It is absolutely essential to breathe clean air

According to the Environmental Health Project, active frack pads, compressor stations, and processing facilities regularly emit particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds (VOCs), and other chemical pollutants that we aren’t able to see. When ingested, these emissions can cause or exacerbate a host of short- and long-term health problems, including headaches, eye and throat irritation, respiratory complications, chest pain, asthma, and various types of cancer.

This Thursday, join the first session of our webinar and Q&A on air pollution and inadequate regulation in the Ohio River Valley. Ohio regulatory agencies’ inadequate monitoring and oversight of fracking-related air pollution in Belmont County endangers our health and livelihoods, especially if an ethane cracker plant is also built in the region. Join our webinar to learn more!

Register here for the webinar and Q&A this Thursday, November 5th, from 6:30pm to 8:00pm EST.

If you can’t make it this Thursday, we’re hosting a second session of Making the Invisible Visible on Thursday, November 19th at 6:30pm Save the date and register here.

The Ohio River Valley is already endangered by the cumulative pollution caused by the fracking industry, including toxic chemicals and radioactive particulate matter. Join us to learn more about how you can protect yourself by participating in a community monitoring program to establish baseline air quality data and advise residents of their exposures and associated health effects.

What you’ll get from this presentation:

>> Information on the potential health risks posed by proximity to shale gas wells and other fracking-related facilities.

>> An understanding of state regulatory agencies’ complicity in allowing petrochemical facilities to emit potentially dangerous levels of chemical pollutants into the air we breathe.

>> Access to free air monitoring equipment, enabling you to evaluate and track the air quality of your home or backyard.

>> The opportunity to discuss air pollution in Belmont County with scientists, air monitoring experts, public health professionals, and community advocates during a 30-minute Q&A session.

This presentation was made possible with the help of the Freshwater Accountability Project, the American Geophysical Union’s Thriving Earth Exchange, Carnegie Mellon University’s CREATE Lab, FracTracker Alliance, Concerned Ohio River Residents, Halt the Harm Network, and the Southwestern Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project.

Thanks for reading! We look forward to seeing you on Thursday,

Ben Hunkler, Organizer, Concerned Ohio River Residents

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See this video: “Hydrofracking and Exposure to Ionizing Radiation,” David O. Carpenter, MD, SouthWest Penna. Environmental Health Project, October 15, 2020

Penna. legislators and Gov. Wolf should listen to the concerned citizens

From an Article by Chrissy Suttles, Ellwood City Ledger, March 9, 2020

Environmental groups and legislators from throughout the state gathered in Harrisburg on Monday (3/9/20) to rally against hefty tax breaks for some natural gas manufacturers.

Representatives from PennFuture, the Breathe Project and nearly three dozen other organizations spoke out against House Bill 1100 in the Capitol rotunda, urging Gov. Tom Wolf to veto the bill passed with bipartisan support last month.

HB 1100 would establish multi-million-dollar tax breaks for companies investing at least $450 million to build a manufacturing plant that creates a minimum of 800 combined temporary and permanent jobs. The incentive is similar to what Shell Chemicals received years ago to build its petrochemical complex in Potter Township.

The new program would cost $22 million annually per plant in missed taxes until the strategy ends in 2050. It encourages the use of natural gas across the board, roping in fertilizer manufacturers.

Speakers argued the subsidy’s return on investment would include health complications and environmental degradation related to natural gas extraction. Others said clean energy companies should be included in the tax breaks.

“No industry is entitled to an open-ended tax credit,” said PennFuture president Jacquelyn Bonomo. “The entitlement mindset of this industry is unacceptable to communities who refuse to be soaked in toxins in exchange for jobs. The days where Pennsylvanians must accept pollution in exchange for progress must come to an end.”

As part of a package of Republican-sponsored bills called Energize PA, the effort is just one of many established to help subsidize the natural gas and petrochemical industries. Although the bill passed through the state House and Senate with sweeping support, including from Beaver County’s state legislators, Gov. Tom Wolf plans to veto it.

Wolf believes the tax breaks should be considered on a case-by-case basis, but the General Assembly could override that veto if it so chooses. Because the bill includes language requiring companies to pay construction workers the prevailing wage rate and make “good-faith efforts” to employ local laborers, it has earned the support of state building trade unions.

Veronica Coptis, executive director of the Center for Coalfield Justice, said the billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies offered in HB 1100 could be invested in schools, childcare, public safety and community development instead. Democratic representatives from Pittsburgh and elsewhere noted the investment’s uncertainty in an unpredictable market.

“This bill asks us to prop up corporate profit margins in an uncertain and volatile global market,” said state Rep. Sara Innamorato, a Democrat from Pittsburgh. “Courting petrochemical development with no plan to recoup that investment pits our public health, public dollars and public goods against private profits. We need coordination, clarity and transparency on the true costs of subsidizing these industries and operations.”

While supporters say petrochemical production will further strengthen the state’s economy, critics caution the industry’s risk to climate and public health. Environmentalists point to a region along the Mississippi River in Louisiana known as “cancer alley” due to a cluster of cancer patients living near petrochemical facilities. (See the graphic below.)

Additionally, Shell’s cracker alone is legally permitted to emit 2.2 million tons of carbon dioxide each year and more natural gas development could lead to increased methane leaks and pipeline spills.

Matt Mehalik, executive director of the Pittsburgh-based Breathe Project, said those concerned about the Ohio River Valley’s future have seen how heavy industrial development can wreak havoc on a region.

Larry Schweiger, chair of the Climate Reality Action Fund, said lawmakers should be instead promoting clean and renewable energy.

