. However, the additives, known as “VOCs,” an acronym for the even less appealing “volatile organic compounds,” are a concern for area residents, WPO supporters say.

“Tar-sands smokestacks would burn off dangerous toxic chemicals, including cancer-causing benzene,” said Dr. Tony Owens, a local emergency room physician. “This pollution can trigger asthma attacks and cause breathing and heart problems, particularly for children and the elderly. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has determined that benzene causes cancer in humans. It’s irresponsible for the oil companies to be denying the serious health effects of a tar-sands project.”

“The Lung Association already has concerns about the air quality in York and Cumberland counties,” said Edward Miller, vice president of public policy for the American Lung Association of the Northeast. “Any additional and significant source of pollution in southern Maine, including a tar-sands export facility, is extremely troubling.”

“I live in the Betsy Ross House and am worried about breathing difficulties,” said 81-yeaer-old Janice Doctor. “If they go ahead with their plan to put tar-sands-oil smokestacks less than half a mile away I can’t just move away, and neither can most of my neighbors. If the smokestacks go up, I’ll be breathing that toxic air, gasping for breath, coughing, wheezing and who knows what else. I could be on oxygen for the rest of my life. Is that any way to treat a longtime senior residents?”