Proposed LNG facility in Eddystone draws community’s ire: ’24/7 emitters’

Read original article here: https://www.delcotimes.com/2025/11/06/proposed-lng-facility-in-eddystone-draws-communitys-ire-24-7-emitters/

By Alex Rose | [email protected] | The Delaware County Daily Times

PUBLISHED: November 6, 2025 at 7:30 AM EST

Numerous panelists laid out the potential environmental, economic, safety and health effects of building a proposed liquefied natural gas terminal in southeast Delaware County on Wednesday before the state House Environmental & Natural Resources Protection Committee.

The long and short of their testimony: No sale.

“I’m sitting here right now trying to contain my rage,” said Zulene Mayfield, chair of of Chester Residents Concerned for Quality Living. “Honestly. I have absolute rage. Because how many freaking times do we have to say, ‘No?’ How many times do we have to fight against everything?”

Committee members also heard from Chester Mayor Stefan Roots; Dr. Robert Howarth, professor of ecology and environmental biology at Cornell University; Delaware Riverkeeper Network Deputy Director Tracy Carluccio; James Hiatt, founder of For a Better Bayou, who traveled up from Louisiana; Lauren Minsky, visiting assistant professor of health studies at Haverford College; and PA Utility Law Project Executive Director Liz Marx.

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Majority Chair Greg Vitali, D-166, Haverford, said the committee had also invited minority chair Jack Rader Jr., R-176, Monroe County; Robert S. Bair, chair of the Pennsylvania Building and Construction Trades Council; and Franc James, chief executive officer of New York-based Penn America Energy Holdings LLC, which has proposed building the LNG facility along the Delaware River waterfront, but all either declined or did not respond.

Penn America’s website does not appear to be functioning, but a LinkedIn description of the company indicates that it wants to export 7.2 million tons of liquefied natural gas annually from a facility somewhere in southeastern Delaware County.

It cites as its strengths the proximity to vast, low-cost Marcellus natural gas resources in the northern and western portions of the state, as well as a shorter trip to European markets compared to already functional LNG terminals along the Gulf of Mexico.

The facility to gather and ship liquefied methane was first proposed for Chester in 2016, but paused under former President Joe Biden’s administration. Reuters reported that James met with current President Donald Trump in June, however, and that Penn America is looking at additional potential sites along the Delaware River.

Vitali said that he believes the project is still very much alive and active, prompting the hearing Wednesday.

Hiatt warned during his comments that these projects often promise a lot of jobs, and that there will be thousands for the construction portion, but only a few hundred hands are needed to actually run the facility afterward.

Mayfield said none of those jobs are likely to go to locals anyway, as they would lack the requisite experience to build and certifications to operate an LNG facility.

The export of those fuels also makes Pennsylvania less competitive, Marx said, meaning higher bills for local ratepayers as they open themselves up even more fully to the global market of demand.

On the other hand, speakers described the potential and expected safety, environmental and health impacts in terms that ranged from “not ideal” to “catastrophic.”

Hiatt noted that just this past week, the Environmental Integrity Project issued a report called “Terminal Trouble,” which showed all seven of the current operating LNG terminals along the Gulf Coast have violated the Clean Air Act.

“Every permit that is given out is a permit to pollute,” he said. “…These export terminals reported 425 pollution incidents, more than 14,000 tons of toxic air emissions. These facilities also emitted 18 billion tons of greenhouse gases that contribute to the climate chaos that we have seen.”

Hiatt described the terminals as “24/7 emitters” of polluting gases that a report by Greenpeace and the Sierra Club had linked to an estimated 60 premature deaths and $957 million in annual health care costs.

Pollution in and around Chester is nothing new, according to Minsky, who went through slide after slide on various negative health impacts from the already two dozen active toxic release inventory sites in eastern Delco.

The darkest shaded and therefore most impacted on the slides invariably matched areas of industry past and present along the waterfront, bleeding a few shades of color as the fan pattern spread to the rest of the county as well, illustrating that all were affected to some degree.

The toxic toll

These toxic release inventory sites must report to the Environmental Protection Agency because they release chemicals known to be hazardous to human health, Minsky said, and include the largest trash incinerator in the United States in Chester, a jet fuel refinery in Trainer, a natural gas refinery in Marcus Hook, and several other chemical and petrochemical companies.

“It is beyond question that the air in these communities is heavily polluted,” Minsky said. “The American Lung Association’s State of the Air report card for 2025 gave Delaware County a grade ‘F’ for particle pollution and a grade ‘D’ for ozone levels. These abysmal scores are for all of Delaware County and in the southeastern riverfront communities, the ground ozone levels (were) also an ‘F’ and out of compliance with standards set by the Clean Air Act.”

Minsky said there is a wealth of studies and reports making “statistically significant” links between the particulate matter emitted by these industries and cancer risks, including childhood leukemia.