“If Pennsylvania lawmakers were serious about creating good paying jobs they would do what New York did by investing in clean energy,” he said. “For about $1.5 billion, New York spawned 40,000 renewable energy jobs where $1.6 billion in the cracker plant will create 300 to 600 jobs post construction.”

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Who in their right mind would give tax incentives for heavy polluting chemical plants?

Your Rights at Stake: Come to Public Hearing on the Anti-Protest Bill

From the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition (OVEC), February 6, 2020

Come out for a public hearing on HB 4615, “The West Virginia Critical Infrastructure Protection Act,” which would create new criminal and civil penalties for conduct around gas and oil pipelines that could be applied to individuals and organizations involved in peaceful protests.

Public Hearing on HB 4615, the Anti-Protest Bill —- 8:30 a.m., Monday, February 10th in the House Chamber at the WV State Capitol, 1900 Kanawha Boulevard East, Charleston, West Virginia

Can’t come? Call your delegate and state your opposition to HB 4615. Find out who your delegate is here and find their contact info here.

In State Houses around the United States, bills are being introduced that would criminalize peaceful protest. The bills would dramatically increase civil fines for protesters, and increase criminal penalties for specific forms of protest, even for organizations and individuals supporting protest.

In the states where the bills have become enacted to law, challenges are underway at great expense to all involved.

Greenpeace protesters in Texas appear to be the first to have been charged under these types of bills, and could face two years in prison and fines of up to $10,000. The organization itself could face a fine of up to $500,000 under the new state law. The Texas bill could even impact journalists covering protests.

South Dakota appears to be the first state where a legal challenge to one of these bills has had a successful outcome. People in Ohio have been resisting a similar bill there, and now this corporations-over-people bill has invaded West Virginia.

HB 4615 is un-American. A basic right for Americans is the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and freedom of expression in the country. Protest was a foundational tenant for American democracy, and since our foundling days, protest has been essential in raising awareness about injustices to bring about social reforms.

HB 4615 is unconstitutional. The right to peacefully assemble is protected under the First Amendment.

Peaceful protest works. Almost every day in America people come together peacefully to demonstrate and raise our voices about clean air and water, equal rights for women and people of color, fair wages and working hours, local land use, and other issues we believe in.

We all deserve to live in a society where we can speak our mind without fear of punishment. This is free speech. If a company is polluting our water source or a politician is acting against the people, we should be able to speak up. This bill stops people from criticizing the powerful.

HB-4615 reeks of ALEC’s* widespread efforts to clamp down on protests of all kinds. HB 4615 has heightened penalties for trespass onto “critical infrastructure” (one year in jail), and felony penalties for trespass with intent to “willfully damage, destroy, vandalize, deface, tamper with equipment, or impede or inhibit operations” (three years in prison and a $1,000 fine). Actual damage, destruction, vandalism, defacing, tampering, impeding/inhibiting is a felony subject to five years in prison and a $2,000 fine. A person convicted of any of these offenses is also civilly liable to third parties for any personal or property damage that results. (*See: ALEC Exposed: The Koch Connection.)

The bill contains conspiracy provisions as well, creating liability for a person or organization that “conspires” to trespass (a $5,000 fine) or to damage/tamper/etc. (a $10,000 fine). Any entity that “compensates, provides consideration to or remunerates a person” for trespassing is also civilly liable for any personal or property damage.

If you can’t make it to the public hearing, please do let your delegate know this bill is unacceptable. As it begins, you should be able to access a live stream of the public hearing by clicking on the “House of Delegates Chamber” audio or video link here.

Stand up for democracy! Come out to this hearing and/or comment to legislators, and then make plans to join us the following Monday, February 17, for Good Government Lobby Day.

Waste plastics accumulation in Nairobi, Kenya

From an Article by Sandra Laville, The Guardian, March 15, 2019

>>> Commitments agreed at UN conference in Kenya do not go far enough, say green groups.

Environmental groups involved in talks at a United Nations conference in Kenya have accused the US of blocking an ambitious global response to plastic pollution.

Representatives of countries at the UN environment conference in Nairobi this week agreed to significantly reduce single-use plastics over the next decade but the voluntary pledges fell far short of what was required, according to green groups.

Norway, Japan and Sri Lanka had put forward proposals for a legally binding agreement for nations to coordinate action against plastic litter in the oceans and microplastics. India also suggested strong action with a resolution to phase out single-use plastic across the world.

But a coalition of environmental groups at the conference condemned the US for blocking the ambitious attempts to tackle plastic pollution at the source as well as downstream.

An initial ministerial statement at the beginning of the event had proposed a commitment to “phase out single-use plastics … by 2025”, a far stronger promise than the compromise nations reached.

On Friday, a series of non-binding proposals were agreed, including the adoption of an action plan by the International Maritime Organization’s marine environment protection committee to reduce plastic litter from ships, and suggestions for better global management of data on plastic pollution. A final statement said countries would “address the damage to our ecosystems caused by the unsustainable use and disposal of plastic products, including by significantly reducing single-use plastic by 2030”.

In response, environmental groups including Break Free From Plastic, IPEN, Plastic Change, No Waste Louisiana and Coare said the proposals did not go far enough.

“Despite sweeping agreement by the majority of countries that urgent, ambitious and global action is needed to address plastic across its lifecycle, from production to use to disposal, a small minority led by the United States blocked ambitious text and delayed negotiations,” they said in a statement.

Countries most affected by plastic pollution including the Philippines, Malaysia and Senegal were against the resolution being watered down.

Large oil firms in the US are investing billions of dollars in petrochemical production over the next decade, particularly shale gas.

