Coke from Coal used for Steel from Iron

From an Article by Warren Scott, Wheeling Intelligencer, February 12, 2022

PHOTO in ARTICLE ~ Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. officials announced Friday the Mountain State Carbon coke plant in Follansbee soon will close permanently.

FOLLANSBEE — Citing a shift in the materials used to produce steel, officials with Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. have announced they will be permanently closing the Mountain State Carbon coke plant in the second business quarter. The plant located in Follansbee employs 288.

Pat Persico, spokesperson for the company, said the move was spurred by the firm’s shift to the use of scrap metal hot briquetted iron in making steel, which produces lower carbon dioxide emissions. Last year the company announced plans to reduce emissions by 20% by 2030.

Persico said, “Fortunately, we anticipate that all impacted employees will have job opportunities at our other nearby facilities.” “We have been recruiting at all of our facilities. Depending on where they want to be, we have many opportunities,” she said. Actually, 12 hourly and three salaried employees will remain at the plant for a time to ensure its closing complies with environmental regulations.

Follansbee City Manager Jack McIntosh, who was called for comment, said, “I feel bad for the families who will be affected.” He said though it appears other jobs will be available to them, they will need to move with their families to fill them, and he is sorry to see residents leaving the city. McIntosh said the absence of a major business such as the coke plant also will impact the city’s budget.

While the plant relied on its own wastewater treatment system, it was one of the city’s largest water users, he said. McIntosh added the plant and the various vendors that supplied it also paid a lot of business and occupation tax to the city. “That affects us all,” he said.

The city manager said while he’s working to estimate the loss, he can say, “there will be budget cuts. We definitely will need to make some.” Staff at Mountain State Carbon and various vendors and contractors working there also have delivered thousands of pounds of food as well as monetary donations to the Follansbee R.E.A.C.H. Program, a local food pantry.

The nation’s largest producer of flat rolled steel and iron ore pellets, Cleveland-Cliffs reported record annual revenue of $20.4 billion and record annual net income of $3 billion for 2021. Cleveland-Cliffs acquired the coke plant and other AK Steel owned facilities in 2020. Over the years, the plant has been owned by Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel, R.G. Steel and Severstal North America.

Established in 1917, the plant was a major supplier of steel for the then-emerging auto industry, as well as the military during World War I. Workers at the plant are members of United Steelworkers Local 9545. They had signed a three-year agreement with the plant’s former owner, AK Steel, that is scheduled to expire at the end of April.

Moms Clean Air Force is being heard locally

From an Article by Rick Shrum, Observer-Reporter, Washington, PA, June 29, 2020

Vanessa Lynch and her husband moved back to the Pittsburgh region following his military service. They thought it was a good place to nurture a family. This is no longer Smoky City Pittsburgh, but she has concerns.

“Pennsylvania is now the second-largest producer of natural gas in the nation, and thus is a significant producer of air pollution, including methane. A recent analysis by the Environmental Defense Fund finds methane in (the state) is leaked 16 times more than what is reported by the oil and gas industry.

“When we moved back … we expected to do so in a healthy and safe environment. We did not expect to have sacrificed so much to ensure the safety of our country, only to return home and not have our own community working to protect us and our children in return.”

Lynch expressed her sentiments Wednesday during a virtual public hearing on a proposed rule to control volatile organic compounds emissions from oil and natural gas sources.

For three hours Tuesday through Thursday, Pennsylvanians could testify at hearings conducted by the Pennsylvania Environmental Quality Board (EQB), an independent 20-member panel that adopts PA Department of Environmental Protection regulations. State PA-DEP Secretary Patrick McDonnell chairs the board.

Testimony focused on a Volatile Organic Compound (VOC)-related rule that was recommended by Gov. Tom Wolf, drafted by the PA-DEP, then approved by EQB by an 18-1 vote in mid-December. It awaits final approval. The rule’s intent is to reduce methane leaks and improve leak detection.

VOCs, by definition, “are emitted as gases from certain solids or liquids and include a variety of chemicals, some of which may have short- and long-term adverse health effects. Concentrations of many VOCs are consistently higher indoors.” The federal Environmental Protection Agency said numerous VOCs “are human-made chemicals that are used and produced in the manufacture of paints, pharmaceuticals and refrigerants.”

The Environmental Quality Board (EQB) estimates that under the proposed rule, VOC emissions would decrease annually by 4,400 tons and methane emissions by more than 75,000 tons.

