Activists ask Beaver County leaders to support greater oversight of Shell cracker plant

BEAVER – Organizers from western Pennsylvania and beyond took to the courthouse Thursday to implore Beaver County’s Board of Commissioners to push for greater oversight of Shell’s ethane cracker plant.

At a packed Thursday board meeting, the crowd asked commissioners to support bolstered air monitoring near the facility and improve communications with residents concerned about public health.

Residents and activists said county leaders are in a position to pressure Shell and Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection to keep the plant operating within the bounds of its permit ― asking the trio to help, among other things, facilitate a town hall involving residents, Shell officials and state regulators.

More: Shell to pay $10 million for air violations and restart cracker plant production

The DEP has issued Shell multiple permit violation notices for exceeding rolling air pollution limits, unexpected gas flaring and malodors during the plant’s startup and early operations, and the company has submitted dozens of malfunction reports in the past year. Shell restarted its production of plastic pellets in May after a two-month maintenance shutdown. The company recently agreed to pay nearly $10 million to resolve the violations.

“As community members, we are often not told what is being emitted from Shell’s facility even when we can smell chemicals in the air,” Rachel Meyer, an Independence Township resident with Moms Clean Air Force, said at a rally held in Irvine Park prior to the board meeting. The group planned to deliver a 70,000-signature petition to Shell with demands for transparency and accountability.

Meyer recounted watching the petrochemicals factory — built on land once occupied by a hazardous zinc smelter — slowly rise near her home.

“First, the trees were cut down for the fracking wells and pipelines, one of which takes ethane to the cracker plant,” she told the crowd Thursday, sharing concerns for her 4-year-old daughter’s health. “We started hearing noise from the natural gas processing plant, then we stopped being able to see the stars like we used to because of the lights and flaring. The air pollution from all this infrastructure is certainly not a good thing to have to raise your family in. Just as we started to enjoy improvements, we are now mourning the loss of these things due to petrochemicals.”

Commissioners said they, too, support real-time air quality monitoring beyond Shell’s fenceline and have expressed their “disappointment” in the company’s rocky startup, but noted they have no regulatory jurisdiction over the business. Their power is limited to advocacy and “bringing people to the table,” they said.

“We do confront Shell with the concerns we have and the concerns of residents, but we don’t have any authority to regulate them,” said Commissioner Chairman Dan Camp, pointing to municipal zoning laws and federal and state regulatory and environmental oversight. “We can’t shut them down, we can’t tell them what they can put into the air, or what they can put into the water.”

Camp said county leaders often know little more than the public about operations at the plant.

More: Questions remain after Shell air monitors detect benzene at Potter Twp. cracker plant

“I have one contact at Shell and for months, probably almost a year, there was no communication until they started to (exceed) their limitations on pollution and we started to really stress our voice,” Camp said. “Our simple thing was: Do better.”

Commissioners noted they have, in the past, urged Shell to halt operations for the sake of public health. In March 2020, Shell leadership briefly suspended construction at the plant after Beaver County Commissioners joined other local politicians in publicly asking the company to help mitigate the spread of COVID-19. Public health experts at the time feared Shell’s 8,000-person and largely transient workforce made the region more vulnerable to transmission and risked overcrowding hospitals.

More: One year of COVID: Building an ethane cracker plant during a pandemic

“(Shell) didn’t shut down because we demanded it,” said Commissioner Tony Amadio. “They shut down because we asked.”

Activists argued that move alone underscores their influence.

Amadio lives half a mile from the complex and told the crowd he “knows what (residents) are talking about” when they describe living near the operation in recent months.

“I can come out on my front porch and it sounds like a jet is taking off when they are flaring,” he said.

Residents said real-time, publicly available air monitoring would help them make more informed decisions on the heels of the East Palestine train derailment and a recent malfunction at Shell’s wastewater treatment plant. Shell’s fenceline air monitors detected elevated levels of benzene, a known carcinogen, following the malfunction and hydrocarbon release at the plant. Rumors of a benzene release at the plant persisted for more than a day, with Shell and the DEP initially reporting “no evidence to date of a significant benzene release or spill.”

Brighton Township resident Shelley Meyer, like others in the community, scrambled for information as she weighed whether to take her daughter to school during the incident. She reached out to Commissioner Jack Manning, who was also told no benzene had been detected and relayed that information to Meyer.

“At that point in time, there was no benzene. Prior to that, there was. And that’s what we didn't know,” said Manning, adding that he’s “all for more monitoring.”

The confusion and delayed reporting, many said, makes clear the need for improved air monitoring and public notification throughout Beaver County, which lacks a local health department and relies on state regulators and the company for information.

More: With Pa. plastics plant poised to open, residents decide: Stay or go?

“Who can I count on to get correct, real-time information about my kid’s health?” Meyer asked.

Manning said that while he defends the plastics industry as a whole and the “decent, hardworking” people whose livelihoods rely on it, he can’t defend Shell’s startup and “the excursions that they've had.” He remains glad Shell chose to build in Potter Township, he said, because it “put Beaver County on the map,” attracting federal investment and giving the county an economic leg up during COVID-19 with thousands of temporary workers.

Camp said he’d like to see part of Shell’s recent $10 million penalty go toward “live air quality monitoring” along the Ohio River, including near Shell’s facility.

Gov. Josh Shapiro last month announced Shell will pay a $4.9 million civil penalty to the DEP and an additional $5 million to projects benefiting “the environment, health and quality of life of the community near the facility.”

In a Thursday statement, DEP representatives said the department is still developing a protocol for selecting projects and recipients to receive the $5 million, and “plans to make this protocol, the selected projects, and additional related information available to the public through its community information webpage." State law requires 25% of the $4.9 million civil penalty be “returned to the municipality in which the violation occurred to be used for projects that eliminate or reduce air pollution or for parks, recreation projects, trails or open space,” the DEP said.

Potter Township is eligible to receive $1.2 million as a result; DEP notified township officials on June 1 and asked them to submit a project proposal within 180 days.

“Shell is paying one of the largest civil penalties in Pennsylvania history ― and it is a direct result of Gov. Shapiro and this administration taking action to hold Shell accountable and deliver real results for western Pennsylvania," the DEP said.

Beaver County Commissioners said they’d be happy to participate in a town hall involving all relevant parties, with Camp telling the crowd he's doubtful Shell, as a private business, would participate in such an event.

Shell representatives said Thursday the company already holds “well-publicized virtual town hall meetings,” for the public. A late April meeting “had a record-number of community attendees,” Shell officials said.

“We will continue our commitment to have these meetings on a regular basis,” the statement continued. “We answer questions from the public, and during several of these meetings, including the last one, had an extensive conversation about Shell’s emergency response plans and the way we would work with local emergency response coordinators in the event of an emergency.”

“We respect people’s right to express their point of view and welcome any constructive engagement on our practices,” Shell added. Crews have made “significant improvements” to operate more effectively and safely, Shell said, and will “continue to report out and comply with all regulations while also applying lessons learned and best practices to ensure our operations have the least amount of negative impact on people and the environment.”

This article originally appeared on Beaver County Times: Activists ask Beaver County leaders to support greater oversight of Shell cracker plant