Construction phase of Shell Cracker Plant in Monaca, PA, October 2019

Spokespersons for both PTT Global Chemical America and JobsOhio said this week the company remains committed to building the multi-billion dollar project in southeast Ohio’s Belmont County as PTTGCA continues searching for an investment partner.

The $20 million was paid to Bechtel Corp. in 2019 to complete site engineering and site preparation for a plant that would convert ethane – a byproduct of natural gas drilling from the Utica and Marcellus shale fields – into different types of polyethylene, raw materials for products that range from plastic bottles to vehicle parts.

The project has been optimistically viewed as a potential economic development boost for an Appalachian region still struggling from the loss of manufacturing jobs decades ago. The plant, its backers say, would create thousands of construction jobs and hundreds of permanent positions and spawn a manufacturing renaissance along the Ohio River.

A similar $6 billion petrochemical plant built by Shell Chemical Appalachia LLC 30 miles (50 kilometers) northwest of Pittsburgh is scheduled to begin operations this year. Shell announced its final investment decision in 2016. News that PTTGC would partner with a Japanese company to build a petrochemical plant in Belmont County first surfaced in 2015, spurring talk of a regional petrochemical hub to take advantage of abundant supplies of ethane.

In an interview with The Associated Press this week, Ohio Lt. Gov. Jon Husted expressed skepticism about whether the Ohio plant would be built. “They can’t find a partner because of market conditions,” Husted said. “They’re the ones who made the promise on what they’re going to do, and it’s up to them.”

Husted said the site, which is owned by PTTCGA, would be attractive to other developers. “There’s a lot of options for other end users,” Husted said. “The last thing I’m going to do is create a false hope. People in Appalachia have been promised a lot of things that businesses never delivered.”

PTTGCA spokesperson Dan Williamson said the company has invested $300 million in the project thus far and that company officials are committed to building the plant. He said there is no deadline for a decision on building it. “If the company wasn’t still hopeful of this happening, they would not continue to invest in it,” Williamson said.

JobsOhio spokesperson Matt Englehart blamed the coronavirus pandemic for the delay in an investment decision that resulted in PTTGCA paying back the $20 million. A U.S. subsidiary of South Korea’s Daelim Industrial Co. withdrew as PTTGCA’s partner in July 2020.

JobsOhio, which is funded with profits from Ohio liquor sales, has provided an additional $50 million in grants and loans for developing the site where a FirstEnergy Corp. coal-burning power plant once stood.

“PTTGCA remains committed to the project, and JobsOhio and its partners continue to work closely with PTTGCA to bring the project to a positive final investment decision,” Englehart said in a statement, adding that PTTGCA is “actively pursuing investors.”

PTTGCA is “in the process” of resubmitting its expired air permit to the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, Williamson said. The permit will reflect PTT Global Chemical’s commitment to reducing global emissions 20% by 2030 and net zero emissions by 2050, he added.

The Ohio EPA recently renewed the company’s wastewater discharge permit.

Working in the company’s favor is that prices for polyethylene and other raw plastics have rebounded since a steep drop in 2020. Analysts say global demand for plastic products will continue to rise this decade.

See the FracTraker Alliance for extensive coverage

From an Article by Nick Cunningham, DeSmog Blog, February 11, 2021

The fracking boom has received broad support from politicians across the aisle in Appalachia due to dreams of enormous job creation, but a report released on February 10 from Pennsylvania-based economic and sustainability think tank, the Ohio River Valley Institute (ORVI), sheds new light on the reality of this hype.

The report looked at how 22 counties across West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Ohio — accounting for 90 percent of the region’s natural gas production — fared during the fracking boom. It found that counties that saw the most drilling ended up with weaker job growth and declining populations compared to other parts of Appalachia and the nation as a whole.

Shale gas production from Appalachia exploded from minimal levels a little over a decade ago, to more than 32 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d) in 2019, or roughly 40 percent of the nation’s total output. During this time, between 2008 and 2019, GDP across these 22 counties grew three times faster than that of the nation as a whole. However, based on a variety of metrics for actual economic prosperity — such as job growth, population growth, and the region’s share of national income — the region fell further behind than the rest of the country.

Between 2008 and 2019, the number of jobs across the U.S. expanded by 10 percent, according to the ORVI report, but in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia, job growth only grew by 4 percent. More glaringly, the 22 gas-producing counties in those three states — ground-zero for the drilling boom — only experienced 1.7 percent job growth.

“What’s really disturbing is that these disappointing results came about at a time when the region’s natural gas industry was operating at full capacity. So it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which the results would be better,” said Sean O’Leary, the report’s author.

The report cited Belmont County, Ohio, as a particularly shocking case. Belmont County has received more than a third of all natural gas investment in the state, and accounts for more than a third of the state’s gas production. The industry also accounts for about 60 percent of the county’s economy. Because of the boom, the county’s GDP grew five times faster than the national rate. And yet, the county saw a 7 percent decline in jobs and a 2 percent decline in population over the past decade.

“This report documents that many Marcellus and Utica region fracking gas counties typically have lost both population and jobs from 2008 to 2019,” said John Hanger, former Pennsylvania secretary of Environmental Protection, commenting on the report. “This report explodes in a fireball of numbers the claims that the gas industry would bring prosperity to Pennsylvania, Ohio, or West Virginia. These are stubborn facts that indicate gas drilling has done the opposite in most of the top drilling counties.”

A Boom Without Job Growth

This lack of job growth was not what the industry promised. A 2010 study from the American Petroleum Institute predicted that Pennsylvania would see more than 211,000 jobs created by 2020 due to the fracking boom, while West Virginia would see an additional 43,000 jobs. Studies like these were widely cited by politicians as proof that the fracking boom was an economic imperative and must be supported.

But the Ohio River Valley Institute report reveals the disconnect between a drilling boom and rising GDP on the one hand, and worse local employment outcomes on the other. There are likely many reasons for this disconnect related to the long list of negative externalities associated with fracking: The boom-and-bust nature of extractive industries creates risks for other business sectors, such as extreme economic volatility, deterring new businesses or expansions of existing ones; meanwhile air, water, and noise pollution negatively impact the health and environment of residents living nearby.

