If North Lake County residents were to allow another energy project to set foot near their homes, the U.S. Department of Energy would have to do a much better job of explaining what the project entails and ensuring residents will be safe from environmental harm.

The more than 40 residents who gathered at Tod Park in East Chicago on Saturday afternoon to protest the project don’t want it whatever the explanation, and they made it loud and clear as they chanted between speakers against it. The DOE and BP, however, haven’t done themselves any favors by what they feel has been obfuscating details, said Ashley Williams, executive director for Just Transition NWI.

“BP is trying to say it’s not happening for years or ‘out of sight, out of mind,’ but the DOE is finalizing the money,” she said. “And with the change in administration, we know their MO is deregulation, so we won’t have any allies at the federal or state level.”

A DOE representative who attended the rally said he was unauthorized to talk to the Post-Tribune; a spokesperson for the DOE didn’t respond to questions by press time.

The project, named Project Crossroads, is part of the Midwest Alliance for Clean Hydrogen (MachH2) Hub, which could receive up to $1 billion in funding and will service Indiana, Illinois and Michigan, the Post-Tribune previously reported. MachH2 will create “blue hydrogen” via fracked gas, Williams said, and then ship some 23 million metric tons of carbon dioxide and other byproducts via pipelines starting in Lake County and stretching through five other counties south.

The pipeline portion of Project Crossroads is expected to cost more than $138 million, with the U.S. Department of Energy funding nearly $100 million, the Post-Tribune previously reported.

The DOE will also give $1 billion toward the hub at BP Whiting Refinery itself, while BP will contribute up to $8 billion of its own, according to a release on U.S. Rep. Frank Mrvan’s website.

“This is taxpayer money, and in addition to that, the (carbon capture storage) tax credit they get will be $85 per metric ton of CO2. At 23 million metric tons, can you do the math on that?” Williams said. “That’s also taxpayer money, so they’re supposed to be out here, but they’ve done the bare minimum. They haven’t asked us if we want it, so they’re coming in without our consent.”

Whiting resident Lisa Vallee, the organizing director for Just Transition NWI, called the project a “false solution” in that what BP and the DOE are calling “clean hydrogen” is anything but.

“Carbon dioxide is invisible, odorless and toxic, and if it leaks could result in possible asphyxiation, seizures and car engine failure — potentially inescapable emergencies for nearby residents,” she told the crowd. “We know this because it happened in Satartia, Mississippi, and Sulphur, Louisiana. And most recently, in Decatur, Illinois, the ADM plant — praised as the first CCS project in the country — experienced a series of leaks that have seeped into the community drinking water supply. ADM knew about the leak for months, but the community didn’t find out until it made headlines in the news. No emergency communication … Sound familiar?”

Carbon Capture storage, in its current form, presents a conundrum. As illustrated in a 2019 Vox article, the industry using CCS the most is the oil industry through enhanced oil recovery, or the practice of injecting pressurized CO2 into existing oil and gas reservoirs to squeeze more hydrocarbons out. But the concern, the article points out, is if oil and gas companies — notorious for wanting as little regulation as possible in order to get things done inexpensively — should first be helming the charge to use CCS, and if producing more gas and oil justifies CCS.

BP, to which the U.S. Department of Justice and Environmental Protection Agency in 2023 ordered it to pay a $40 million fine as well as install nearly $200 million in pollution protection measures, also had its own issues this year, Vallee added.

“In January, BP leaked benzene, a known carcinogen, into the air along with hydrogen sulfide. Residents were scared, reporting experiencing dizziness and headaches,” Vallee said. “Or how about in February, when a power outage led BP to evacuate non-essential workers and close down the refinery? I looked out my window and saw the thick black smoke coming from the stacks, realizing that something was very wrong.

“No city official came to evacuate us, and nobody let us know what was going on. So, do you trust that if there was a carbon dioxide leak, BP would let us know? Or ensure that our schools, our cities will be able to provide each of us with oxygen packs in case the pipelines explode? I, for one, do not.”

Sergio Meza, a senior at Bishop Noll Institute in Hammond, told the crowd that he, like many of them, was born at St. Catherine’s Hospital and raised by working-class immigrant parents. East Chicago has many beautiful areas, but industrialization and the run for the almighty dollar ruined them, he said.

“The factories and industries along our shores were seen as new beauty to the land, the beauty of fulfillment. They were the engines of growth, progress, and opportunity,” Meza said. “But now that same symbol of prosperity we see today symbolizes poison: poison to our air, our water, our people and our future. The air we breathe is no longer filled with dreams but instead filled with pollution. No longer can We look upon the sky and wish on a shooting star for a better life, a better future and a better home.”

Bryce Gustafson, program organizer for Citizens Action Coalition of Indiana out of Indianapolis, said Indiana, because it wants to attract more business, is now experiencing a “gold rush” of companies bringing these solutions to it. Because there’s so much of it, it may be an issue for people to organize efficiently.

But as he’s seen in West Terre Haute, where residents there are fighting back against a carbon capture storage project slate for it, it can be done.

“These companies are looking at us because we’re ‘flyover country,’ so to them, we’re a bunch of rubes, but we shouldn’t accept the idea that we are,” he said.

“The folks in West Terre Haute weren’t paying attention, but now they are extremely active, and I hope we can all come together because this is a huge issue, and it’s an existential threat to transitioning from fossil fuels.”

Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.