As Exxon Pushes Gulf Refinery During March Madness Ad Blitz, Facility Offered $1.4B Tax Break

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ExxonMobil has engaged in a Marchย advertising blitz, repeatedly airing a new commercialย during national cable news channel breaks and prominently, during TV timeouts during the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I basketball tournament, better known as Marchย Madness.

The commercialย vaguely promotes what Exxon says is a new jobs initiative, which it claims will create 45,000 positions along the U.S.ย Gulf of Mexico, without specifying details aboutย the source of the jobs. Yet far from Madison Avenue advertising firms, a local battle has taken place the past severalย months in Gulf Coast communities over the prospective sitingย of andย tax breaks for a proposed Exxon refinery co-owned by the Saudi Arabian state-owned company, SABIC (Saudi Basic Industriesย Corporation).

A mere three weeks into the ad blitz, twoย Texas entitiesย voted to give tax subsidies to the proposed facility, dubbed Gulf Coast Growth Ventures. Both representing San Patricio County,ย Texas, the San Patricio County Board of Commissioners and the Gregory-Portland Independent School District offered Growth Ventures over $1.4 billion in tax breaks for the $9.4 billion Exxon-SABIC plant.ย 

The tax breaks came amid opposition by area fenceline communities, who have expressed concerns about the potential for explosions and air pollution stemming from the proposed petrochemicalย plant.

โ€œThe school board vote came despite a petition signed by 1,500 people who oppose the plant, citing safety and environmental concerns,โ€ explained The Advocate newspaper in Baton Rogue, Louisiana. โ€œThe plant would be less than 2 miles from the district high school. Previously, Portland’s city council approved a resolution asking Exxon Mobil to rule out their city as aย site.โ€

Petrochemicalย Facility

Growth Ventures, if built, will refine petroleum intoย plastics, known in industry lingo as a โ€œcrackerโ€ facility.ย ย ย 

โ€œOne unit would produce monoethylene glycol, which is used in latex paints, automotive coolants and anti-freeze, or as a building block to create polyester for the manufacture of clothing and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) for beverage bottles and containers,โ€ Gulf Ventures explains on its website. โ€œAdditionally, two polyethylene units, would provide polyethylene for use in film, packaging, bottles and containers, and various sizedย pipes.โ€

Pollution and potential health effects from the currentย boom in cracker facilities were tackled in theย February Food and Water Watch report, How Fracking Supports the Plastic Industry. The reportย points to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) data to highlight that 13 petrochemical plants released 4.9 million pounds of toxic materials into the Louisiana environment in 2015. Texas, which will likely house Growth Ventures, already has 28 petrochemical plants, which released 13.8 million pounds of toxic materials inย 2015.

Exxon is the top producer of natural gas in the U.S., which these days is extractedย nearly exclusively onshore via hydraulic fracturing (โ€œfrackingโ€), the controversial horizontal drilling technique. Growth Ventures says on its website most of its gas will be sourced from Texas, with the site capable of producing 1.8 million tons of ethylene per year at its up-to-1,400-acreย plant.

The final locations under consideration for the proposed plant include St. James Parish and Ascension Parish in Louisiana, as well asย San Patricio County and Victoria County inย Texas, with San Patricio the clear front-runner after offering the massive subsidy. Growth Ventures officials have called San Patricioย its โ€œpreferred site.โ€

On its website, Growth Ventures says it expects to make a decision on the final location in the next 60โ€“90 days.

Copy-Paste

At the launch ofย Exxon’s ad blitz, President Donald Trumpย came under fire for promoting the company’s jobs claim in a White House press release, which blatantlyย plagiarizedย the Exxon press release. Ghostwriting in support of Exxon isn’t limited to the White House,ย however.

The Growth Ventures website was registered by Renwick DeVille, aย lobbyistย in Louisiana who works for the firm Harris, DeVille Associates. The metadata for aย company presentation for Growth Ventures also lists a Harris, Deville employee, Michelle Hultberg, as theย author.

Gulf Coast Growth Ventures

Image Credit: Gulf Coast Growthย Ventures

DeVille has previously ghostwritten letters for members of Congress in support of Exxon’s proposed Golden Pass natural gas export facility, as revealed in an April 2015 DeSmog investigation. The Golden Passย facilityย also fits under the umbrella of Exxon’s Growing the Gulf initiative.

โ€œStayย Strongโ€

The permitting processย in San Patricio County, Texas, has been hotly contested, with Growth Ventures’ plans coming under fire by citizens at local government meetings.ย Robert Tully, Exxon’s executive for Growth Ventures, acknowledged theย oppositionย in a March 21 open letter.ย 

โ€œOur GCGV team has conducted over 80 meetings to listen to residents and discuss the project,โ€ wrote Tully. โ€œMany of those meetings were encouraging and supportive, while others were pretty tough to say the least. But all were beneficial as we came away each time with a better understanding and a greater appreciation for the thoughts and feelings of theย community.โ€

The leading group fighting against the facility,ย Portland Citizens United,ย whose membership consistsย largely of parents of young children, said on its websiteย that the proposed facility site is located only aย mile away from area Kโ€“12 schools.ย 

โ€œMany homes are literally across the street from the proposed location and would suffer tremendous property value loss and suffer the brunt of emissions as well as noise and light pollution,โ€ they explained. โ€œSimilar Steam Cracking Plants (Baytown) produce the following emissions into the air, water or soil: Sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide (from burning of natural gas), Benzene (causes cancer), Butadiene (causes cancer), Greenhouse Gases like Carbon Dioxide, and Smog Air from volatile organicย compounds.โ€

Growth Ventures is incorporated in Delaware, known as an onshore tax shelter, under the nameย GCGV Asset Holding LLC. Construction of the Gulf refineryย is slated to begin in quarter two of 2020, with completion scheduled for the first quarterย of 2024, according to forms filed with the Texas Comptroller of Publicย Accounts.

In a press release disseminated after San Patricio County, Texas, handed Growth Ventures theย massive tax subsidy, Portland Citizens United saidย that it sees the school district’s subsidy offerย as only the first chapter in the ongoingย battle.

โ€œEach of you has contributed in many ways to this effort and we should all thank each other for staying together and raising the awareness that had heretofore been silenced through secrecy,โ€ they wrote. โ€œThey cannot turn a shovel on construction until the permit is issued. Stayย strong.โ€

Main image credit: ExxonMobil | YouTubeย Screenshot

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Steve Horn is the owner of the consultancy Horn Communications & Research Services, which provides public relations, content writing, and investigative research work products to a wide range of nonprofit and for-profit clients across the world. He is an investigative reporter on the climate beat for over a decade and former Research Fellow for DeSmog.

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