Steam Cracker Chemical Plants are huge and profitable using cheap ethane, and emit millions of tons of carbon dioxide plus ....

From an Article by Chase Rogers, Corpus Christi Caller Times, March 24, 2022

SAN PATRICIO COUNTY — Years after selecting the Coastal Bend as the site for its new ethylene cracker plant, ExxonMobil and Saudi Basic Industries Corp. held a ribbon-cutting ceremony marking the startup for the new facility. Nearly 300 people attended the Wednesday event, which marked the “successful startup” of the $7 billion Gulf Coast Growth Ventures facility located on a 16-acre plot of land near Gregory in South Texas.

The facility progressively began operations last year, producing materials used in packaging, agricultural film, construction materials and clothing. The operation includes a 1.8 million metric ton per year ethane steam cracker, two polyethylene units capable of producing up to 1.3 million metric tons per year, and a monoethylene glycol unit with a capacity of 1.1 million metric tons per year.

“I can say with 100% confidence that Gulf Coast Growth Ventures is a very, very special facility built in a very, very special place. … We couldn’t have done it without you, the people in this room,” GCGV president and site manager Paul Frisch told the attendees, which included representatives from each of the companies, community leaders and elected officials.

Construction on the facility began in 2019 after the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality granted GCGV permits following a contested case hearing, wherein concerns were raised by environmental groups and local residents.

The construction process of the facility produced an estimated 6,000 construction jobs. Now completed, the manufacturing plant currently employs more than 600 full-timers, Frisch said.

While ExxonMobil and SABIC have partnered for 40 years on petrochemical projects, Gulf Coast Growth Ventures represents their first joint venture in the Americas. Ownership interests in GCGV are evenly divided with 50% to ExxonMobil and 50% to SABIC. ExxonMobil is the site operator, according to a GCGV news release.

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American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) ~ Pittsburgh Local Section Event

“Completing Construction of Shell’s New Ethane Cracker in the Ohio River Valley at Monaca, PA”

DATE & TIME: Wednesday, April 6, 2022 ++ 6:00 to 9:00 pm

Agenda: 6:00 pm – Registration & Networking, 6:30 pm – Buffet Dinner, 7:15 pm – Presentation, 8:00 pm – Q&A

The Hilton Garden Inn was built in 2019 on a bluff overlooking the $6 billion construction site where workers are completing construction of this new facility. The hotel is located about 1/2 mile from the Monaca exit (39) on I-376, about 10 miles north of the Pittsburgh Airport.

Come for a great meal and an indepth discussion about how this large plant was designed and built. It has been reported that this is the largest single construction project ever in Western PA.

For more information about this project, see articles at:

Shell Polymers … State Impact PA … Wikipedia

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Energy attorney Jessica Thompson

From an Article by David Beard, Morgantown Dominion Post, October 25, 2018

PITTSBURGH — F e n c e l i n e monitoring is a way to monitor emissions from well pads and other gas industry sites. It’s been talked about in West Virginia for several years, though the state has done nothing about it. Several experts talked about its potential benefits, its limitations and its apparent inevitability during a panel session at the 2018 Shale Insight C o n f e r e n c e.

Fence line monitoring involves setting up air- and weather-monitoring equipment at the edge of well pads to get a handle on what’s escaping from the site into the surrounding community. WVU Professor Michael McCawley recommended to the Legislature several years ago that it’s a good way to track not only air quality, but noise, dust and light pollution. His recommendation came from a study mandated by the Legislature, but the Legislature never did anything with it.

During the panel discussion, energy attorney Jessica Sharrow Thompson explained what fenceline monitoring is. Across all industries — not just natural gas — the EPA’s Air Toxics Initiative and enforcement efforts are leading to fenceline monitoring to reduce hazardous air p o l l u t a n t s. EPA’s action has picked up since 2016, she said, though there are no current federal or state mandates to do it. “But it’s likely to start coming.”

Four factors are driving that movement, she said: air quality and public health data gaps; what EPA terms “citizen science,” which is encouraging people to collect their own data, unfortunately with low cost sensors and monitors that generate unreliable data; community concerns; and EPA’s air quality enforcement and national compliance initiative. Along with addressing those issues, she said, fenceline monitoring can help provide transparency to the public and allow operators to track their data and refine site emissions estimate. But there are risks, too, she said. Among them, the public and agencies can misunderstand and even misuse the data.

Lisa Bailey, senior toxicologist with environmental consulting firm Gradient Corp., talked about public health and the limitations of fenceline monitoring.