“There can be no mistake that the closer people live to shale gas development, the higher their risk for poor health outcomes,” Alison Steele, Executive Director of the Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project, told DeSmog. “More than two dozen peer-reviewed epidemiological studies show a correlation between living near shale gas development and a host of health issues, such as worsening asthmas, heart failure hospitalizations, premature births, and babies born with low birth weights and birth defects.”

Moreover, oil and gas drilling is capital-intensive, not job-intensive. As the example of Belmont County shows, only about 12 percent of income generated by the gas industry can be attributable to wages and employment, while in other sectors, on average, more than half of income goes to workers.

In other words, it costs a lot of money to drill, but it doesn’t employ a lot of people, and much of the income is siphoned off to shareholders. To top it off, equipment and people are imported from outside the region — many of the jobs created went to workers brought in from places such as Texas and Oklahoma.

Despite the huge increase in shale gas production over the past decade, the vast majority of the 22 counties experiencing the drilling boom also experienced “economic stagnation or outright decline and depopulation,” the report said.

“[W]e could see long ago that the job numbers published and pushed out by the industry years ago were based in bluster, not our economic realities,” Veronica Coptis, Executive Director of Coalfield Justice, a non-profit based in southwest Pennsylvania, told DeSmog, commenting on the report. “At industry’s behest and encouragement, Pennsylvania promoted shale gas development aggressively in rural areas for more than a decade. And yet, the southwestern counties at the epicenter of fracking do not show any obvious improvement in well-being.”

Petrochemicals Also a False Hope

After natural gas prices fell sharply amid a glut of supply beginning in 2012, the number of wells drilled began to slow. Industry proponents then pinned their hopes on a new future: plastics. Petrochemical facilities would process low-cost natural gas into the building blocks of plastic and spur a virtuous cycle of new manufacturing while prolonging the drilling boom.

But the petrochemical promise has mostly been a mirage. Most of the proposed ethane crackers have been cancelled or delayed. Only one has moved forward: Shell’s ethane cracker in Beaver County, Pennsylvania, which was lured to the state with a $1.6 billion tax credit, the largest tax break in Pennsylvania history.

Even in Beaver County, job growth has been anemic: the county saw employment actually contract by 0.5 percent between 2008 and 2019, despite breaking ground on Appalachia’s flagship petrochemical facility, according to ORVI. In reality, the Shell cracker will employ several thousand people temporarily during construction, but only employ 600 people permanently when it comes online.

The market for petrochemicals has soured dramatically since Shell gave the greenlight on the project several years ago, raising doubts about future growth. And yet, in 2020, the Pennsylvania legislature passed another $667 million tax credit intended to lure in more petrochemical facilities to the state. Democratic Governor Tom Wolf supported it.

As the ORVI report concluded: “[P]olicymakers should look very critically at proposals to expand or otherwise assist the natural gas industry, which has yet to demonstrate that it is capable of contributing positively locally or on a large scale to the states and counties where it is most prevalent.”

Stored Underground NGL Fire and Explosion Hazards for Two Counties in OH and Marshall County in WV

From the Concerned Ohio River Residents, January 25, 2021

The Ohio Department of Natural Resources is currently considering a permit application to construct the Mountaineer natural gas liquids (NGL) storage facility 2.5 miles from Clarington, OH, along Ohio Route 7 in Salem Township. The facility would store up to 3.25 million barrels of highly flammable, explosive natural gas liquids (NGLs) in underground caverns near dozens of frack wells and adjacent to the Ohio River, posing a significant threat to our region’s public health and natural resources.

Last Thursday, CORR and a coalition of advocacy groups hosted a community meeting on the the Mountaineer facility. We outlined the specific threats posed by the facility’s construction, including groundwater contamination, air pollution, subsidence, and an increase in fracking and fracking waste. Other underground storage facilities have seen serious and even deadly incidents caused by inadequate regulation, including fires, explosions, chemical leaks, earthquakes, and sinkholes.

How can we be sure a similar disaster wouldn’t happen to Mountaineer? Get the facts they won’t tell us:

Click here to view a recording of our Mountaineer Community Meeting.

Concerned about the Mountaineer NGL Storage Facility? You can help make a difference. Submit a public comment to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources today. You can use our draft template to quickly submit a blanket list of comments to ODNR, but we encourage you to add a few sentences about any specific concerns you may have about the facility. Unique comments carry more weight in the permit evaluation process. How would storing explosive natural gas liquids near the Ohio River affect you and your family?

Click here for more information on how to submit public comment.

Get the Facts on the Mountaineer NGL Storage Facility:

Powhatan Salt Company LLC has applied through the Ohio Department of Natural Resources for three solution mining well permits to begin creating storage caverns in the Salina salt formation, just 2.5 miles north of Clarington, OH along the Ohio River in Monroe County, so that its sister company, Mountaineer NGL Storage LLC can store natural gas liquids (NGL) next to and potentially beneath the Ohio River.

The Mountaineer NGL storage facility would store natural gas liquids like ethane, propane, and butanes extracted from fracking, supporting the industry proliferation and increasing the massive amount of toxic, radioactive waste it generates. To create these storage caverns, Powhatan Salt Company would inject millions of gallons of fresh water underground at high pressures to carve out salt cavities. Powhatan would withdraw approximately 1,928,000 gallons of fresh water each day from the Ohio River to carve out the first storage cavern. More caverns could be constructed to increase storage capacity, each of which would require approximately 380,200,000 gallons of freshwater.

We believe the existing application materials for these wells do not contain enough information for anyone to evaluate the safety of these operations. The applications do not fully consider the possibility of contaminants migrating to underground sources of drinking water, and they include no real emergency response plan. How will we find out if the caverns leak? What will we do if they leak? Without a doubt, local residents will be the ones to suffer the consequences.

Take action today. Click here to submit your concerns to ODNR.

