An ethane cracker in Port Arthur, Texas Credit: BASF
The Ohio EPA began 2017 by granting PTT Global Chemical a water permit that will allow the company to discharge wastewater from a massive ethane cracker into the Ohio River.

The cracker, a proposed industrial complex covering hundreds of acres just south of Wheeling, W.V., would convert ethane into ethylene (for use in plastics manufacturing). Ethane is a component of the natural gas that’s found throughout the heavily drilled Marcellus and Utica shale plays in southern Ohio and West Virginia. Total investment costs for the facility hover around the $5.7-billion mark.

A final decision on the project from the Thailand-base company and the state of Ohio is anticipated in March. Until then, the permitting process continues apace.

“Permitted discharges may result in changes from current water quality conditions, but cannot violate Ohio’s water quality standards that protect human health and the environment,” according to the Ohio EPA. As a spokesperson explained during a public meeting last fall, trace amounts of polyethylene and ethylene will be inevitable in the wastewater discharge.

The agency is currently considering air permit applications that seek to allow associated air pollutants. The Wheeling News-Register lists a number of airborne chemicals that would be discharged from the ethane cracker: “nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, sulfur oxides, volatile organic compounds, ammonia, carbon dioxide equivalents, xylene and benzene.”

Shell is moving forward with its own ethane cracker in nearby Beaver County, Pennsylvania.

In our 2015 feature on the Marcellus and Utica drilling boom, Scene learned that “downstream” industry — the production of more refined petrochemicals — is the next step in the natural gas world. Ohio finds itself in the heart of it all.

This article appears in Jan 11-17, 2017.

Eric Sandy is an award-winning Cleveland-based journalist. For a while, he was the managing editor of Scene. He now contributes jam band features every now and then.

9 replies on “Ohio EPA Will Allow Proposed Ethane Cracker to Discharge Wastewater into Ohio River”

  2. One thing’s for sure: this won’t be the first cracker to discharge wastewater into the Ohio River.

  3. this is processed waste water. you could drink it. a lot better than what cities and towns dump into the river

  5. @ STEEL GUY. I’d like to see you drink a glass of that processed waste water. Just scoop a glass into the discharge stream and gulp it down. You know, to prove how safe it is.

  6. I remember run off from farms using various fertilizer that eventually worked it’s way to the ocean / bays on eastcoast causing dead zones and as a result hurt the population of crabs and other marine life.. it took more than one farm but the idea that farmers hundreds of miles away if not more contributed to these dead zones raises questions in my mind as to the overall health of the waterways that wildlife depends on.

  7. Um you guys do realize that the ethane won’t stay in solution in the water right? Vapor pressure is too high, you won’t have any of the contaminants in the water as they will remain in a vapor state.

  8. You are correct in that ethane has a relativility low vapor pressure. However a cracker puts a carbon based molecule through a series of reactions to “crack” the bonds to derive other chemicals. The waste water would contain small amounts of chemical waste as indicated in the article. Analysis of the waste may show that it is in within acceptable limits in terms of ppm or ppb, however there would trace amounts of the bi-products from the cracking process present.

  9. Steel guy is right. The water is far cleaner going back in than coming out. Calling it waste is a misnomer. #nothingtoseehere #

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