Moms care for children and the environment

Rajani Vaidyanathan, an electrical engineer from Allegheny County, testified: “In these times of COVID-19, which is a respiratory syndrome, it behooves us to pay more attention to our air quality … I have a metabolic syndrome and my spouse has hypertension, so we really need you, the DEP, to help us be safe in these times with better air pollution controls.”

Karen Knutson testified that she lives in Indiana Township, in a largely rural section of Allegheny County, and spends time in rural Mercer County. She said she has seen “lots of small producing gas wells and they almost seem to accompany every other farm. The tanks are rusty. The wells are old. They are not too far from the house.”

Patrick Henderson of the Marcellus Shale Coalition, an oil and gas industry trade organization, testified Thursday evening. He said: “Pennsylvania’s shale gas industry takes seriously its responsibility to operate safely and efficiently and prides itself in going above and beyond federal and state environmental standards. After all, our employees live in our local communities, and have a vested interest in ensuring that our water, land and air resources are protected and enhanced.”

He included about a half-dozen bullet points on the upside of natural gas. Among them were: Since 1990, domestic natural gas production has risen 50% while methane emissions have declined 43%; gas is generating 40% of Pennsylvania’s electricity today compared with 1% in 2000; and VOCs from power generation have fallen 33% since 2005, about the time shale gas began to boom in Pennsylvania.

Henderson closed by saying that as PA-DEP “moves forward with this rule-making, we encourage all parties to recognize these benefits and foster policies to encourage the continued development and use of Pennsylvania’s natural resources.”

Shell Cracker and Trump protesters rally in rainstorm at Beaver, PA

From an Article by Davenport Rae Kurutz, Beaver County Times, August 13, 2019

BEAVER — Linda Stanley remembers playing outside as a child in Ambridge and coming inside with burning nose and lungs. Her parents fluffed it off, saying they couldn’t smell anything.

Decades later, the county’s steel mills have closed, but Stanley believes there’s a bigger threat in play — Shell Chemicals ethane cracker plant.

“That’s when I learned that kids and older people are a barometer for what is happening … Now I want to try to protect the most vulnerable members of our community,” said Stanley, of Economy, as she was standing outside the Beaver County Courthouse on Tuesday protesting the cracker plant. “Shell’s not going to do anybody in Beaver County any favors. What is the benefit for us? We certainly don’t need more plastics.”

Under the bouncing watch of a towering orange baby Donald Trump inflatable holding a cellphone — and his chicken-suit wearing compatriot — about 200 protesters brandished signs decrying the plant and President Donald Trump. The protest was concurrent to Trump’s tour and speech at Shell Chemicals’ $6 billion development in Potter Township, 5 miles from the courthouse.

Trump came to Beaver County on Tuesday to tout economic development, manufacturing and energy production and his administration’s role in supporting them. The visit was initially scheduled for Aug. 8, but was postponed following mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, Texas, the prior weekend.

While the majority of the protest was directed at Shell and Trump’s changes to environmental policies, signs and speakers addressed other issues, ranging from gun control to women’s rights and abortion.

Rob Conroy, director of organizing for Cease Fire PA, reminded the crowd of the mass shootings earlier this month and called Trump a child who “fans the flames of white supremacy and racism” during his speech. “Enough, I say, is enough,” Conroy said. “We can do better.”

Numerous protesters had signs to that effect, exclaiming “Hate does not make America great,” “I stand for respect for the environment,” “Dump Trump 2020” and “Silence is compliance.”

Others carried umbrellas adorned with streamers, and a group were covered in plastic bags calling themselves “trash flowing” on the sidewalk.

Not all protesters were from Beaver County — some came from Ohio, and numerous came from Pittsburgh. Wanda Guthrie, of the East Liberty neighborhood of Pittsburgh, and friends Terri Supowitz, of Wilkinsburg, and Catherine Gammon, of the Greenfield neighborhood of Pittsburgh, said they came because the cracker plant needs to be stopped. While it’s located in Beaver County, it will affect people all throughout the region, they said.

“We really don’t want to have the cracker plant here,” Guthrie said.

“It’s bad enough it will destroy (Beaver County),” Supowitz said. “But it’s going to hurt all of southwestern Pennsylvania.”