Contact Us:

CORR’s website: www.concernedohioriverresidents.org

Email: general@concernedohioriverresidents.org

§ Concerned Ohio River Residents P.O. Box 135 Bridgeport, OH 43912

Guernsey Power Station construction site on 10/15/20. Young’s home and racetrack on left across railroad tracks.

From an Article by Julie Grant, Allegheny Front, December 11, 2020

Kevin and Marlene Young built their house in the country, so they had space for horses. “I was raised around horses, and that’s my love,” Marlene said. With names like Buckeye Blast and Creekside Pete, their horses aren’t just pets. They built a half mile track to train them as racehorses. “If you see my track, the polls out there are placed 1/8 mile apart, and that’s how you clock a horse to tell how fast you’re going,” Kevin said. Their horses have won tens of thousands of dollars in prize money.

Surrounded mostly by farmland here in Guernsey County, Ohio, 65 miles west of the Pennsylvania border, they have space to grow grass for hay. The Youngs also built their home into something of a tourist business. When a scenic railroad started running on the train tracks along their property, it would stop here. They opened an antique shop, and even hosted weddings in the outdoor setting.

Big trucks drive past the house throughout the day. The farm field next door has become an industrial construction site. The air is often filled with dust — there’s a thick layer of it on their new truck. Some nights, bright construction lights shine through their windows. “I mean, come on man, that’s unbelievable,” Marlene said.

In the summer of 2019, Caithness Energy started building one of the largest natural gas power plants of its kind in the nation. Thanks to fracking, cheap natural gas is replacing coal to generate electricity. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, this site is one of 30 natural gas-fired generators planned in Ohio and Pennsylvania. EIA expects 231 new utility-scale natural gas generators to be built in the U.S. by 2024.

There’s already a pipeline that will run natural gas from the region to this site. Once constructed, the Guernsey Power Station will generate 1,875 megawatts, enough power the company says for 1.5 million homes.

But the Youngs don’t want to live next door to it. Like others who live nearby, they say the construction has caused cracks in their walls. “My dishes shake. My bedroom is on the second floor, and it’s like you put a quarter in one of them beds,” Marlene said. “That’s how it vibrates.”

The land was known to flood, so the company is moving dirt in some spots to raise it 20 feet. But Kevin said when it rains, water now runs off, flooding his property. “This way, I’m taking all the water,” he said. “It’s like a lake.”

In November, Ohio EPA issued two notices of violation to Gemma Power Systems, the company building the plant for Caithness, for problems with erosion and sediment running off the property. But much damage has already been done.

One of their horses got startled by the construction equipment just over the fence, and injured itself. “And she was laid up for a month, and we had to dress this leg every day,” Kevin explained. The Youngs have stopped training their horses, sometimes even putting them on respirators. Marlene falls apart when she talks about her best horse, Creekside Pete.

“I had to sell him to get him out of here,” she sobbed. “I put big boards up so he wouldn’t come out of his stall because of the stuff going on. I sold him so he wouldn’t hurt himself.” Creekside Pete has gone on to win $68,000.

Caithness has bought out three families in this neighborhood for the plant. At this point, the Youngs want a buy out too, but so far they say the company hasn’t approached them.

Even a Buyout Can Be Difficult

One of the homeowners who received a buyout is April Ball. Until recently, she lived down the street from the Youngs. Ball grew up there, and inherited the house on an acre of land after her parents died. She thinks about the green fields and trees around it, and of walking barefoot to fish in the creek.

“It’s just sad. I think about it every day. It never goes away,” Ball said, sitting on the back porch of her new house in the town of Cambridge. “I think about it when I wake up, when I’m at work, after work, in the evening.”

When the gas plant was under consideration, Ball, a housekeeper at a nursing home, wasn’t able to get to a community meeting. She had no idea how much it would impact her life.

The construction company fenced around her house, and put up big trailers along the property line. Once the construction began, her ceiling cracked and water in her toilet started coming up black. “You can’t live like that,” she said.

An attorney for Caithness offered her fair market value for her house. She didn’t have money for her own lawyer, so even though it wasn’t enough to buy another home in the country, she took the deal. “Part of me wanted to leave, but then a part of me just wanted to stay. This is my home,” Ball said. “And how dare these people come here and do this?”

A Billboard for the Region’s Economic Development

But many people in the area see the new natural gas plant as a hope for the region’s future. When Caithness came here in 2016, Norm Blanchard, economic development director for the region, was thrilled by the idea of a $1.6 billion plant. “For us, it was almost like a carnival coming to town,” he said.

The company is spending $25 million to prepare the site, according to Blanchard, and has promised $42 million dollars to the local school system over 32 years.

It promised local workers would help fill a thousand construction jobs. But labor unions claim local people have not been hired, something Caithness denied in an email statement to The Allegheny Front.

Once it’s completed in 2022, the plant is expected to employ 30 high tech workers. Blanchard wishes it was more, but he’s not complaining. As he stood along the I-77 highway, looking at the huge construction site, he said the eight cranes are like a billboard for economic development here.

“Something like this, to be able to locate it here, puts you on the map,” Blanchard said. “We’re hoping that others will ride the coattail. They’ll say, ‘that kind of development is coming to Guernsey County, there’s other things that we can do.’ ”

Few Protections Exist for People in the Path of Development

Like many areas near power plants, the poverty rate here is high. In Byesville, where this plant is being built, the poverty is more than twice the national average.

According to environmental attorney Dave Altman, many communities jump at the money and jobs offered by deep-pocketed energy companies. “Local governments, somewhat understandably, at times will blindly accept promises and really operate in denial of the collateral damage to the people who are left behind,” Altman said.

Kevin and Marlene Young said they haven’t gotten help from local officials. They shouldn’t expect the state government in Ohio to protect them either, according to Altman.

“There are definitely laws, that’s for sure, and the law should be protecting people,” he said. “But I’m not kidding you, the agencies that you think are protecting you in Ohio often see their primary client or customer as the regulated entity.”

