Project to hire locally

Plant construction will employ 1,000

 

by Stephen J. Pytak Staff Writer
Pottsville Republican

12/22/2006

GILBERTON — If the proposed coal-to-oil plant gets the green light next year, 1,000 union construction workers can look forward to $20- to $30-per-hour jobs, on average, plus benefits, union representatives said Thursday.

“There’s a lot of economic potential with the jobs and the rates and the incomes that’ll be generated,” said John W. Rich Jr., president of WMPI Pty LLC, which is developing the project.

“And we are going to put Schuylkill County workers on that job, as many as we can,” said Leo Gary Martin, Pottsville, president of the Schuylkill County Building & Construction Trades Council, which represents the 15 unions supplying workers.

Martin said he would like to try for a 100 percent Schuylkill Countian workforce at the site.

Rich, Martin and other union officials met in Rich’s Gilberton Coal Company office Thursday to talk about their hopes for the project and the challenges it faces in the year ahead.

Jobs are among the benefits promised.

Martin said approximately 100 workers representing his union, the International Association of Bridge Structural Ornamental and Reinforcing Iron Workers No. 420, based out of Reading, would be called to work on the project.

Dennis G. Keefer Jr., a representative of International Union of Operating Engineers No. 542, based out of Fort Washington, said about 90 workers from the county will work on the job site.

And Ray J. Sajone, a representative of United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters Union No. 524, based out of Scranton, said between 200 to 250 workers from the county will work on the site.

The salary issue for the union construction workers needed to build the plant was settled in September, when the trades council signed on.

“Our wages from labor to the highest paid craft averages $20 to $30 per hour. And on top of that you have your pension, your medical, all of that is paid,” Martin said.

It will take three years to construct the plant on a 75-acre site in Mahanoy Township, said WMPI Project Manager Robert B. Hoppe.

It would take approximately 4.5 million to 5 million man hours to build, Rich said.

“That’s phenomenal, especially in the county,” Martin said.

Manpower will make up a third of the construction cost, now estimated at $700 million, Rich said.

Martin said a such work opportunity is rare for local journeymen.

“We don’t get work in the county. Too often greedy employers or contractors will bring workers in from wherever they can,” Martin said. “All that aside, when we get a company that’s guaranteeing to use union labor, that means every union construction worker in this county will have a job at home and decent wages.”

And apprentice workers from the county will also be brought on board as part of the 100 union workers. Martin said his union pays them a starting wage of $14.80 per hour.

“And what are the ramifications of those wages in our community? Those people live here. They stay here. They buy things here. And that’s so important rather than having construction workers from Pittsburgh or Alabama coming here and sending their money home,” Martin added.

How much the estimated 150 workers inside the proposed coal-to-oil plant and 400 support staff members, including truck drivers, will earn in terms of salaries is still being determined.

“That’s under negotiation with our licensers,” Rich said.

Those companies include Shell Global Solutions U.S., Houston, which will provide the gasifier, and Sasol Synfuels International Ltd., South Africa, which is providing the Fischer-Tropsch Liquefaction Technology.

For over a decade, Rich has been working to build the first coal-to-liquid transportation fuel plant in the country. It will use piles of coal waste dotting the northern Schuylkill County landscape to make a zero-sulfur diesel fuel.

Early in the new year, the U.S. Department of Energy should finalize its environmental impact study, which should be released by the end of January or early February, Hoppe said.

And through the year, Rich said he will continue to work toward securing the financing for the estimated $700 million project.

In 1999, the state offered WMPI $47 million in tax credits. In 2000, Rich’s project won a $7.7 million competitive cost-share investment from the Department of Energy; and then, in 2003, the federal government boosted the project with $100 million through its clean coal power initiative program.

“They’re cost shares that are committed at closing,” Rich said.

The rest of the project will be paid by WMPI and investors. Rich does not feel he’s competing for investors with Green Renewable Energy, Ethanol and Nutrition, which has proposed a $300 million ethanol plant near Joliett.

“I think there’s plenty of investors out there. I think there’s plenty of dollars out there to invest in projects that qualify. The issue is satisfying the investors. ” Rich said.

Because this is a new technology being used in the United States, WMPI has applied for the federal loan-guarantee program.

“The bankers want to see that there’s somebody standing behind this,” Rich said. “And everything’s kind of held up now because the Senate’s changed and the House has changed and all of the committee heads have changed and we’re trying to figure out how that’s all going to play out. So that’s thrown another element of delay into the process.”