And the 600 permanent jobs Shell promises isn’t worth it, they said. “There are other ways to invest in jobs,” Gammon said. “This is not it. It’s shortsighted.”

Terrie Baumgardner, a member the Beaver County Marcellus Awareness Community, said she participated in the protest because she wants people to be more aware of the impacts of the cracker plants — including those proposed outside of Pennsylvania. She said she doesn’t want to see the region become a “cancer alley,” a term coined for an area in Louisiana with clusters of industrial plants and corresponding clusters of cancer patients.

“I’d like this area to be a safe haven from the petrochemical industry,” Baumgardner said. “This is not the best thing for our economy.”

Teenage organizer Natalie Leslie, a 16-year-old junior at Blackhawk High School, said she got involved with organizing the protest because people need to understand the lasting effects of what Trump’s policies are doing to the environment.

“I hope this spreads the light of the situation with the cracker plant,” said Leslie, of Chippewa Township. “I’d like to see a lot of younger people involved.”

Across the street, more than a half-dozen teenagers watched the protest. Some wore “Make America Great Again” hats, while one wore a flag featuring Trump depicted as Rambo. One of the young men taunted the protesters using a bullhorn, encouraging them to go home.

As a car drove past, honking as dozens of others had, a teenage girl called out the window “Bernie 2020” as the counter-protesters yelled “Trump 2020″ repeatedly.

Their presence wasn’t planned, said Chris Gordon, a student at Beaver Area High School. “I was passing by here when I saw the balloon of Donald Trump as a baby, and that got me thinking, ‘You know a few years ago when Obama was here, there weren’t any protesters for him,’” said Gordon, 17. “And I was thinking, ‘If they had a giant balloon of Obama, Republicans would be called racist or discriminating against him.’ So I came down to see what they were protesting about.”

Don Houghton quietly and thoughtfully watched the protest from Irvine Park. He was sorting through the information he had, noting that there was more regulations on the cracker plant than any of the steel mills or other industrial plants in the region, simply because it’s newer. While he is a registered Democrat, he said he respects Trump as the president. He doesn’t understand the hatred he hears spewed most days.

“I miss Sept. 12,” he said, referring to the day after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. “Everyone was united. No Democrats, no Republicans, no independents.”

MD Senator Robert Zirkin, Baltimore County

Banning Fracking from A to Zirkin in Maryland and Elsewhere

Engage Mountain Maryland says a ban on fracking is essential in Maryland

Senator Bobby Zirkin has been a long-time opponent to hydraulic fracturing and was instrumental in helping pass the two year moratorium currently in place in Maryland. He is now working with the public, answering questions and working on ban legislation he plans to introduce in the next legislative session in Annapolis, MD.

The moratorium will expire next year and permits to drill could be issued as soon as October of 2017. Regulations on fracking are currently in review and expected to be published before the end of the year, however it’s widely felt that there are no regulations that will protect the public from the known dangers of fracking. Public input and participation are essential in the near term.

Contact: EngageMountainMaryland@gmail.com, P. O. Box 81, Oakland, MD 21550

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Public Opposition to Fracking Grows Worldwide

From an Article by Paul Brown, EcoWatch.com, October 16, 2016

Public opposition to pumping water and chemicals into the ground to extract gas from shale—the technique known as fracking—is growing even in the countries whose governments are most in favor. But there are anti-fracking protests in London.

Although only four countries—France, Bulgaria, Germany and Scotland—have an outright fracking ban at the moment, many districts in countries that allow fracking in some areas ban it in others. This is true in the U.S. and in Canada, where potential wells will not be developed because local authorities have refused permission.

The carrot for governments generally has been the promise from the fossil fuel companies of large quantities of cheaply-extracted gas that will last for decades and cut their reliance on imports.

Fracking Boom

This has certainly been true in the U.S. and Canada, where a large-scale fracking boom has altered the balance of world energy resources and cut the price of gas so much that both coal and nuclear have struggled to remain competitive in electricity production.

In theory, China has even larger reserves of shale gas and is anxious to phase out coal plants, actively exploring a cleaner home-grown gas industry of its own. But allegations that fracking contaminates water supplies and creates small earthquakes have led to a backlash in local communities across the world.

In Algeria, for example, where water is extremely precious, it led to large-scale protests. And in Europe, a much more crowded continent where homes and villages are always close to the proposed drilling sites, there has been a lot of local opposition.