The new facilities, which are being built by ExxonMobile Chemical and Shell Chemical, among others, will help fuel a 40% rise in plastic production in the next decade, according to industry experts.

The world already produces more than 300 million tonnes of plastic a year.

“It’s hard to find one solution for all member states,” Siim Kiisler, the president of the UN environment assembly, told Agence France-Presse before the final decision. “The environment is at a turning point. We don’t need verbose documents, we need concrete commitments.”

When asked whether the US had pushed to have the commitments watered down during the week’s negotiations, Kiisler said: “I will not answer that question.”

David Azoulay, from the Center for International Environmental Law, condemned the weakening of the commitment.

He said: “The vast majority of countries came together to develop a vision for the future of global plastic governance. Seeing the US, guided by the interests of the fracking and petrochemical industry, leading efforts to sabotage that vision is disheartening.”

Exponential growth of plastics worldwide

2018 Ocean Heroes respond to plastic pollution crisis

Article by 2018 Ocean Heroes: Claire MacQueen (13 years old), Sabine Thomas (13) and Ava Inskeep (14)

We despise single-use plastics. We want to keep our oceans and our beaches clean. Early last year I (Claire) lived in India for several months and became curious about plastic waste, as it was much more visible in India than back home in the U.S. Seeing all the plastic waste while I was visiting helped me to understand that much of the trash produced by the U.S. actually ends up in developing countries, like India, which does not have a proper waste management system like we do at home, which causes a ton of trash to end up in waterways and the ocean.

While I was in India, an activist that I got to know nominated me for the 2018 Ocean Heroes Bootcamp, a global youth summit co-founded by Lonely Whale, Captain Planet Foundation and Point Break Foundation. The Bootcamp equips participants with tools to develop campaigns to fight plastic pollution.

I recruited my friend Sabine to join me at Ocean Heroes Bootcamp, and we both learned how we could help our community rely less on single-use plastic.

Once Sabine and I returned from the Bootcamp, our friend Ava also got involved, and we started the Instagram account, Straw Free D.C. Sabine, Claire and Ava spoke with the Washington Post last month at the Washington International School.Theresa Vargas / The Washington Post

As eighth-grade students, we didn’t know how much influence we would have across our nation’s capital to eliminate single-use plastics in Washington DC but understanding that big results sometimes come from small steps, we decided to first focus on eliminating single-use plastics in our school.

We noticed a lot of unnecessary single-use plastics at school, like the cafeteria’s plastic cutlery dispensers that dispense multiple single-use plastics at a time, causing many unused utensils to fall on the floor and land in the waste. When we raised this concern to the Washington International school, leadership invited us to help select our school’s next food service provider, which will be decided by the end of the 2019 school year. Within this new role, we will get to weigh-in on each company’s sustainability practices, including their use of single-use plastic.

While we were working to reduce plastics in our school, we were also developing our citywide campaign focused on single-use plastic straws. The timing of our campaign launch was very fortunate. To support the ban on plastic straws, our first step was to email the council-people who represent Wards 1, 2 and 4, because two are the representatives of the wards in which we live and the third is an at-large member who represents all DC residents.

When we got in touch with Brianne Nadeau, representative of Ward 1, she told us about a proposed city wide ban on straws which they were already working on. After learning about the ban, and that it only included plastic straws and stirrers, we wanted to take things a step further and support legislation that would eliminate single-use plastic straws and utensils. So, we went back to our school and met with our principal to discuss plastic use in the cafeteria. Our school will soon be choosing a new food provider, and we will be able to advocate for the company that we think will be the most environmentally friendly.

We hope that our efforts can be a model for other DC schools to follow in the future. We also hope to continue growing our social media campaign to raise awareness across our community and the region.

We credit Ocean Heroes Bootcamp with the inspiration that helped us learn to work with each other and how to reach out to other activists fighting to eliminate single-use plastics in our community.

It’s important that everyone is doing their part to make a difference for our environment—including the youth! Kids have longer to live on this planet, so it’s in our best interest to take care of it. If nothing changes, there will be more plastic than fish in the oceans by 2050 (we’ll only be in our early 40′s by then!)

Collaborating with friends and other activists is not only more fun, but also allows us to combine our different skill sets, and ultimately accomplish a lot more than we could on our own.

We’re so excited for the 2019 Ocean Heroes Bootcamp and we’re looking forward to learning new effective ways to beat plastic pollution and make a difference in our community.

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“A Grand Plan to Clean the Great Pacific Garbage Patch” — Can a controversial young entrepreneur rid the ocean of plastic trash? By Carolyn Kormann, New Yorker (Magazine), February 4, 2019

Peter Ross in Vancouver, BC

A ‘smog’ of plastics may be killing our oceans

From an Article by Daphne Branham, Vancouver Sun, September 6, 2016

ABOARD THE AKADEMIK SERGEY VAVILOV — The biggest problem in the world’s oceans isn’t swirling, Texas-sized islands of discarded plastic. It’s the small stuff; the little bits you can’t see that are congregating in gyres where ocean currents converge.

If it were only big, visible chunks of floating plastic, the fix would be simple. Send some people in boats with big nets and scoops and collect it. Unfortunately, it’s way more complicated than that and it’s why Marcus Eriksen is trying to change the narrative by using a different analogy — smog in the oceans.

Eriksen is one of the authors of the peer-reviewed study that estimated there are 244,000 tonnes of plastic in the world’s oceans. Of that, 92 per cent of the pieces are five millimetres or smaller, which works out to an estimated 5.25 trillion tiny pieces. Some microplastics absorb toxins such as PCBs, DDT, other pesticides, flame-retardants and oil from vehicles. Others release toxins as they degrade.

