In this video, Charlie Summers and Angus King clash over King’s financial interest in an engineering firm that has been serving the natural gas industry for almost 40 years. King was a critic of natural gas last year, claiming that hydrofracking is dangerous to the environment, but he now supports using more natural gas.
He received $25,000 last year as a member of the board of directors of Woodard & Curran, an engineering firm in Portland that offers its natural gas utility clients “a one-stop source for all of their engineering and environmental requirements.”
King authored an op/ed piece for the Portland Press Herald on June 5, 2011 in which he criticized “hydrofracking,” a process that uses water and chemicals to fracture bedrock and capture natural gas, as something that would contaminate the groundwater and cause environmental damage. He now calls for using more natural gas.
King, Summers and Cynthia Dill are seeking election to fill U.S. Senator Olympia Snowe’s seat. Former governor Angus King calls himself an independent candidate. Summers is the Republican candidiate, and Dill is the Democratic nominee. The debate was held Wednesday, Oct. 10 in front of 350 people at a breakfast meeting of the Androscoggin County Chamber of Commerce at the Ramada Inn in Lewiston.
