I would first like to thank the good people of Pennsylvania and the Royal Dutch Shell Oil Corporation for sponsoring this column. (Not true, but may I ask that you momentarily suspend disbelief and consider a world in which they would sponsor this column). What they are really endorsing is a way of thinking, and they certainly have gotten me to thinking about our way of life and the tradeoffs made for a “better” way of life.
Let us venture to Beaver County, Penn., and the small town of Monaca on the Ohio River, 25 miles northwest of Pittsburgh. Imagine yourself boarding a pontoon boat and drifting with the river current slowly south. It is dusk. The day’s final orange rays follow the hills towards you, over the placid waters. Through a clearing of aspen and maple there is a white glow, the intensity of which displaces the sunset; so bright you must squint to look in that direction. As you clear the trees, it hits you, as if all of Las Vegas is condensed into 800 acres beside the river.
You can now switch off your imagination because that is a reality for Monaca residents. Your reality too, should you want to visit the newly constructed $6 billion dollar ethane cracker plant. I’m sure its owner, Shell, wouldn’t mind if you took a few selfies.
$6 billion is a mountain of money — even in 2022 dollars. With two-thirds of the local residents and an array of politicians — including Sen. John Fetterman — either neutral or in favor of the plant, Shell looks to have made a sound investment for the wealth of its shareholders. An investment in plastic.
Yes, this phantasmagoria of LEDs, furnaces, vats and miles of steel tubing has been assembled in another feat of engineering, to produce … plastic: specifically, raw plastic pellets the size of lentils — called nurdles. The Monaca plant will produce 1.6 million metric tons of the stuff. And there are more than 30 of these mega-plants littered across the country.
Sure, there were environmentalists who fought long and hard to prevent the construction of this current colossus, our pyramid to culture, and they lost. Those who would preserve and perpetuate a culture of “progress” won the battle. While the overall hypocrisy is poignantly encapsulated in Greta Thunberg’s “blah, blah, blah,” the tradeoffs on the ground, in the wage serfs who supplicate themselves at the altar of Big Oil, it’s a paycheck, a mortgage payment, another pulled pork sandwich during the Steelers game.
And in that sense, we’ve decidedly leaned towards a culture of plastic (don’t overlook the credit card variety), which, by the way, has a nasty habit of resisting decomposition. The oceans are a dumping ground for 8 to 12 million tons of it annually. The carbon dioxide from that single plant is equivalent to that of a quarter of a million cars. Birds and fish need not fret though: Shell and the Pennsylvania DEQ have worked out that an annual limit of 159 tons of particulate matter and 522 tons of volatile organic compounds ought to keep nature just fine and dandy. Human cancer rates and birth abnormalities? Don’t go on letting a little paranoia spoil our road to a stronger GDP.
Satire aside, don’t give up the fight. Don’t forget it is us consumers who feed the beast. Those bright lights turned on at dusk at the ethane cracking plant leave me in awe, the sheer technical prowess and promise with which these industrial behemoths capture the hearts and minds of entire cultures. Truly amazing — considering that carbon is a finite resource with declining revenues.
“Plastics is the fossil fuel industry’s Plan B,” observes Tatiana Luján, an attorney taking on petrochemical giant INEOS, who plans to build a similar ethane cracker in Antwerp, Belgium. The demand for plastics and profits is growing so fast that by 2030, 30% of oil will be directed at the petrochemical industry.
There you have it; you want to reinvigorate the economy — invest in plastic. Or, you can watch “The Graduate” and listen to that foreboding advice from Mr. McGuire as told to a confused and impressionable young Ben Braddock, “I just want to say one word to you, just one word. Are you listening? Plastics.”
After years of globetrotting, Broadman finds himself writing from his perch on the Palouse and loving the view. His policy briefs can be found at US Renew News: usrenewnews.org.