US EPA Removing Pollution Protections for Ohioans

On December 20, the Trump administration will eliminate a 1974 rule approved as part of Ohio’s federal air quality plan, officially called the State Implementation Plan or SIP. The rule allows people to take polluters to court to stop environmental nuisances like dust and odors that endanger health and property.

“They would have been able for 40 years to take that evidence [of a nuisance] into court, and now they won’t be able to do that directly anymore,” Altman lamented. “I think that it’s one of the great travesties that people don’t even know happened to them.”

Without the nuisance provision in the SIP, Altman said that people will only be able to sue polluters for damages, something he said is difficult. “They need to recover large damages to give lawyers an incentive to take the case. People want to live their lives, not wait until they have large damage cases.”

In an email statement, Ohio EPA spokesperson Heidi Griesmer said Ohio did not request removal of this rule, but does not oppose it being withdrawn by US EPA. “Many other states across the nation, including all Great Lakes states, had their nuisance rules withdrawn from their SIPs, or never had them in their SIPs in the first place,” she said. “Ohio EPA retains full authority to ensure compliance with the rule and can initiate enforcement action when necessary.”

But that hasn’t proven helpful to people experiencing pollution problems, according to Altman. “Every citizen I know who has used the provision to reduce or stop the pollution tried to get the O[hio] EPA to enforce the rule for years and got nowhere,” he responded.

No Adverse Health Effects Expected

The Guernsey Power Station received air permits from Ohio EPA, and has limits for pollutants like volatile organic compounds, carbon monoxide, and particulate matter. “[C]omputer modeling was completed before permit issuance, and no adverse health or welfare effects are expected,” Griesmer said.

But the Youngs don’t want to wait to find out. Marlene recently started having serious health issues. Kevin wants to protect them both. “I’d just assume get us a little trailer or something, and clear out of this whole state, and not have to deal with any of this,” he said. They’ve recently retained a lawyer.

Braskem petrochemical plant lighted up at night

News Briefs from PetroChem Update, June 4, 2020

1. Thailand’s PTT Global Chemical sets new FID deadline by March 2021

Thailand-based PTT Global Chemical’s Final Investment Decision (FID) on whether to build an ethylene-polyethylene complex in Belmont County, Ohio will be announced by the end of March 2021, PTTGC America said on June 1, 2020.

“While the pandemic has prevented us from moving as quickly as we would like within our previous timeline, our best estimate is for an FID by the end of this year or in the first quarter of next year,” said PTTGC America President and CEO Toasaporn Boonyapipat.

The new date is a postponement of the FID of up to nine months. A report by the Thai embassy in Washington D.C. had estimated in February an FID “by the middle of this year.”

As the mid-2020 date approached and following industry commentary related to an indefinite postponement, a company spokesperson replied in mid-May to an e-mail inquiry saying PTTGCA could not provide at that time any firm timeline for an FID decision.

2. Dow’s Fort Saskatchewan PE expansion timeline unchanged

(Story was updated on June 12 to include a reply from Dow saying project timeline unchanged.)

Dow Canada’s project to incrementally expand capacity at its ethylene facility in Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta through the addition of another furnace remains ongoing, a company official said by email on June 12.

“We have not announced any changes to the project timeline,” a company spokesperson said.

The comment follows a request for an update following reports that the company was likely to delay construction work for an expansion of an existing polyethylene plant in Western Canada due to Covid-19 contagion concerns.

Bob Masterson, CEO of the Chemistry Industry Association of Canada, estimated the project investment at about C$250 million. He had said early in the month in an interview that a potential delay was likely due to safety concerns as bringing contract workers could be a risk to adjacent operations.

The expansion will add 130,000 tonnes of annual polyethylene capacity to current production.

Dow announced the expansion on January 29, 2020 saying at the time that 700 workers were going to participate in the construction. It didn’t provide a cost but estimated completion by end of the first half of 2021. The Canadian Press estimated at the time the investment at C$200 million.

3. Braskem widens net losses in first quarter 2020

Brazil-based Braskem posted on June 3 a net financial result loss of 6.2 billion reais (about $1.2 billion) or more than double compared with a net financial result loss of 2.9 billion reais in the fourth quarter of 2019, as it cited currency depreciation.

The first quarter net financial result loss is several times deeper compared with the Latin America’s biggest petrochemical company net financial result loss of 923 million reais in the first quarter of 2019.

Braskem also said the net loss attributable to shareholders for the first quarter of 2020 was only 3.6 billion reais. This compares with a similar net loss attributable to shareholders of 2.9 billion reais in the previous quarter.

Braskem also said its first quarter 2020 EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) was $294 million, 22% higher than in the fourth quarter of 2019.

The on-quarter EBITDA increase resulted from higher sales volume of resins in the Brazilian market, polypropylene (PP) in the United States and Europe, and polyethylene (PE) in Mexico.

However, total EBITDA decreased on-year by 34% in dollar terms. The decline from the first quarter of 2019 was due to lower spreads in the international market, Braskem said.

EBITDA just for the United States and Europe was $62 million, up 33% from the fourth quarter of 2019 because of “capacity utilization rates normalization in the U.S. and the re-stocking trend in the chain in Europe due to (Covid-19) uncertainties.”

As for Mexico alone, the EBITDA was $79 million or 2% higher than in the fourth quarter of 2019. This represented 21% of the company’s consolidated EBITDA.

“The increase in (Mexico’s) EBITDA is mainly explained by the growth in PE sales volume supported by the higher supply of ethane,” the company said.

Braskem Idesa imported 12,600 tons of ethane from the United States during the first quarter.

This helped to offset in part a reduction in the supply of ethane by Pemex. Braskem said that resin demand in the Brazilian market (PE, PP and PVC) grew 3% compared with the first quarter of 2019, reflecting the recovery in construction, consumer goods, packaging and agriculture.

In relation to the fourth quarter of 2019, demand growth of 7% was due to seasonality, it said.

Braskem also reported an unscheduled shutdown of its Rio Grande do Sul polyethylene integrated unit, which resulted in lower capacity utilization rate of its cracker.