The issue has also become much more controversial because of the increasing awareness of climate change. Exploiting new fossil fuel reserves is seen as being against the spirit of last year’s Paris Agreement on climate change, when all the governments of the world signed up to prevent dangerous global warming.

Starting a new fracking industry seems incompatible with the declared aim of governments in keeping global temperature rise below 2°C.

The UK government, while signing up to the Paris Agreement, is enthusiastically backing fracking to provide a home-grown source of gas for 50 years, and has overturned local authority objections to allow exploratory wells to be drilled in Lancashire, northwest England. However, the ban remains in place in Scotland because of public opposition and a large renewables industry.

But it seems unlikely that fracking will have an easy ride even in England. A report by the University of Nottingham on public attitudes to the new industry has shown that support has sunk to an all-time low in the UK. It has dropped from 58 percent in favor in July 2013 to just more than 37 percent in October 2016—the first time that a majority of people has been against fracking. The surveys have been running annually since 2012.

The reasons for opposition are all environmental, because of local effects and also the unacceptability of more fossil fuels as an energy source. While local environment concerns dominated early opposition, the wider implications of climate change and the issue of exploiting new fossil fuel reserves is becoming more important.

Downturn in Support

The survey asks whether shale gas should be part of the UK energy mix. Since this question was first posed in July 2013, shale gas continues to lag behind in popularity, compared with other energy sources. And according to this latest survey, it remains the energy source the public are least likely to want in the UK’s 2025 energy mix.

Professor Sarah O’Hara, of the School of Geography at Nottingham and co-director of the survey, said:

“The sharp downturn in support for the extraction and use of shale gas in the UK over the last 12 months is hugely significant, as is the fact that for the first time since we began running the survey in March 2012 more people are against shale gas extraction than in favor.

“It is clear that people are not only concerned about possible impact on their immediate environment, something that dominated early debates around shale gas, but importantly are beginning to think more broadly about the implications for greenhouse gas emissions and future climate change.”

Mathew Humphrey, professor of political theory at Nottingham’s School of Politics and International Relations and survey co-director, said: “The results of the survey show that the government will increasingly have its work cut out selling fracking to the UK public.”

London anti-fracking protests

Excessive Volatile Organic Compounds in Air

Could Shell’s Ethane Cracker Erase Recent Gains in Air Quality?

From an Article by Reid Frazier, The Allegheny Front, September 9, 2016

Officials around the state are optimistic about the impact of Shell’s new ethane cracker on the local economy. It will bring thousands of construction jobs to western Pennsylvania and 600 permanent ones once it’s built along the Ohio River in Beaver County. The plant will produce 1.6 million tons of plastic a year out of the region’s natural gas.

But Jim Fabisiak, an environmental and occupational health professor at the University of Pittsburgh, is concerned about another impact on the area—how the facility could affect air quality.

Audio Stream in Original Article:

LISTEN: “How Shell’s Ethane Cracker Will Impact Air Quality”

At his office, Fabisiak pulls out a sheet of paper with a simple line graph on it. It shows the amount of industrial pollution in Beaver County for volatile organic compounds, or VOCs. These are a broad class of chemicals that help form ground-level ozone, or smog, which can exacerbate asthma and other lung problems.

“There’s a steady improvement,” Fabisiak says. “From 1999 to current, there’s been about a 50 percent reduction in VOCs released by industry over time. That’s significant progress in air quality.”

But beginning in 2016, the line on Fabisiak’s paper starts going up, and up, until the year 2021. That’s the year Shell’s ethane cracker is slated to come online in Beaver County.

“Adding the cracker to this point in time brings the levels greater than what we’ve seen in 1999,” Fabisiak says.

In fact, with a projected 522 tons of VOC emissions per year, the plant would be the largest source of VOC pollution in western Pennsylvania, according to the most recent data available in the EPA’s 2011 National Emissions Inventory. It would be the third largest source in the state, behind an oil refinery in Philadelphia and a styrofoam plant in Reading.

The next largest nearby VOC polluter is U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works, with 336 tons. In addition, the cracker is classified as a major source of hazardous air pollutants like benzene and formaldehyde, which can cause cancer and other serious health problems.

Fabisiak says these emissions are a concern because Pittsburgh’s air already fails to meet federal standards for several pollutants—including ozone—and routinely ranks poorly in national air health surveys.