As for microfibres, a study published this summer by researchers at Southampton Solent University found that as many as 2,000 fibres from fleece and polyester fabrics are released during a single washing cycle. Almost all of those find their way through municipal sewage systems to the sea.

A couple of years ago, the Great Lakes were described as being awash in microfibres with bits found enmeshed in the gastrointestinal tracts of some fish and fish-eating birds like cormorants.

And there’s growing evidence of microplastics in the Arctic Ocean. “Polar sea ice is becoming a major sink for microplastic contamination,” according to a 2014 study. “And, as the ice melts, these microplastics can be released into the environment.” The study was cited by the Canadian government last year when it added microbeads to its list of toxic substances in 2015.

What no one knows is the extent of microplastics in the Arctic or where they come from. It’s why Eriksen, founder of The 5 Gyres Institute, and Eric Solomon, the Vancouver Aquarium’s head of Arctic programs, were sampling water during a 12-day trip through the Northwest Passage.

Because of the focus on plastics, everyone on the expedition looked for bigger plastic pieces while we were ashore on desolate, unpopulated islands. All sorts of stuff was found — shopping bags, rope, gun shell casings, plastic-coated wire and smaller, unidentifiable pieces.

But it was the micro-bits that were the real target. Eriksen and 5 Gyres “citizen scientists” dragged a 60-centimetre wide Manta trawl behind a Zodiac at about two knots for 30 minutes.

Solomon and the aquarium’s volunteers took some sediment samples as well as numerous samples from 3.5 metres below the surface. “It’s not sexy stuff,” admitted Solomon. “It’s basically just sieving sea water.”

Several times a day, a pail full of water was poured through a metal sieve, which filtered out anything larger than 63 microns. (A micron is one one-thousandth of a millimetre.)

Both sampling methods yielded a few bits visible to the eye. One water sample viewed under a microscope had copepods (small crustaceans), translucent marine snails, phytoplankton, thin strands of fibres and a pinkish piece that looked like a granite rock.

“I’m really curious about the coloured bits,” Solomon said. “The blue pieces are the question marks for me. They have a square-ish base that comes up (under the microscope) rough, jagged with reflective flecks.” Neither Solomon nor Eriksen was making any guesses about whether any of what they found is plastic. That requires further study.

The aquarium’s samples will be handed over to Peter Ross, head of the Ocean Pollution Research Program, to do the toxicology work. The aquarium’s lab is the only one in Canada with a $300,000 Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometer, which will eventually not only identify plastic, but determine exactly which of 5,000 varieties of plastic it is.

But before that, the samples will be rinsed again and the bits from each sample counted and measured. Sediments will be removed using a technology Ross and his team have developed using canola oil to emulsify with the sediments, leaving the plastic floating on the top.

Other samples with phyto- or zooplanktons will be put on glass-coated polypropylene well plates, immersed in nitric acid, covered and heated until the tissues have dissolved.

Only then will the samples be put through the spectrometer where an infrared beam strikes a crystal that Ross says “excites” the electrons. Because each kind of plastic has a unique signature, the response conveyed back to the spectrometer can be identified within 20 seconds.

Why this matters is because if scientists can identify specific kinds of plastics concentrated in specific areas, they can begin to determine where they’re coming from and what can be done to stop it. 

How big is the problem?

When Ross and his team sampled the water off the B.C. coast a couple of years ago, the results were astounding. One of every 34 copepods and one of every 17 euphausiids contained microplastics or fibres.

Based on their findings, they estimate that juvenile salmon in the Strait of Georgia may ingest two to seven microplastic particles each day, while returning adult salmon take in up to 91 particles. Extrapolating from that, the researchers concluded humpback whales could scoop up more than 300,000 plastic bits daily.

Their study, published in Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology last year, was described as “the first indisputable evidence that species at the bottom of the food web are mistaking plastic for food.”

Others have studied fish and bivalves sold in markets in several different countries. As Eriksen said, “If you eat oysters, you’re likely feeding on your own fleece.”

Microplastics include everything from tire dust to fibres from dryer exhaust; from broken down bits of plastic bottles, Styrofoam containers and other packaging to microbeads intentionally added to cosmetic products. Global plastics production went from 202 million tonnes in 2002 to 299 million tonnes in 2013. By 2030, it’s forecast to reach 600 million tonnes and double that by 2050.

What is the majority of all that plastic used for? Packaging, according to the U.S. Plastics Industry Trade Association’s 2015 global trends report. That’s followed by vehicle production and medical uses. Eriksen says the plastics come from three sources. One is unavoidable catastrophic events like Japan’s 2011 tsunami that washed 16.2 million tonnes of debris into the ocean.

Another is poor product design including the proliferation of single-use products. Some of this can be blamed on our demand for convenience. Think of single-serve coffee pods; frozen foods in ‘stand-up-straight’ plastic bags that can’t be recycled; individual cleaning wipes; and over-packaged, small items from memory cards to mascara.

Finally, there’s poor waste management. It ranges from nonexistent in developing countries to inefficient and insufficient in wealthy countries where even massive landfills and incinerators don’t seem capable of dealing with what’s thrown into them.

Even with good intentions, progress is slow. Statistics Canada reports 92 per cent of Canadians have access to recycling and 98 per cent use at least one recycling program (bottles, plastics, paper, etc.). But total residential waste disposal continues to grow.

We need to start making choices about what we buy. But we also have to decide who ought to pay the lion’s share of the fundamental switch away from being a throwaway society. Will it be producers or consumers?