Ethylene production increased at the cracker in Bahia compared with the fourth quarter of 2019, when it underwent maintenance.

#############################

A threat from above: Plastic rains down on US National Parks and Wilderness areas

From an Article by Kate S. Petersen, Environmental Health News, June 9, 2020

New research estimates more than 1,000 tons of microplastic particles, potentially circulating in global atmospheric currents, are deposited at conservation sites each year.

Last August, scientists delivered the chilling news that microplastics suspended in the Earth’s atmosphere were being deposited in remote areas of the Arctic and Europe. Now researchers report similar microplastic accumulation in iconic American protected areas including the Grand Canyon and Joshua Tree.

Publishing their results today in Science, the researchers estimate total yearly plastics deposition over their study area to be the equivalent of 123 to 300 million discarded water bottles.

The study is the first to calculate rates of microplastic pollution from the atmosphere onto American protected areas and adds to a growing body of research suggesting that microplastics are traveling long distances in the atmosphere. Microplastic pollution can harm wildlife health, and the researchers expressed concern about potential impacts to ecosystem stability in fragile and unique protected areas of the U.S.

Janice Brahney, an assistant professor at Utah State University and lead scientist on the new report, made the discovery while analyzing atmospheric dust—particles that get swept up into the atmosphere and then settle out again.

Examining the dust under a microscope, she found something she did not expect. “Scrolling around these samples, I started to see all these colorful pieces,” Brahney told EHN. “Nearly every single sample had plastic in it.”

Pennyroyal Opera House in Fairview (Ohio), area of concern for two injection wells

Please support the Concerned Ohio River Residents (CORR) by taking this action on two proposed injection wells for Belmont County, OH TODAY. With the proposed petrochemical hub in Appalachia, we believe more and more injection wells are being planned to prepare for the waste that would be generated to feed the build-out. We also believe that by stopping the cracker plant, there will be less of a need for injection wells. Read on to see how you can help CORR today.

Tri-State Environmental SWIW LLC is applying for two injection well permits at a single location in section #2 of Kirkwood Township on Dickinson Cattle Co. land near Barnesville, Ohio. The permit application states that the average injection at this site would be 8,000 barrels a day of oil and gas waste.

We have the opportunity to submit comments in opposition to this dangerous facility through March 14th. We urge folks to do so and to try to recruit others to take action as well. We would suggest also sending your letters of opposition to the company. Calling Ohio Dept. Of Natural Resources (ODNR) to voice your concerns, as well as submitting written comments, is encouraged.

***Please request for a public hearing in your letter or if you call. If there are enough requests, the ODNR may hold a hearing on the injection wells.***

Injection wells not only threaten our water supplies, they can also be a significant source of air pollution. Below is a link to Earthworks FLIR images of the Silcor injection well in Cambridge, Ohio that shows evidence of significant air pollution. If these injection wells are permitted, brine truck traffic will increase drastically in and around Barnesville, Fairview and surrounding areas. Injection wells have also been proven to cause earthquakes.

Efforts to stop these injection wells are encouraged and greatly appreciated. We must remain resistant and persistent to all that threatens us and our children’s future.

Thank you, Concerned Ohio River Residents
(740) 738-3024

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Send written comments postmarked by March 14th to:

Ohio Department of Natural resources, Resources Management
2045 Morse Road, Building F-2, Columbus, Ohio 43229-6693
(614) 265-6922

And to the company at:

Tri-State Environmental SWIW LLC
40200 Cadiz Piedmont Road, Cadiz, Ohio 43907

FLIR images of Hillstone Silcor Injection Well: https://youtu.be/_sKZoQTcPio

############################

See also: Company seeking permits for two injection wells in Kirkwood Township, Shelley Hanson, Martins Ferry Times Leader, March 1, 2020

FAIRVIEW — Tri-State Environmental of Cadiz has applied for permits to install two different brine injection wells off Fairview Road in Kirkwood Township, Belmont County. Fairview is home to the Pennyroyal Opera House.

According to a public notice, Tri-State has applied for permits with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources to drill two wells to inject brine water associated with the production of oil and natural gas. The first well would be called Tri-State #1, in Section 31, Kirkwood Township.

“The proposed well will inject into the Ohio Shale at a depth of 4,600 to 4,800 feet. The average injection is estimated to be 4,000 barrels per day,” according to the notice. “The maximum injection pressure is estimated to be 1,060 psi.”

The second well would be called Tri-State #2, in Section 25, Kirkwood Township. “The proposed well will inject into the Bass Islands through Salina Group at a depth of 5,200 to 5,500 feet,” the notice states.

The No. 2 well also would receive an estimated 4,000 barrels of brine per day. This would equate to about 168,000 gallons per day.

For more information, contact ODNR at 614-265-6922. Comments and objections must be received by ODNR no later than 15 days after Feb. 28 via mail to:

Ohio DNR Division of Oil & Gas Resources Management, 2045 Morse Road, Building F-2, Columbus, OH 43229. Comments can also be emailed to: oilandgas@dnr.state.oh.us.

www.nocrackerplantov.com

From an Article by Scott McCloskey, Staff Writer, Wheeling Intelligencer, January 19, 2020

MOUNDSVILLE — For some of the nearly 50 people who turned out to view a documentary film screening, the film not only provided a new perspective about how widespread the plastic waste problem is worldwide — but it also validated their concerns about the proposed PTT Global Chemical America plant for Belmont County.

The Ohio Valley citizens group, Concerned Ohio River Residents, made the educational documentary prerelease screening of “The Story of Plastic” available Saturday afternoon at the Grave Creek Mound Historical Site theater in Moundsville. The group invited dozens of invited local “decision makers” and politicians in an effort to showcase the global plastic pollution crisis that the world now faces, according to Bev Reed, an organizer of the group.

She said while the 90-minute film still has still not been released to the public by its creator, Deia Schlosberg, she is hopeful the film will be made available to the public as soon as possible. Reed said the film is “very eye opening,” and that the group members feel very fortunate to have access to an early viewing.

