West Virginia natural gas will be used at the proposed cracker plant in Wood County. Antero Resources made the announcement today, March 26th. The company has signed an agreement to become an ethane supplier for the Ascent petrochemical complex in Washington, West Virginia. Antero intends to provide 30,000 barrels of ethane per day to the project headed up by Odebrecht and Braskem.

“[Antero will provide] at least 40 percent of the ethane they will be using in West Virginia at this plant.”

The cracker plant is still technically in the “proposed” phase. However, back in January Odebrecht purchased the property near Parkersburg, on the Ohio River. “Possibly by the first quarter of next year we could start to see construction.”

Antero resources is based out of Denver, Colorado but has a field office located in Bridgeport. All its operations are in the Appalachian Basin and the company operates 15 drilling rigs in West Virginia. The company currently employs 264 workers.

The ethane is recovered from “wet” natural gas. It is then cracked by heating to a high temperature to form ethylene, then polymerized to manufacture polyethylene, which is used in making plastics.