Economist Briefs WVU-P on Odebrecht Ethane Cracker
In February, the former director of West Virginia University’s Bureau of Business and Economic Research and professor emeritus at WVU, Tom Witt, released a study about the coming economic miracle that will be the Odebrecht ethane cracker plant in Parkersburg, WV (see Economist Releases Report on WV Cracker Plant’s Economic Impact). Witt’s previous employer, WVU, also hired him to brief them about this coming economic miracle. They specifically want to be sure their educational programs will help prepare the local workforce. Witt briefed the Parkersburg Board of Governors earlier this month. What did he tell them?…
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Baker Hughes is the world’s fifth largest oilfield services company. Schlumberger and Halliburton are numbers one and two, respectively. Oilfield services companies provide drilling equipment and yes, even fracking equipment (and fracking fluids) that power the shale revolution. Baker Hughes, with a large presence in the Marcellus/Utica, has just donated (for the second year in a row) $100,000 to Susan G. Komen®, the world’s leading breast cancer organization, to help in the effort to find a cure for breast cancer. Anyone alive over the age of 30 almost certainly has a relative or friend who is or has been afflicted by this disease. Doing what we can to fight it is something we all can get behind. But because some wacko anti-drillers make wild claims that fracking fluids “cause cancer”–even though fracking fluids contain many of the same chemicals in the stuff under your kitchen sink–some lib groups (incredibly) oppose the donation and efforts by Baker Hughes, saying it is blood money and “pink washing” the fracking industry…