Shell Officials Optimistic Cracker Plant Will Attract New Business
Earlier this week, Shell announced its mighty ethane cracker plant in Beaver County, PA (near Pittsburgh) is finally, ten years after first announcing, fully operational and producing plastic pellets (see Shell Officially Launches Pa. Cracker Plant Using M-U Ethane). Part of the raison d’etre for granting the plant a $1.7 billion break on taxes for 25 years is to lure manufacturers (and investments, and jobs) to locate nearby, in PA (see Gov. Corbett’s PR Campaign for $1.7B Cracker Plant Tax Break). So far, frankly, that hasn’t happened. At least not in a big way. But don’t worry, says Shell execs. They are “optimistic” the region will attract new manufacturing plants that want to use Shell’s plastic pellets.
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