Microplastics are everywhere, so there’s no time to waste. Because as we nibble away at the problem, microplastics and nanofibres are being gobbled up by almost everything along the food chain. Including us.

What are microplastics and where do they come from?

Microplastics are synthetic polymer particles. While there is no agreed-upon scientific definition of their size, Canada has accepted the United Nations’ Joint Group of Experts on the Scientific Aspects of Marine Environmental Protection’s recommended range of between five millimetres and one nanometre (one-billionth of a metre) in size.

Some microplastics are manufactured specifically for use in personal care products (toothpaste, face cleansers, anti-aging creams, shaving creams, eyeshadow, baby products, sunscreen, lipstick), industrial cleaning products, printer toners, anti-slip products and medical applications.

Peer-reviewed research indicates that the number of microbeads in personal care products varies from 137,000 to 2.8 million in a 150 ml bottle. Used on a daily basis, a single application of some products could result in as many as 94,500 microbeads released into the household waste water stream.

A voluntary survey of the Canadian Cosmetic, Toiletry and Fragrance Association’s members found that they produced an annual total volume of microbeads ranging from 30 kilograms to 68,000 kilograms per year. Other microplastics are by-products of bags, bottles, and fishing line that are breaking down while microfibres slough off synthetic and fleece clothing when it is laundered.

As some microplastics break down, they release chemicals. Others are stable, but attract other toxins. They enter the food chain either because they float and are eaten by birds and other species in the open ocean (pelagic) or they sink and are eaten by bottom feeders.

Peter Ross shows a sample of microplastics and microfibers in the Vancouver Aquarium lab in British Columbia, Canada:

Low Density Polyethylene (LDPE) products

Polyethylene market (may or may not be) ready for increased capacity

From an Article by Frank Esposito, Plastics News, 12/28/2015

For the North American polyethylene resin market, 2016 might prove to be the calm before the storm.

Three new capacity projects are set to come on line that could add as much as 4 billion pounds of production capacity to the market next year. Similar projects expected in 2017 could boost capacity by another 6 billion pounds.

Overall, 27 PE expansions have been announced for North America. If they all come to fruition, they’ll add more than 34 billion pounds of capacity — a 75 percent jump over current capacity of roughly 45 billion pounds.

This scenario has led to some concern. The domestic PE market is growing, but not at a rate high enough to handle that much material. That means a good chunk of that new PE will have to be exported outside North America.

For his part, Dow Chemical Co. executive Diego Donoso believes the PE market will be able to handle the new capacity, which is being made possible through low-priced feedstocks based on shale gas.

“You have to look at the impact of the world, because it’s all connected,” said Donoso, global packaging and specialty plastics business president with Midland, Mich.-based Dow. “And before you look at 2016, you need to look at 2013 and 2014 when we had a high oil price scenario. The market added [13 billion pounds] of new capacity globally and was able to absorb it. We had 20 cents in [PE price] increases without a single price drop, and the market stabilized because supply was tight.

“Then in 2015,” he added, “lower oil prices took the floor away and there were price corrections and an overcorrection of inventory. It was a very different world than in 2013 and 2014, but we didn’t give away all of our margin to the market.”

Chris Bezaire of PE maker Nova Chemicals Corp. also believes that those expecting chaos from the new PE capacity will be disappointed. “There’s no question there will be a [PE] surplus, but it will be fleeting,” said Bezaire, PE vice president with Calgary, Alberta-based Nova. “We’ll work with that. We’re not afraid.”

“Between now and 2020-21, new supply add will find its way into the marketplace,” he added. “Not all of it will be in North America. A new supply/demand equilibrium will come into line and there might be a short-time 10 percent surge in exports. It’s natural ebb and flow.”

But Donoso and Bezaire might need to spend some more time convincing veteran industry consultant Robert Bauman that all will be well with the market once the new PE arrives. “It’s going to be a bloodbath,” said Bauman, president of Polymer Consulting International in Spring, Texas. “We’re going to see inventory build with prices dropping. It will be one of the worst performance periods for the industry in a long time.” Bauman added that PE export markets “don’t have a panacea in Latin America — the economy in Brazil is a disaster and Argentina isn’t good.”

Market analyst Mike Burns was taking a calmer approach to the PE situation at Resin Technology Inc. in Fort Worth, Texas. “To keep a good balance [in North America], we have to compete with the global price,” Burns said. “As long as the North American price is within 10 cents of the Asia price, that will keep Asian resin from getting into the U.S. and will allow the U.S. to export to Latin America. “We have to keep that balance of exports flowing and stopping imports from coming in. If our price gets too high outside that window, North American processors would call China,” Burns added. “The key to the whole thing is the price of oil and the cost to make pellets in other regions.”

Now 2016 “is looking to be a transition year to the long awaited PE buyer’s market that should be fully in place during 2017 and 2018,” said Phil Karig, managing director of the Mathelin Bay Associates LLC consulting firm in St. Louis. 2016 PE demand growth “should be tepid at best,” he added, and PE exports from the U.S. to Mexico “will have to find another home as the massive Braskem PE joint venture comes on line.”

Profit margins for North American PE makers should still be “quite good” in 2016, according to market analyst David Barry at PetroChem Wire LLC in Houston. Producers “aren’t worried about margin in the near term,” he added. “But that will change when the new capacity comes on.” Barry described the export market as “a wild card,” but he added that North American exports recently had some strong months at times when exports traditionally hadn’t been that strong.

