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Ongoing Demolition Work at Future Belmont OH Ethane Cracker Site
Bulldozers and heavy equipment continue to demolish an old coal-fired electric plant in Belmont County–at the site where PTT Global Chemical says they want to build a $5.7 billion ethane cracker plant. It’s a good sign that PTT continues to spend big money on the project. PTT is in the midst of spending $100 million on engineering plans for the plant (see PTT Announces 2 Contractors Working on Belmont Cracker Plant). The project is the first of all the announced cracker projects in the northeast to get its own website (see Getting Serious: Ohio Ethane Cracker Gets its Own Website). And now, demolition at the FirstEnergy R.E. Burger power plant site…
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Details are just now coming to light of a new E&P (exploration and production, or drilling) company headquartered in Pittsburgh and focused totally on the Marcellus and Utica region. Until now the company has flown under our radar. The company is American Petroleum Partners (APP)–not to be confused with Aubrey McClendon’s American Energy Partners (AEP)–and is headed by Rice Energy alumnus Varun Mishra, who is the founder and CEO. The big news is that last September Mishra’s new company, founded in 2014, received a major injection of investment capital. Apollo Global Management invested $411 million in APP with the option to double it up to $800 million. MDN has it on very good authority that although APP quietly issued a press release about this last September (see it below), the company has intentionally kept the news quiet. Not any more! Big mouth MDN is blabbing it to the world. Below are the bits and pieces we’ve been able to put together about this newest Utica/Marcellus driller…
A trucking company contracted to haul brine (i.e. naturally occurring water from the depths that comes out of a borehole long after drilling operations are completed) for Gulfport Energy crashed last Wednesday early in the morning and spilled 5,000 gallons of brine onto a field, which found its way into a creek, which emptied into a local reservoir serving Barnesville, OH residents (Belmont County). The trucking company is ECM Energy Services Inc. Barnesville was not drawing any water from the reservoir at the time (they have three local reservoirs from which to draw), so there was no threat to the local human population. Neither was there any impact on the local wildlife population. In fact, it was pretty much a non-event–except for the way it was inaccurately portrayed by media outlets like the Columbus Dispatch, whose reporter either intentionally misrepresented the facts, or was too obtuse to understand the facts…
Another piece of the puzzle slides into place with respect to the $5.7 billion ethane cracker project in Belmont County, OH planned by Thailand-based PTT Chemical and financial partner Marubeni Corp. from Japan (see 
In 2012, Barnesville (Belmont County), OH signed a contract with Gulfport Energy to sell Gulfport water from the Slope Creek Reservoir for 1 penny per gallon. Earlier this year Gulfport wanted to begin drilling in the area, following a joint venture agreement with Antero Resources. But Barnesville said the water level in the reservoir is too low and wouldn’t sell any to Gulfport, so Gulfport sued and in March the whole matter ended up in federal court (see 
An expert speaking at the Utica Summit III yesterday in Stark, OH said he believes the Marcellus/Utica region will see three, possibly four, ethane crackers built. Tom Gellrich of consulting firm TopLine Analytics, a company that “closely follows ethane markets,” said he thinks the first ethane cracker to get built will be the Shell cracker plant in Beaver County, PA…
Yesterday Rice Energy announced that the company’s subsidiary, Rice Midstream, has signed a joint venture agreement with competitor Gulfport Energy to develop a pipeline gathering and water delivery system for Gulfport’s Utica Shale drilling program in Ohio’s eastern Belmont County and Monroe County. Rice will be 75% owner and in charge of the jv. Rice and Gulfport plan to invest a combined $640 million into the jv over the next six years. Construction begins immediately and the first gas (and water) will begin to flow through the new system by middle of next year. Here’s the details…