Houston-based Appalachian Resins Inc has agreed to lease about 50 acres of land in the Salem Township of Ohio to build its planned $1 billion ethylene and polyethylene production facility, the company confirmed in an emailed statement to trade publication DownstreamToday.
Appalachian Resins plans to start operating the facility in early 2019, aiming to process around 18,000 barrels per day of ethane into ethylene and polyethylene to produce about 600 pounds per year.
The company earlier this year announced that it would build the plant in West Virginia, making use of natural gas from the nearby Marcellus and Utica shale formations.
"There is no difference in our development activities, we have essentially only moved across the Ohio River," chief executive James Cutler said.
"We will not be integrating with an existing operating (brownfield) facility but will be more of a greenfield location. However, we will have improved rail facilities," he added.
According to Cutler, the company decided to move the location of the planned facility to Ohio because of business and commercial reasons and to accommodate a larger production facility, but the West Virginia site only has space for a 500 million pound plant, he said.