Through October, U.S./Canadian sales of high density PE were up 6.6 percent, according to the American Chemistry Council in Washington. Domestic sales were up only 1 percent for the period, but export sales rocketed up almost 42 percent. Sales of HDPE into household chemical bottles provided a domestic bright spot, growing 7 percent.

Regional sales of low density PE through October improved 3.3 percent, with domestic growth of almost 4 percent lessened somewhat by growth of only 1.2 percent in export markets. Sales of LDPE into non-food packaging film soared more than 11 percent in that 10-month period.

For linear low density PE, 10-month sales grew 6.3 percent. Domestic sales growth of almost 6 percent was amplified by a 9 percent rise in export sales. Sales of LLDPE into all types of film  —  packaging and non-packaging  —  climbed almost 8 percent in that period.

Donoso recently met with several large food packaging companies who were moving more products into ready-to-eat snack packaging. “Even more food companies are going from rigid packaging to flexible,” he said. “Packaging is strong,” added Bezaire at Nova. “More people are more eating out of the home. Families are smaller and they eat out more than we did as kids.”

Nova will do its part for new PE capacity with a 1 billion pound-capacity LLDPE line in Joffre, Alberta. Mechanical completion of the line is set for July 1, Bezaire said, with material expected to be available in the market in September and October. The new line’s output “is an extension of what we currently produce,” he said. “We’re building what our customers want.” Nova also is considering building a new PE plant either in Ontario or on the U.S. Gulf Coast, Bezaire added.

North American PE demand also will be helped by new capacity making better-quality resins in volumes that previously were unavailable, he said. This will allow North American processors to make products that couldn’t be made with earlier resins. “The PE being made in Joffre is the cleanest PE in North America when it comes to gels and clarity,” he said. “The future is bright — it’s maybe never been brighter in North America.”

Dow’s Donoso agreed that the quality of PE being made in North America has greatly improved. “All of our reactors are providing our highest-performing products,” he said. “To go from rigid to flexible packaging, you need better resins.”

He added that he’s doubtful that all of the PE capacity projects announced for North America will come online as scheduled, pointing out that previous waves of capacity expansion often had delays. Bauman agreed, saying welders, pipefitters and other specialty workers needed to build these new lines and plants are becoming scarce on the Gulf Coast.

Through October, PE makers in the U.S. and Canada were exporting about 21 percent of total LDPE and LLDPE production and about 18 percent of their HDPE output. RTI’s Burns and other market watchers say those numbers need to be closer to 30-35 percent to handle the new capacity.

“If you’re a [PE] seller, you’re going to see increased competition, more capacity chasing demand and price and margin pressure,” IHS Chemical analyst Nick Vafiadis said in October at the Global Plastics Summit 2015. “If you’re a buyer, you’re going to see more supply options, increased competition and increased quality demands.”

“The [North American PE] market is going to be very competitive in two to three years,” added Barry at PetroChem Wire. “Producers will need to cater to processors to get material sold. If they don’t, someone else will.”

Mathelin Bay’s Karig doesn’t see the new capacity affecting regional PE prices much in 2016. “Even with reduced exports, capacity utilization in 2016 will remain high enough to keep PE prices from cratering, unless oil prices turn sharply downward again,” he said.

At Dow, Donoso remains confident. “The world will balance itself,” he said. “The market is very resilient.”

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See also the articles on low prices for oil and natural gas, excess ethane and plans for ethane crackers at: www.FrackCheckWV.net

Micro-plastics form as plastic trash deteriorates to foul waterways and accumulate in wildlife

Plastic Trash is Contaminating Landfills, Streams, Rivers & Oceans — The Public Health is at Risk Around the World

From an Article by Marc Hillmyer, Ensia, University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment, July 29, 2015

Minneapolis — The fate of the world’s oceans may rest inside a stainless steel tank not quite the size of a small beer keg. Inside, genetically modified bacteria turn corn syrup into a churning mass of polymers that can be used to produce a wide variety of common plastics.

“It’s a bit like making yogurt,” says Oliver Peoples, chief scientific officer of Metabolix, Inc.

The Cambridge, Massachusetts–based company where bioplastics take shape in laboratory-scale fermentation chambers is one of a growing number of businesses and institutions working to develop cost-competitive, more environmentally friendly replacements for conventional plastics, which are made from fossil fuels, fail to decompose and are turning our oceans into seas of floating plastic.

“We’ve seen this huge increase in production in plastic that results in an increase in the waste stream as well,” says Jenna Jambeck, an environmental engineering faculty member at the University of Georgia. “Unlike material that biodegrades, plastic has all of these issues. It easily travels into waterways, it physically fragments into smaller pieces which are extremely hard or impossible to collect, and [it tends to] absorb chemical contaminants that are already in the environment.”

Some 4.8 million to 12.7 million metric tons (5.3 million to 14 million tons) of plastic, or up to 4 percent of the roughly 300 million metric tons (330 million tons) of plastic produced each year, entered the ocean as trash in 2010. The figure is expected to increase 10-fold in the next decade as more plastic is produced and subsequently evades waste management and recycling efforts, according to a study Jambeck and colleagues published earlier this year in the journal Science.

What effect all this plastic has on living things, including humans, remains unclear. A number of recent studies show that chemicals in small bits of plastic, and even the plastic bits themselves, can accumulate in birds, fish and other marine life. Laboratory testing has shown the chemicals that comprise them can cause adverse health effects, including liver damage and endocrine disruption through altered gene expression. Whether similar effects occur outside the laboratory or whether they extend up the food chain to people who eat marine organisms remains unknown, yet both seem entirely plausible.