“The Story of Plastic” focuses on exposing the truth behind the plastic pollution crisis, according to its creators. In the film, footage shot over three continents illustrates the ongoing catastrophe: fields full of garbage, heaps of trash; rivers and seas clogged with waste; and skies choked with the runoff from plastic production and recycling processes.

The film shows interviews with experts and activists, and scenes which reveal the impact of the flood of plastic on ecosystems and communities around the world, and the global movement rising up in response.

Reed said the film was meant to highlight the risks such industry would pose to the region, if the proposed Dilles Bottom ethane cracker plant would come to fruition.

“It shows shots from around the world of communities that are drowning in plastic … and shows why we need to be alarmed,” Reed said. “This cracker plant would create about 3 billion pounds of plastic feed stock pellets per year — much of what would be used for single use plastics. It’s impacting our human health. It’s impacting animal health.

“By 2050 plastic will outweigh fish in the world’s oceans so it’s very worrisome,” she added.

Reed said another issue is the proposed cracker plant would be built by companies from overseas and the profits would not stay here. “The whole reason (companies) want to build this is to use our gas, that we have here in the shale, and to create this plastic — all for their profit,” she said.

A panel discussion was held in the theater following the film. Dr. Randi Pokladnik, a local retired environmental scientist/research chemist spoke about the impacts that plastic — especially single-use plastics — and petrochemicals have on health, and the cracker plant’s potential impact on the Ohio River. Upon her introduction to the crowd, Pokladnik quickly noted how disappointing it was not to have one local politician in attendance.

“Why don’t the local politicians show up and watch this? What are they afraid of — that they might learn something that is disturbing,” Pokladnik said. “If you go into the grocery store today, it’s hard to shop without finding everything you pick up is encased in plastic. When I was little, I remember a lot of things came in glass and there wasn’t any plastic. You used butcher paper for meats and things like that. I think we have to, … as a population, rethink the way we look at our lifestyles because so much of this is unnecessary. … If you look at it, at the end of the day there’s a choice we have to make — do we have this ‘throwaway’ lifestyle that we think we can manage sustainably or do we live on a liveable planet.”

Also as part of the panel discussion, which the group live-streamed via Facebook, Beaver County, Pennsylvania resident Terri Baumgardner discussed what it’s like living near the Shell cracker plant and a panelist from Texas who lives near petrochemical facility participated via video conferencing.

Shadyside Resident Susan Brown, who is a Concerned Ohio River Residents member, said she learned a lot from watching the film. She said she’s trying to learn more about the health issues that cracker plant could possibly create if it would indeed be built in Belmont County.

“It was educational in a lot of aspects — in realizing how global the issues are … and what we should be doing,” said Brown, who is also a former resident of Dilles Bottom. “For me it’s the justice of it. … I’m just trying to be involved and make other people aware of it,” she added.

She said the companies using all of these throwaway plastics need to be held accountable for their actions. Brown said she feels gas companies should not be able to just come into an area and do what they want and produce what they want to produce.

Organic farmer Mick Luber, who said he lives “in the middle of all that fracking out there” in Cadiz, said he thought the film was very good. “It was in-depth, and from every perspective from around the world,” he said. Luber said it show just how much companies need to be held more responsible for all of the plastic packaging going on around the world.

While no final investment decision has been made in the proposed PTT Global Chemical America plant to be located in the Dilles Bottom area of Belmont County, the plant, if constructed, would use byproducts from fracked natural gas to make polyethylene, a component of plastic. Ethane is one of the natural gas liquids found in abundance in the local natural “wet” gas stream, particularly in the Utica and Marcellus shales. The Bechtel Corporation confirmed last June that it had been selected to oversee construction of the multi-billion dollar facility if a final decision were made to construct it.

Bechtel currently is overseeing construction of Royal Dutch Shell’s cracker plant in Monaca, Pennsylvania. The proposed PTT Global Chemical America plant at Dilles Bottom, just south of Shadyside along the Ohio River, would be of similar size and scale to the Shell plant. PTT, based in Thailand, has been studying and assessing the local market since at least late 2015, when it announced it would tap into the region’s large concentration of wet gas from Marcellus and Utica shale drilling and build an ethane cracker plant at the former FirstEnergy R.E. Burger power plant site.

See also: www.nocrackerplantov.com

Natural gas liquids (NGL) projects and plans in the Marcellus - Utica region

From an Update of Kallanish Energy News, March 22, 2019

NORTH CANTON, Ohio — Ohio-based Marathon Petroleum is exploring the possibility of an underground liquids storage facility in eastern Ohio’s Utica Shale, Kallanish Energy reports.

The company is looking at utilizing underground salt caverns for ethane, butane and propane storage, said Jason Stechschulte, commercial development manager for Marathon Pipe Line LLC. The site would be near the company’s Hopedale fractionation facility in Harrison County.

Core samplings in 2018 looks promising

The company last year conducted core sampling and the site has potential, he said Thursday at the day-long Utica Midstream conference sponsored by the Canton Regional Chamber of Commerce and Shale Directories. The event drew roughly 130 people to Walsh University in North Canton.

Marathon is talking with potential customers, but there are no firm plans, price estimates or timetables, Stechschulte said. Any timetable would be driven by customer interest and permitting, he said. He described the plan as a “multi-year project.” No applications have been filed for the project, except for the coring work done in 2018.

What the company is envisioning is a storage facility that would provide a solution for the entre industry in the Appalachian Basin, he said. Natural gas liquids would be stored under pressure with the ethane, butane and propane all being segregated in different salt caverns, he said.

The facility would be close to numerous pipelines in the area where Ohio, West Virginia and western Pennsylvania come together. Storage is needed as Shell Appalachia continues to build its ethane cracker plant at Monaca, Pennsylvania, northwest of Pittsburgh.

Waiting on PTT Cracker in the Ohio River valley —-

PTT Global Chemical is still looking at building a similar cracker at Dilles Bottom in Ohio’s Belmont County. A final investment decision has been expected for some time.