“It’s important to think about exposure and also to think about risk,” she said. It has to be understood, she said, that toxic substance concentrations at the monitor won’t be the same as at the source, or out in the community. Concentrations will decrease moving away from the s o u rc e. Data will be affected by other air sources: industry, cars and so on, she said, along with wind and weather. “That has to be considered when considering health impacts.” Out in the community, it’s hard to distinguish wh at ’s coming from the site from what’s coming from other sources such as industry and vehicles, she said. Monitors should also be installed at point in the community, although that data will be affected by other sources, too.

And evaluating the data and how site emissions might affect public health also poses a challenge, she said, because other factors will play a role — such as exposure to other pollutants, smoking and so on. Christopher Rimkus, managing general counsel for MPLX/MarkWest, shared the real life example of adequate data providing a payoff when a citizen complained about site emissions and EPA stepped in with threats of enforcement. “What we assumed to be true was in fact true,” he said. “Folks were safe.” But that was just one site. “There’s still a lack of trust. We need data to inform the public, to inform our operations, to inform rulemaking.”

Having adequate data and sharing it assures the regulators and the public, he said. “We need to gather it in a way where there’s t r a n s p a r e n c y. ” It has to be available to everyone.

Senator is On The Job

“Time to Wake Up” — Now Over 100 Speeches on the Floor of the US Senate

From an Article by Katie Valentine, Think Progress, May 18, 2015

For climate activists — or really anyone who thinks climate change is a problem — there’s a lot to love about Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse. The two-term Democratic Senator from Rhode Island is a climate change champion in Congress, introducing legislation aimed at slowing the planet’s warming, calling out colleagues who deny the problem exists, and, for nearly the past three years, giving weekly, impassioned speeches on the Senate floor on the need to act on climate change.

On Monday (May 25th), Whitehouse will give his 100th floor speech on climate change. As Agence France-Presse reports, Whitehouse usually gives these speeches to an empty or near-empty room, accompanied by a green sign warning his colleagues that it’s “Time To Wake Up.”

Few of Whitehouse’s colleagues have taken his pleas for action to heart. More than 56 percent of Republicans in the 114th Congress deny or question that climate change exists and is caused by humans, and some members of Congress, such as Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), openly mock the idea that climate change is posing a problem.

So far, this hasn’t deterred Whitehouse, however. “If I look back 20 years from now and I can’t say I did everything possible, I’ll never be able to live with myself,” he told Morning Consult about his weekly speeches.

Whitehouse said he had something specific planned for his 100th speech, which he’s set to give around 6:15 p.m. Monday, but said he was “not going to ruin the surprise.” Until then, here are six of the greatest moments from Whitehouse’s past floor speeches on climate change:

‘They’re Not Gynecologists, Either’

In early 2014, a pattern emerged among some politicians who were asked whether or not they accepted that climate change was happening: instead of answering definitively one way or another, they skirted the question, saying simply “I’m not a scientist.”

Whitehouse lambasted this response in November, noting that the lawmakers who have used the excuse — including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), House speaker John Boehner (R-OH), and Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) — were “not gynecologists, either, but many have no hesitation about trying to regulate that area.”

“Say you’re not a scientist. Isn’t the responsible thing to sound out scientific opinion?” Whitehouse asked on the Senate floor. “Scientific opinion about climate change is now firmly settled. Climate change is caused by the massive carbon pollution we have unleashed.”

‘You Can Believe NASA….Or You Can Believe The Senator With The Snowball’

In Feburary, Sen. Whitehouse hit back against Sen. Inhofe’s speech in which the Republican senator brought a snowball to Senate floor in an attempt to show that, despite NASA and NOAA finding that 2014 was the warmest year on record, it was “unseasonably cold” in D.C.

In his brief speech — which wasn’t technically part of his 99 “It’s Time To Wake Up” speeches on climate but which still addressed climate change — Whitehouse referenced the multitude of groups that acknowledge climate change, including an corporate interests, “every major American scientific society,” the U.S. Navy, and Pope Francis.

He also explained that the polar vortex was responsible for bringing cold air down to D.C. that week — an event that doesn’t disprove the earth’s greater warming trend that is “beyond legitimate dispute” among scientists.

‘The Oceans Are Warning Us And We Still Do Not Listen’

Whitehouse doesn’t just focus on political fights in his speeches, however. As a Senator from Rhode Island, Whitehouse has been particularly keen on spreading the word about climate change and ocean acidification’s impact on the world’s oceans. In one of his latest speeches on ocean acidification and warming, Whitehouse spoke of the oceans’ mass absorption of carbon dioxide and the impact that has on marine life, and on the fishermen that depend on it.