And that’s not all. Plastics are notorious in the greenhouse gas department as well. Roughly 8 percent of the petroleum used worldwide each year goes to make plastic directly or to power the plastic manufacturing processes, according to a recent report by the Worldwatch Institute. Greenhouse gas emissions associated with bioplastics are 26 percent lower than those associated with conventional plastic, according to a recent life-cycle analysis of corn-based and petroleum-based plastic by researchers at Michigan State University.

Emerging Alternatives

Finding non-petroleum-based, decomposable alternatives to today’s plastics, however, isn’t easy. Plastic made from corn, sugarcane or other plant-based material isn’t necessarily degradable, and getting degradation to occur when you want it to can be difficult.

“You don’t want your plastic bag to degrade while you are using it,” Hillmyer says. “On the other hand you want it to degrade rapidly when put into another environment.”

While chemists have had difficulty reformulating petroleum-based plastics so that they can degrade, a number of bio-based, degradeable alternatives are emerging.

Despite these and other recent successes, bioplastics remain a tiny fraction of the industry as a whole. Natureworks, a company based in Minnetonka, Minnesota, is one of the world’s leading manufactures of bioplastics. The company makes polylactic acid, or PLA, a biodegradable plastic it sources from cornstarch and makes into a wide range of consumer products — including single-use flatware, cups and packaging — that decompose at the end of their useful life. The company’s initial production facility in Blair, Nebraska, came online in 2002 and can produce 140,000 metric tons (150,000 tons) of PLA per year. The company recently announced plans to open a second plant in Southeast Asia that would use sugarcane as its

The Coca-Cola Company in 2009 launched PlantBottle, a drink bottle made from 30 percent sugarcane-based polyethylene terephthalate, or PET. The bottles are not degradable but, unlike most biobased plastics, can be recycled along with conventional PET, a commonly recycled plastic. Since 2009 the company has produced 35 billion of its original PlantBottles. In June 2015 the company unveiled a new version that is 100 percent biobased.

Government regulation, however, is leading to the increased use of bioplastics. In 2014 Illinois banned microbeads, tiny plastic abrasives commonly used in facial scrubs, shampoo and toothpaste, due to concerns about environmental degradation in the Great Lakes. At less than one millimeter in diameter, microbeads are too small to be filtered by sewage treatment systems and have been found in both freshwater and marine environments.

With a federal ban on microbeads expected, Metabolix partnered with Honeywell in March to produce a biodegradable alternative to microbeads The microbeads the two companies are developing are made from Polyhydroxyalkanoates, or PHA, a bio-based plastic that is more expensive but also more versatile than PLA. The microbeads the two companies are developing are made by fermenting cornstarch, though they could also be made from non-food crops such as switchgrass. PHA microbeads will degrade into carbon dioxide and water in a matter of months at the same rate as cellulose or paper, Peoples says.

Around the Down Sides

As we increase our reliance on plastics sourced from crops such as corn or sugarcane, we could inadvertently introduce new environmental concerns. A recent study in the journal Cleaner Production noted bioplastics grown from agricultural feedstocks use significant amounts of water, pesticides and fertilizers that can cause air and water pollution and compete for land with crops grown for food.

One possible way to get around the down sides of plant-based plastics while still reducing dependence on petroleum is to use CO2 as a feedstock instead. Novomer, a company spun out from research at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, is turning waste CO2 from ethanol production plants into plastic. The company makes polyols — polymers used to make flexible foam found in mattresses, seat cushions and insulation, as well as a range of specialty coatings and sealants.

“If your mattress was made with our material, it would be roughly 22 percent by weight carbon dioxide,” says Peter Shepard, Novomer’s executive vice president of polymers. “It takes a greenhouse gas that is a waste material and turns it into a valuable product.”

Typically CO2 is too inert to react with other compounds, making its use in plastics or other applications difficult. Geoffrey Coates, a chemistry professor at Cornell University in Ithaca and a co-founder of Novomer, developed a catalyst that increased the reactivity of CO2 while simultaneously slowing down the reactivity of another key polyol ingredient — making it easier to incorporate CO2 into the resulting polymer.

The biggest challenge for bioplastics is that they are competing against conventional plastics, incredibly inexpensive materials that have been honed for the past 60 years, Scheer says.The polyols made by Novomer are degradable but lose their degradability when combined with petroleum-based chemicals to make foam.

Though the company is currently focused on making foams and sealants, Shepard says Novomer’s CO2-based polymers could be used to make degradable plastics with a CO2 content as high as 50 percent.

Biggest Challenge

Despite strong growth in recent years, some say bioplastics haven’t lived up to their potential.

“The bioplastics industry has not been able to create polymers that are attractive enough in terms of pricing and in terms of properties that will make the world willing to change,” says Frederick Scheer, the former CEO of Cereplast, a once-leading bioplastics company that declared bankruptcy in 2014.

“People are somewhat conscious of the environmental impact of oil-based materials that will not biodegrade, but they are not willing to spend the extra dollars to push [new] types of materials,” he says.

Competition with petroleum-based plastic has only intensified over the past year as the price of oil has dropped in half. “In order to be competitive with traditional oil-based material we needed the price of oil to be somewhere around $130, $140 a barrel,” Scheer says. “Clearly, at $50 a barrel we are far away from being able to compete.”

Scheer says the capacity to make all of the world’s plastic from non-petroleum sources exists, but to do so would require significant government support. “It will have to be driven by regulation that will force the cost of plastic and cost of oil to be substantially higher than it is right now,” he says.

Polyethylene Competitor?