A private company, Colorado-based Mountaineer NGL Storage, hopes to develop a storage facility in salt caverns at Clarington in Ohio’s Monroe County. It would be designed to handle up to 3.5 million barrels of natural gas liquids. Natural gas liquids are also flowing via pipelines to eastern Pennsylvania for export.

Rio Pipeline work wrapping up —-

In other news, Marathon Pipeline is completing the finishing touches to expanding its Rio Pipeline to move Utica Shale liquids from Lima, Ohio, to Robinson, Illinois. That required adding three pumping stations on the 250-mile, eight-inch line.

Stechschulte told the audience the pipeline will move roughly 55,000 barrels per day, starting within the next 10 days. The company is also working to move Utica normal butane and isobutane to refineries and storage in the Midwest, a project that will be completed by mid-2020. The two projects together will cost Marathon about $150 million, he said.

The company is also looking at a possible arrangement to move Utica liquids from Cadiz and Scio in eastern Ohio, to Bells Run on the Ohio River for river transport, he said. That might be an arranged in cooperation with EnLink Midstream.

========================================

See also: New Warnings on Plastic’s Health Risks as Fracking Industry Promotes New ‘Plastics Belt’ Build-Out, Resilience & DeSmog Blog, March 5, 2019

Explosion sent flames 200 feet high seen for 15 miles

From an Article by Scott DiSavino, Reuters News Service, January 23, 2019

(Reuters) – U.S. natural gas output in the Marcellus and Utica shale in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia dropped by 7 percent on Wednesday, following an explosion on Enbridge Inc’s Texas Eastern (TETCO) pipeline on Monday.

The blast, which injured two people who lived nearby and damaged three homes, occurred on TETCO’s 30-inch (76.2 cm) line about two miles south of Summerfield in Noble County in southeast Ohio at around 10:40 a.m. EST, the Calgary-based company said in a statement.

Before the incident, drillers were producing about 30 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) of gas in the Marcellus and Utica region. That dropped to just 28 bcfd on Wednesday, according to Refinitiv, a financial data provider.

One billion cubic feet is enough gas for about 5 million U.S. homes for a day.

At the time of the blast, gas was flowing through TETCO from the Marcellus and Utica shale fields south toward the Gulf of Mexico, according to gas traders.

The amount of gas moving through TETCO south of the damaged pipe in Athens and Scioto Counties in southern Ohio dropped from around 1.2 bcfd on Monday to less than 0.1 bcfd on Wednesday, according to Refinitiv data.

In Bath, Monroe and Boyle Counties in Kentucky, flows also fell from over 1.0 bcfd on Monday to about 0.1 bcfd Wednesday.

In Pennsylvania, meanwhile, flows in Greene County in the southwest corner of the state reversed direction from 0.6 bcfd moving West on Monday to 0.4 bcfd heading east on Wednesday. Greene County is one of Pennsylvania’s biggest gas producing counties.

Officials at Enbridge could not say when the damaged section of pipe would return to service. The Calgary-based company said it was working with the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio and the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) to identify the cause, monitor repairs and evaluate environmental impacts.

Enbridge said the damaged section of pipe was built in 1952-53 (65 years) and an inspection of the line was performed in 2012 (6 years) with no remediation needed.

The 9,029-mile (14,531-km) TETCO pipeline was designed to carry gas from the U.S. Gulf Coast and Texas to high-demand markets in the mid-Atlantic and Northeast. It became bi-directional over the past five years, enabling it to also carry gas from the Marcellus and Utica shale, where production is growing rapidly, to markets in the U.S. Midwest and Gulf Coast.

##########################

NOTE: We believe that 65 years is an excessive lifetime for a buried metal pipeline operating at high thru-put and high pressure. Further, safety inspections should take place every year for old pipelines, not to five or six or more years. Water lines are relatively safe but natural gas and LPG pipelines are explosive with fires resulting. DGN

Rover Pipeline sediment pollutes adjoining land area

From an Article by Joe Napsha, Pittsburgh Tribune Review, November 13, 2018

A natural gas drilling company was fined $294,000 by the state for polluting the Monongahela River last year with about 4 million gallons of mine water when it punctured an abandoned mine as it was boring underneath Route 136 in Forward Township to install a pipe to carry fresh water for a drilling site.

The Department of Environmental Protection in Pittsburgh said Tuesday EQT Production Co. in Cecil paid the fine as part of a consent order and agreement covering violations of the Clean Streams Law in Allegheny County.

According to the DEP, EQT inadvertently pierced the abandoned Gallatin mine on January 17, 2017 as it was boring a hole underneath Route 136 to install a pipeline from the Monongahela River to its Rostosky drilling site in Forward Township, Allegheny County. It took EQT until Jan. 31 to stop the discharge through the waterline borehole to unnamed tributaries of the Monongahela River and associated wetlands.

EQT was aware when it applied for permits in July 2016 there were several abandoned coal mines in the area, the DEP said. EQT relied on regional mapping that generally described mine pools as “not flooded or unknown” but did not undertake any further investigation. There were seeps of orange water near the area of the waterline borehole.

Since the incident, EQT has constructed a collection and drainage system similar to what was in place when the water was discharged. EQT also agreed to establish a $100,000 fund with the Clean Streams Foundation to provide for the maintenance, operation, and replacement of the system.

In September, Commonweath Court upheld a $1.1 million fine levied against EQT Production’s parent company, EQT Corp. of Pittsburgh, for violating state environmental laws by failing to prevent significant contamination from a fracking water holding pond in Tioga County six years ago.

The state Environmental Hearing Board found that water from the drilling site in Tioga County continued to pollute area groundwater, even after the company emptied the pond.

############################

ROVER natural gas pipeline agrees to pay $430,000 penalty for water pollution violations

From an Article by Kate Mishkin, Charleston Gazette, June 12, 2018

Rover Pipeline LLC has agreed to pay the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection $430,000 for water pollution violations in the state, according to a consent order made public Tuesday.

The natural gas pipeline project and the WV-DEP made the deal May 15, documents show, but the public comment period for the consent order ends July 13.