“I’ve had fishermen back home tell me they’re catching fish their fathers and grandfathers never saw come up in their nets,” Whitehouse said.

Warmer temperatures “make oxygen less soluble in water,” Whitehouse said. “Do we tell the fish to hold their breath while we wait to wake up?” Also, “From coast to coast, and pole to pole, the oceans are warning us, and we still do not listen,” he continued.

‘[Mitch McConnell’s] Own State Recognizes Climate Change As A Problem’

In March, Senate Majority Leader McConnell issued a statement warning other states not to comply with the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed rule on carbon pollution from power plants.

But Whitehouse, in an April speech, singled out McConnell’s state of Kentucky for its statements on climate change. Whitehouse said that the state of Kentucky — along with several cities, Kentucky-based scientists, and Kentucky publications — have warned about the impacts climate change will likely have on the state, including increased migration from coastal states.

“Before our distinguished majority leader, the senior senator from Kentucky, asks all other states to throw in the towel on conforming to the U.S. government’s plan for dealing with carbon pollution, I would ask that he acknowledge that his own state recognizes climate change as a problem,” he said.

‘The Clearer The Science Becomes, The Harder The Polluters Fight’

In his 98th “Time To Wake Up” speech on climate chage, Whitehouse compared the tactics of the oil industry in sowing doubt on climate change to those of the tobacco industry, which in the 1950s and 1960s sought to spread doubt that smoking caused cancer. Action on climate change is a “business risk” for the fossil fuel industry, and that risk is similar to the risk felt by the tobacco industry if the public believed cigarettes caused cancer, Whitehouse said.

“The fossil fuel industry is engaged in a massive effort to deny climate science and deceive the American public,” he said. “They’ve been at it for years, and the clearer the science becomes, the harder the polluters fight.”

See also: Senate Floor Charts of Senator Whitehouse

WVU researchers to investigate methane emissions in shale gas development

From the article at The State Journal, Dec 06, 2013

A team of researchers at West Virginia University’s Center for Alternative Fuels, Engines and Emissions will study the amount of methane emitted from dual fuel engines in the development of shale gas.

According to WVU, one of the biggest costs associated with shale gas development and utilization comes from the use of diesel fuel. Diesel engines power everything associated with well development, including the trucks that move equipment to a well site, the drilling rig itself and the compressors used for the hydraulic stimulation of wells.

Several companies are looking into possibly converting those engines to a mix of diesel and natural gas to reduce operating costs while using a domestic fuel source.

The WVU research team will look into the amount of methane emissions associated with dual fuel and dedicated natural gas technologies because of a $2 million grant from the Department of Energy’s National Energy Technology Laboratory.

Andrew Nix, principal investigator and assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, will lead the CAFEE team, which has a history of conducting alternative fuels research, in collecting data from in-use equipment operating in the Marcellus Shale region.

“This collection will help us identify and quantify in-use fugitive methane emissions,” Nix said. “Our next step will be to develop test cycles to conduct additional laboratory testing at CAFEE’s Engines and Emissions Research Laboratory to mitigate fugitive methane.”

WPA: Coal miner family in West Virginia, ca. 1935 by unknown

American philosopher George Santayana wrote “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” in his Reason in Common Sense, The Life of Reason, Vol.1.   As the shale gas industry roars to life in West Virginia, it is perhaps a valuable exercise to review the history related to our major extractive industry, King Coal, and apply the lessons from that experience to this new extractive industry.  We West Virginians are, after all, experienced, and one of my favorite expressions is “Experience is what you get when you don’t get what you want.”

At the public hearing yesterday at the Capitol, advocates for protective laws significantly outnumbered those who spoke in favor of allowing the Marcellus shale gas industry to continue to operate in a regulatory vacuum.   Those opposed to protective laws argued that the industry brings in jobs and economic benefits to the state.

“Last year, our industry paid $200 million in state taxes and created 35,000 high-paying jobs. Marcellus Shale drilling will create 7,000 new jobs and $300 million in salaries,” said Mike McCown, president of the Independent Oil and Gas Association of West Virginia.

Sean O’Leary, from the West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy countered with “Today, 10 counties in the state generate 62 percent of the gas we produce. They have a higher rate of poverty than the other [45] counties.”