If sustainable plastics that reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and degrade at the end of their useful life are going to go mainstream, they will have to be able to sub in not only for microbeads, foam and other specialty applications but also for thermoplastics — low-cost, shapeable polymers that comprise more than 80 percent of the hundreds of millions of tons of plastic produced each year.

Coates is now working on a new biopolymer with properties comparable to or perhaps better than polyethylene, the most widely produced thermoplastic used to make everything from trash bags to water bottles to plastic toys.

Even a thin layer of polyethylene is incredibly strong, making, for example, mailing envelopes that are nearly impossible to open without scissors or milk jugs that don’t break when dropped on the floor. “Most of that is because it’s a semicrystalline material,” Coates says. “The [polymer] chains pack next to each other in a very tight and specific fashion that overall, gives pretty impressive properties.”

In a 2014 study published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, Coates and colleagues at Cornell described a new material with a semicrystalline structure that is made from a sugar feedstock and has properties similar to polyethylene, yet is better able to decompose at the end of its useful life.

The new material, known as poly(polypropylene succinate), hasn’t been tested to see how quickly it would decompose in a landfill or marine environment. But based on its composition, Coates says, it should begin to degrade in water after several months, a time period that would exceed the useful life of most single use products. Poly(polypropylene succinate) breaks down into propylene glycol and succinic acid, nontoxic materials that are further reduced to CO2 and water when ingested by microbes.

It’s unlikely that poly(polypropylene succinate) will ever cost less on a pound-for-pound basis than conventional polyethylene, but its unique crystalline structure suggests it could perform better than its petroleum counterpart. If so, bioplastics manufacturers may someday be able to compete with today’s plastics industry by making things like milk jugs with significantly less material than petroleum-based plastics.

Uphill Battle

Short of sweeping government regulations that place a price on carbon or require all plastics to biodegrade, bioplastics will have to find ways to outcompete conventional plastics if they are ever going to fill more than niche applications.

It’s an uphill battle — but one that another once-niche product, the solar panel, is increasingly winning. In 2007 solar power made up less than 0.1 percent of U.S. electricity generation. Thanks to ingenuity and innovation, the price of photovoltaic modules has dropped from $4 per watt to $0.50 per watt, making solar the fastest growing source of electricity in the country.

Might those working on bioplastics see a similar sea change? Ultimately, a lot will likely ride not only on how well their products break down, but on how much they can break down conventional plastic’s competitive edge.

See also: www.FrackCheckWV.net

Texas Refinery Photo

Petrochemical Industry Continues Expansion in Texas

Article by Rebecca Maitland, Houston Chronicle, September 13, 2013

As the energy industry reviews the rest of 2013 and into 2014, the consensus is growth and continual expansion, with the shale plays remaining the focus upstream, and midstream and downstream are slated to expand as well, due to the worldwide demand for energy. According to Tim Cutt, president, Petroleum & Potash, BHP Billiton, the energy industry will continue to grow, not only into 2014, but beyond.

“We always look at the long term, and we see a continued robust demand for the commodities we produce, including oil and gas, which we fully expect to remain strong globally. In the decades ahead, China and much of Asia, as well as Africa and Latin America will buy more consumer goods, and use more energy, as world population grows and nations industrialize,” Cutt said.

Right now, BHP Billiton sees shale as its growth engine as it builds upon its experience. “We are developing a manufacturing-like process that will boost drilling and completion performance, reduce costs, and accelerate the time from the spudding of the well to the sale of the product,” Cutt said.

Upstream will continue to grow, especially with LNG export terminals under construction or awaiting approval. But the midstream and downstream sectors will naturally grow along with it.

Phillips 66, a downstream energy company with leading businesses in midstream, chemicals, refining, and marketing and specialties, is embracing the U.S. energy renaissance – created through the rise in oil and gas production in North America, and is playing a key role in helping to revitalize the American manufacturing sector.

“We are making investments to increase the amount of lower-cost feedstocks reaching our refineries and chemical plants, much of it coming from here in the U.S. We also are making investments to build pipelines, terminals and rail loading and offloading facilities, as well as to expand chemicals processing capacity through our 50/50 joint venture, Chevron Phillips Chemical Company,” said Alissa K. Hicks, spokesperson, Phillips 66, Houston.

In midstream, Phillips 66 is pursuing development of a 100,000-barrel-per-day natural gas liquids fractionator adjacent to its Sweeny Refinery in Old Ocean. The project will help boost the local economy with more than 25 full-time jobs and hundreds of temporary construction jobs. If approved, construction is expected to begin in the first half of 2014 with startup expected by the second half of 2015.

“Phillips 66 is also evaluating a project to construct an LPG export terminal at the site of our existing Freeport Terminal. The project will potentially develop multiple parcels of land in Freeport and would create an estimated two dozen full-time jobs and hundreds of construction jobs. If approved, construction on the terminal is expected to begin in late 2014 with completion expected in mid to late 2016,” Hicks said.

In chemicals, CPChem plans to construct a world-scale ethane cracker at its Cedar Bayou plant in Baytown, and two polyethylene units in Old Ocean, near the Sweeny Facility. In total, the USGC Petrochemicals Project is expected to create approximately 400 long-term direct jobs and 10,000 engineering and construction jobs.

The entire project is estimated to cost approximately $6 billion. CPChem plans to seek final investment approval later in 2013. Pending final approval by CPChem’s board of directors, the company expects the project to be completed in 2017.

BHPB also has a number of openings throughout its operations. “We have many important positions open across the board, but experienced drilling and completion professionals are particularly challenging to attract in today’s highly competitive environment,” Cutt said.

For more information, visit www.bhpbilliton.com and www.phillips66.com.