Because of these emissions, environmental groups are appealing the cracker’s air permit and asking the state to require Shell to install air monitors next to the plant.

But Shell and state officials say the cracker isn’t a threat to public health.

Mark Gorog, air quality program manager for the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection’s Southwest region, says since the Pittsburgh metro area doesn’t meet federal air standards, Shell has to install modern controls for pollutants like nitrogen oxides and install a leak detection system in the plant itself.

“Their emissions limitation has to be at least as stringent as the best [technology] out there,” Gorog says. “So the technology they install has to be the ‘latest and greatest.’”

In addition, the company had to show the PA-DEP that its plant wouldn’t make the air unhealthy in Beaver County.

“They modeled to show they will not cause an exceedance of [federal air standards], and they did a risk estimate for [hazardous air pollutants] that showed there was not going to be an undue risk to the public,” Gorog says.

On top of these measures, the company will buy more than 1,000 tons of pollution offsets to make up for the pollution that will come from its smokestacks, storage tanks and flares. These offsets are called Emissions Reduction Credits, or ERCs. They work kind of like a cap-and-trade system. The idea is that a company that wants to build a facility that would add pollution to an area, like Shell, pays other companies to clean up emissions at existing facilities. The way they do this in many states is by buying credits from a plant that is either closing or installing pollution controls.

Under state law, Shell is allowed to buy credits from plants that are already closed. The University of Pittsburgh’s Jim Fabisiak says this means pollution that’s been gone from the region will be coming back—in the form of emissions from Shell’s ethane cracker.

“I don’t see that as improving the air quality to any great extent. It’s like three steps forward 2.99 steps back,” Fabisiak says.

Workers are already preparing the site in Beaver County for Shell’s multi-billion dollar ethane cracker.

For instance, the company is buying 70 tons of credits from FirstEnergy for two coal-fired power plant units it closed in Armstrong County in 2012. It’s also buying 100 tons of credits from FirstEnergy’s closed Mitchell Power Station, which ceased operation in Washington County back in 2013.

Fabisiak says the best way for the system to work would be for Shell to buy credits for future cuts to pollution—from, say, a company investing in new pollution reductions at a power plant.

“If everyone’s still staying in the area and operating, that results in slow decreases in the amounts of emissions over time,” Fabisiak says.

The Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), which approved Shell’s plan, doesn’t see a problem with how the pollution credit system is working. Under state law, closed facilities have 10 years to sell their emissions credits. The DEP’s Mark Gorog says new plants have to buy 15 percent more pollution credits than they will actually emit. So if Shell wants to emit 100 tons of pollution, it will have to buy credits for 115 tons.

“Over time, what the [ERC program] does is shrink the pool of emissions and bring the area into [federal air rules] attainment,” Gorog says.

This won’t happen overnight. Krishnan Ramamurthy, acting director of DEP’s Bureau of Air Quality, says its plans call for the region’s air to meet federal guidelines within five years. He says the emissions credit program actually helps them reach that goal by providing incentives for companies to clean up.

“The emissions reduction credits have a cash value. It’s supply and demand,” Ramamurthy says.

And if demand goes up—for example, if more companies want to build new plants alongside Shell’s facility—then the price of the emissions credits will go up too. And that could encourage companies to close or clean up older, dirtier plants.

“They can put additional controls to justify the control cost by selling some of their credits,” Ramamurthy says.

The U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works is one of the region’s biggest sources of VOC pollution with 336 tons of annual emissions. The ethane cracker’s 522 tons of projected VOC emissions would make it the largest source of VOC pollution in western Pennsylvania.

Currently, credits in Pennsylvania are reportedly selling for $2,000 to $10,000 a ton. That puts the price tag for Shell’s credits in the $2 to $10 million range.

In an emailed statement, Shell declined to say how much it spent on its emissions credits. But a company spokesman emphasized the plant was built on the site of the Horsehead zinc smelting plant, which had a heavy environmental footprint of its own. Some of Shell’s pollution credits actually came from that plant, which closed in 2014.

With or without Shell’s ethane cracker, DEP officials admit it won’t be easy for Pittsburgh to meet federal air standards in the future—especially after the EPA enacted stricter rules for ozone last year.

“It is working,” Gorog says. “There are areas being [cleaned up]. But part of the issue is EPA has ratcheted down limitations on [air pollution] over the years, so it’s kind of a moving target for us.”

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