O’Leary has a good point.  Let’s harken to the experience we have had with the coal industry and jobs.  It can be noted that many of the unhealthiest counties in the state are also large coal producers.    The top ten coal producing counties have an average household income of $33,198 versus $37,528 for the state of WV and $52,029 for the entire United States.

History shows that the coal industry generated many hidden costs in terms of illness, death, and environmental tolls which have been subsidized, and will continue to be subsidized, by West Virginians and society at large.  A study conducted by the Harvard Medical School announced on February 16, 2011 analyzes and tallies the full cost of coal, following its life cycle from exploration, through transportation, processing, and burning to estimate that coal is costing the U.S. one-third to over one-half a trillion dollars annually.  “The public is unfairly paying for the impacts of coal use,” says Dr. Paul Epstein, the lead author of the report and associate director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School.  “Accounting for these ‘hidden costs’ doubles to triples the price of electricity from coal per kWh, making wind, solar, and other renewable very economically competitive. Policymakers need to evaluate current energy options with these types of impacts in mind. Our reliance on fossil fuels is proving costly for society, negatively impacting our wallets and our quality of life.”

This study echoes one of the conclusions of a January 2010 report issued by Morgantown consulting group Downstream Strategies and authored by Rory McIlmoil and Evan Hansen.  McIlmoil, the lead author of the report entitled The Decline of Central Appalachian Coal and the Need for Economic Diversification, said the industry does provide substantial benefits to the state but simultaneously imposes massive costs that were evident in the fiscal 2009 budget.  “These are costs that, lacking a change in state policy, will be paid by the citizens of West Virginia for decades to come,” he added.  Given all the plusses and minuses, the report said the net cost to the state in fiscal 2009 came to $97.5 million.

Now we have another extractive industry tapping out the valuable natural resources of our state and furthermore, demanding to do so without any regulation or oversight.  The federal Environmental Protection Agency is in the course of preparing a review of the hydraulic fracturing industry which is scheduled for completion and release in 2012.  New York has implemented a moratorium on new hydrofracking permits to allow time to study the impacts.  Pennsylvania has had 1600 hydrofracking violations between Jan. 2008 and August 2010, of which 1000 were  likely to cause environmental damage.   Meanwhile West Virginia led the nation in the number of gas drilling permits by issuing more than 2800 permits between 2002 and 2008 despite the fact that it has an inadequate inspection force (18 inspectors) to oversee the 50,000 wells, vertical and horizontal, already in existence.

The gas isn’t going anywhere until it’s extracted.  Is it prudent to embrace with open arms an industry which is employing relatively new technology without taking the time to fully assess the impacts?  I recently heard the analogy made that coal is one needle stuck in our arm and that we need to be careful that natural gas, also a fossil fuel, doesn’t become a needle in our other arm.  Recent findings show that natural gas isn’t as clean as we originally thought (see FrackCheck, Jan. 12). When the environmental impacts of hydrofracking are fully accounted for and assessed in relation to climate change, will gas still be described as a transition fuel to renewables?  How much will it cost us in health impacts which are inexorably linked to environmental impacts?

Based upon our state history with coal, any new extractive industry should be viewed with a careful eye toward hidden costs. It would be the wise choice for West Virginia to institute a moratorium on new drilling permits until a) the WV Legislature passes regulations aimed at minimizing impacts, b) the WVDEP Office of Oil and Gas is expanded to the capacity needed to adequately do the job of inspection and enforcement, and c) the EPA report is released in 2012.   Otherwise, we are, very likely, condemned to repeat our mistakes.  And gain even more “experience”.

Based upon a new EPA analysis, gas may not be as clean as previously predicted.  The  new analysis doubles its previous estimates for the amount of methane gas that leaks from loose pipe fittings and is vented from gas wells.  When all these emissions are counted, gas may be as little as 25 % cleaner than coal, or perhaps even less.  Based upon previous estimates, gas was believed to be 50% cleaner than coal.  Estimated emissions from horizontal  hydraulic fracturing being used in Marcellus are almost 9,000 times higher than the EPA had previously calculated. There is concern, given that methane is a potent greenhouse gas, that the full impact of reliance on gas as a transition fuel to carbonless energy sources has not been identified and that the benefits of gas have been overstated.

“What if, with revelations around methane emissions, it turns out to be only a 10 or 20 percent reduction of carbon from coal? If that’s true,” he said, “gas is not the panacea” said James Rogers, CEO of Duke Energy.  Rogers worries that a blind jump to gas could leave the country dependent on yet another fossil resource, without stemming the rate of climate change.  Propublica story by Abrahm Lustgarten