The agreement is in response to notices of violation and cease-and-desist orders issued to Rover Pipeline dating back to April 2017, said Jake Glance, spokesman for the DEP. In all, the pipeline has received 18 notices of violation and two cease-and-desist orders, the most recent of which was issued on March 5, when the regulators said crews left trash and construction partially buried on site and failed to clean the roads around the construction site.

The DEP also issued a cease-and-desist order in July 2017 for similar violations.

Rover is just one of the major pipelines being built to tap into the region’s natural gas boom. Last month, the Mountain Valley Pipeline, another pipeline project, also received a violation notice from the DEP for violating water quality standards — problems environmental and citizen groups warned might happen.

“What Rover shows us is that pipelines do have water quality impacts and when you layer the steep terrain and the complex hydrology … you’re getting into uncharted territory and we fear we’re going to see more problems and possibly even worse than we see with Rover,” Rosser said. “We hope it’s not in repeated nature we’ve seen with Rover.”

The $430,000 agreed-upon penalty is substantial, but it’s a small sliver of the project’s $4 billion budget, she said. Plus, the DEP spends money to monitor the pipelines and inspect construction sites.

“So $430,000, I would suppose a great deal of that went to cover DEP’s ability to provide the oversight. And then you’ve got a hundred sites where the streams have been polluted, and how can you put a dollar figure on that?” Rosser said. “The chemistry of the streams has been changed and can’t be reversed to how they were.”

Construction on the pipeline was “essentially complete,” and the company is working with the WV-DEP to finalize the settlement, a spokeswoman for the company said. The consent order references violations dating back to April 2017, including failing to control erosion and keeping sediment water from leaving construction sites.

“The good news that I see is that [the] DEP was on top of it, that they did a good job documenting multiple violations and it shows the importance of oversight of these projects because this company did not appear to be acting in good faith,” said Angie Rosser, executive director of the West Virginia Rivers Coalition.

Energy Transfer Partners, Rover Pipeline’s owner, also owns the Dakota Access Pipeline — the subject of protests and heightened attention over its being built in North Dakota.

The 713-mile-long Rover Pipeline will move natural gas from processing plants in West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Crews are building the pipeline in Doddridge, Tyler and Wetzel counties in West Virginia.

Rover is just one of the major pipelines being built to tap into the region’s natural gas boom. Last month, the Mountain Valley Pipeline, another pipeline project, also received a violation notice from the DEP for violating water quality standards — problems environmental and citizen groups warned might happen.

“What Rover shows us is that pipelines do have water quality impacts and when you layer the steep terrain and the complex hydrology … you’re getting into uncharted territory and we fear we’re going to see more problems and possibly even worse than we see with Rover,” Rosser said. “We hope it’s not in repeated nature we’ve seen with Rover.”

The $430,000 agreed-upon penalty is substantial, but it’s a small sliver of the project’s $4 billion budget, she said. Plus, the DEP spends money to monitor the pipelines and inspect construction sites.

“So $430,000, I would suppose a great deal of that went to cover DEP’s ability to provide the oversight. And then you’ve got a hundred sites where the streams have been polluted, and how can you put a dollar figure on that?” Rosser said. “The chemistry of the streams has been changed and can’t be reversed to how they were.”

##############################

FERC approves service on two (2) Rover Pipeline laterals

Reported from the Kallanish Energy News Service, November 5, 2018

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has granted Rover Pipeline permission to begin additional service moving natural gas across northern Ohio.

The federal agency last week told the company it could begin service on the Sherwood Lateral, Sherwood Compressor Station, Sherwood Delivery Meter Station, CGT Lateral and CGT Delivery Meter Station in the Appalachian Basin (primarily in West Virginia).

They were the last parts of the Rover pipeline project that needed FERC approval.

############################

Federal agency cites Rover Pipeline for three (3) violations

Reported from the Kallanish Energy News Service, October 31, 2018

Rover Pipeline has been cited for three violations by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

The violations are for improper testing of pipeline welds, failing to comply with specifications or standards on repairing dents to the steel pipe, and failure to build the pipeline to avoid stresses on the pipeline.

The agency said the company committed “probable violations.” The violations could have triggered multi-million-dollar fines, but the federal agency said no fines would be imposed. The company said it is not contesting the violations and has been working with the federal agency to correct the problems. It said it is “in general agreement” with the agency’s proposed compliance order.

The company has spent in excess of $11.5 million in correcting the problems, it reported. Those violations have prevented Rover Pipeline from beginning commercial service on its Sherwood and CGT laterals to move natural gas from the Appalachian Basin, the company acknowledged.

The violations were discovered in PHMSA inspections on January 25, March 19-22, May 8-11 and June 18. The violations were issued by the PHMSA on September 11 and came to light in a recent company filing with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that oversees interstate pipelines.

Rover Pipeline, an Energy Transfer Partners’ subsidiary, on October 25 filed a request with FERC seeking to begin full operations on the Sherwood and CGT laterals prior to November 1. It said the problems with the PHMSA had been corrected.

It said its shippers “have urgently requested Rover to place these facilities in service to allow their stranded natural gas supplies to be transported to Midwest markets.” A similar request was filed last August.

Those two laterals are mechanically complete and the final grading and seeding have been completed, Rover Pipeline wrote. The company said it has also filed plans for additional ground-movement areas outside the construction right-of-way along the Sherwood and CGT laterals.

The Sherwood Lateral runs about 54 miles from eastern Ohio into West Virginia. The CGT line runs roughly six miles from the Sherwood line to an interconnection with a Columbia Gas Transmission line. They are among the last Rover laterals to be approved for commercial service.

The $4.2 billion twin pipelines had encountered trouble with leaks and spills from horizontal directional drilling in Ohio where drilling had been halted for a time because of concern by state agencies. Construction was also halted for a time in West Virginia because of erosion and sediment control problems along pipeline laterals.

The 713-mile pipeline will move up to 3.25 billion cubic feet per day of Utica and Marcellus natural gas to the Gulf Coast, the Midwest and Ontario. Initial service on the pipeline began August 31, 2017.