Howarth also touched on the continued use of fossil fuels contributing to the alarming rate with which global temperatures are heading toward a rise of 1.5 degrees Celsius globally above the pre-industrial revolution baseline. That number is considered by many to be the “tipping point” where disruptions already being hinted at in today’s weather systems become irreversible.

“Two degrees is far, far more dangerous and we’re on track to hit that sometime in the next 15 years or so unless we address the problem, and the problem is from our use of fossil fuels,” he said.

While carbon dioxide usually gets top billing as the most dangerous greenhouse gas, Howart said methane has also played a crucial role, though it is in the atmosphere at a much smaller level, making up about 30% of all global warming since the industrial revolution, compared to 50% for carbon dioxide.

In the very recent past, over the last 10 to 20 years or so, Howarth said methane has contributed 45% to 50% of all global warming, just as climate change has been drastically accelerating during that same period.

Methane from sources like the Marcellus shale also requires an outsized amount of energy to extract, liquefy, transport and re-gasify for use when compared to traditional fossil fuels, Howarth said, contributing even more to the problem and leaving a larger footprint.

Carluccio noted that the hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” process needed to extract the methane uses more than a thousand chemicals, including known carcinogens that leak into groundwater and have been linked in numerous studies to increased cancer rates, low birth weights, birth defects and other health problems.

She gave a sort of “cradle to the grave” presentation on extraction and transportation of LNG with associated potential harms, such as the 108 pipeline safety concerns in Pennsylvania between 2010 and 2018 that caused 15 explosions, eight fatalities, 21 injuries, 1,118 people to be evacuated and more than $67 billion in property damage.

The volumes proposed by Penn American would require even more wells to be drilled and production to be increased, Carluccio said, which could presumably add to those numbers.

What if it’s built?

Arriving at what would be the only LNG facility in any of the four watershed states, nestled in the most densely populated part of Pennsylvania, would present its own set of dangers, she added.

Liquefying the methane in Chester by dropping it to minus 260 degrees Fahrenheit would produce its own pollution that would most impact those living nearby, Carluccio said.

She added that the liquid storage phase itself is also fraught with danger and subject to catastrophe, which is why regulators suggest that such facilities be built far away from dense population centers.

“If released in the air, (liquid methane) forms a very cold, flammable vapor cloud more than 600 times larger than the storage container,” Carluccio said. “An unignited ground-hugging vapor cloud can move very far distances and exposure to the vapor can cause extreme freeze burns. In an enclosed space, it asphyxiates, causing death. If ignited, the fire is inextinguishable. The fire is so hot that second-degree burns can occur within 30 seconds for those within one mile. The cloud can also explode with the force of a catastrophically powerful bomb.”

Such explosions can and do happen, as illustrated by the Freeport LNG Terminal in Quintana, Texas, in June 2022. Luckily, no one was injured in that blast, which could be felt miles away and caused some $275 million in damage, forcing the facility to close for eight months.

The size of that facility far outstrips what is being proposed for the Delaware River, however, and Carluccio made clear that the difference would greatly increase the potential for death and injury.

In the case of leaks, local fire chiefs are supposed to evacuate a 1- to 2-mile area, but Carluccio said that is simply not feasible in this densely populated area, or anywhere along the Delaware watershed, which is why Delaware state has banned LNG terminals outright.

Bringing large LNG tankers up the river would also require a massive dredging operation, she said, and the potential for spillage and explosion incidents from those tankers could create an even more devastating blast equal to 69 Hiroshima bombs.

‘Not welcome here’

“I am here to strongly and emphatically say ‘No’ to LNG in or near our city,” said Roots. “… LNG is simply not welcome here. An LNG terminal or export terminal would be an extreme health and safety hazard, as you’ve already heard, for the City of Chester or for any other town along this stretch of the Delaware River.”

Roots introduced a new three-letter acronym summarizing his administration’s take on the proposal: WMO, which stands for, “We’ve Moved On.”

“As we seek to revitalize Chester, my vision is to build new housing and attract new residents to the city,” he said. “…It would be devastating to our city’s progress to put a ticking time bomb LNG terminal on our waterfront, in close proximity to our residents, our visitors and our workers. This dangerous facility does not belong in a densely populated urban area like Chester. … We’ve moved on. Go away. We’re not entertaining another bad deal that harms the people who live, work and play here.”

As Mayfield summarized: “This community has had to withstand these battles for years, demanding our right to breathe and live just like any other community. We are not statistics. … Our children matter, our community matters. People over pollution.”

Vitali, a stalwart defender of environmental causes in the commonwealth, closed the hearing by thanking those who testified Wednesday and saying this is clearly an issue that requires more scrutiny and public input.

“I think that this issue of the LNG terminal along the Delaware waterfront is just a huge issue from a climate perspective, from an environmental justice perspective, from a consumer protection perspective,” he said. “And I just think it’s people like you, who take the time to show your opposition to political leaders, that gives us any hope of prevailing here.”