Casey Junkins of the Intelligencer says that West Virginia based Aither Chemicals plans to have a catalytic cracker plant in production by 2016.  The location will be on a river but the state where the plant will be sited has not been announced.  There is no recent press release on the Aither Chemical website.    From the Intelligencer story:

The plant is expected to employ about 2,000 construction workers and provide employment for 200 employees when in operation.  Royal Dutch Shell is expected to announce the location for it’s larger scale steam cracker plant early this year.  That multibillion dollar project is expected to employ 10,000 construction laborers.

Keith Pauley says he misspoke when he said “RMG will provide funding for the entire construction of this project” on Tuesday, according to a story in Wednesday’s Daily Mail. Pauley is President and CEO of Mid-Atlantic Technology, Research & Innovation Center (MATRIC).  He informed the South Charleston Economic Development Committee on Tuesday that Aither, a spin-off of MATRIC,  had lined up $500 million in financing from Pittsburgh, Pa. based Renewable Manufacturing Gateway, known as RMG to build a cracker plant.

Aither’s planned cracker will use a catalytic technology rather than steam technology to convert ethane to ethylene, a building block of plastics and chemicals.  Pauley claims that the construction of a catalytic plant is expected to cost about 1/3 the cost of a $1.5 billion steam cracker plant.  New Martinsville and Institute are under consideration as future plant sites.

RMG President Steve Adelkoff told the Daily Mail on Tuesday, “We’ve been negotiating with Aither to assist in raising capital. We also have some of our own capital to invest but not nearly the $500 million it takes to build one of these plants.”

Per the Daily Mail, Aither already has the support of the West Virginia Jobs Investment Trust in the form of a $250,000 convertible debenture (a loan that is convertible to stock.)   The nonprofit West Virginia High Tech Consortium also has invested $200,000 in a convertible debenture with Aither through it’s Innova branch.

There has been much talk of bringing an ethane cracker plant to West Virginia.  But the state is investing in an alternative technology via an investment of $250,000 by the West Virginia Jobs Investment Trust in Aither Chemicals, LLC. A traditional cracker plant requires an investment of approximately $1 billion or more.  According to the press release by the WV Dept. of Commerce, “Aither uses an integrated process for creating chemical products derived from ethylene. Aither’s process is designed to work on a smaller scale with less start-up costs than traditional steam cracker.”

Leonard Dolhert, Chief Executive Officer of Aither, said the company’s immediate goal is to build an alliance of investors, of which the Jobs Investment Trust is key.

There was no information released regarding potential future investors in Aither.

“In Marcellus shale and the byproduct ethane gas, West Virginia has a natural resource with tremendous economic potential.  Aither’s approach to convert ethane into petrochemicals will enhance our capability to develop this resource, retaining and creating jobs in this state” said Keith Burdette, chair of the Jobs Investment Trust and secretary of the state Commerce Department in a prepared statement.

Raw natural gas is composed of methane (70-90%) and natural gas liquids such as ethane, propane and butane.

Charleston Daily Mail story, 8-12-11