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AceNewsDesk – When Shell Chemical Appalachia announced the start of a massive plastics manufacturing facility last November in western Pennsylvania, the subsidiary of oil major Shell described it as “world-class,” and touted the company’s “strong and innovative safety focus.”
But now, just six months later, the plant has been the site of multiple malfunctions, including the leakage of benzene, a known carcinogen, along with other pollutants last month. The events come with putrid chemical odors and have area residents fearing for their health and calling on state officials to shut the plant down.
“We’re being told everything is okay, everything is safe, and it’s not,” said Hilary Flint, a cancer survivor who said she worries daily about how the malfunctions at the Shell plant may be affecting her health. Though she lives several miles away, she often spends time visiting her partner in Monaca, the community neighboring the Shell plant. Flint said both she and her partner contracted respiratory illnesses the week of the Shell plant’s chemical leak.
On Tuesday, the environmental advocacy group Earthworks shared a videothe group said showed “a major pollution event” that occurred April 13-14, dates that Shell air monitors recorded benzene levels up to 110 micrograms per cubic meter. The minimal risk level for benzene exposure is set at 29 micrograms per cubic meter, set by the US Department of Health and Human Services’ Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. The World Health Organization says benzene exposure is a “major public health concern” and that “no safe level of exposure can be recommended.”
For Shell, a benzene level above nine micrograms per cubic meter is supposed to trigger an investigation, under the terms of an agreement between Shell and environmental groups.
A key issue is Shell’s “ground flare pollution control,” a process designed to burn up invisible harmful hydrocarbons produced through plant operations so they don’t contaminate the air. While Shell has assured the community its flares successfully destroy up to 99.55% of emissions, Earthworks and other groups critical of Shell claim air monitoring proves the flaring operations are not working.
“Shell is releasing harmful pollutants and exceeding multiple pollution limits,” Anais Peterson, Earthworks petrochemical organizer, said in a statement Tuesday. “For almost six months Shell has been polluting Beaver County and the surrounding areas with no repercussions.” (
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