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PARKERSBURG - The placement of a production node for the Appalachian Hydrogen Hub in Washington will impact all of Wood County and surrounding areas, local leaders said Friday.
"If it's in Wood County, it's good for Parkersburg," Parkersburg Mayor Tom Joyce said. "It's good for Parkersburg because it's good for the local economy."
Joyce praised the efforts of state lawmakers, particularly those representing Wood County in the state Senate and House of Delegates, to help make the hub a reality.
Delegate Bill Anderson, R-Wood and chairman of the House Energy and Manufacturing Committee, said developments in the state are always good news but "it's especially sweet when something's going to come to Wood County.
"I kidded (state Department of Economic Development Secretary) Mitch Carmichael a while back, 'It's time to keep moving up the river,'" Anderson said, referencing the $2.7 billion NuCor electric arc furnace facility in Mason County and the $500 million BHE Renewables project in Jackson County announced in 2022.
Wood County Commission President Blair Couch said development in the area based around natural gas has been discussed for years, going back to the 2013 announcement of a cracker plant that never came to fruition.
"It's a real exciting time for any investment in Wood County," he said. "Hopefully, with this type of investment, we'll be able to move forward."
The location of the facility has yet to be finalized, said Lindsey Piersol, executive director of Wood County Economic Development. She said she's optimistic that a lot of the estimated 20,000 jobs - construction and ongoing employment - the project is expected to generate will be in West Virginia.
"I think you'll see some more eyes on our area as a result of this announcement," Piersol said.
And those eyes aren't likely to stop looking when they reach a county or state line.
"There are a lot of manufacturing synergies that are built out around these hubs," said Jesse Roush, executive director of the Southeastern Ohio Port Authority in Marietta.
Some of those businesses could set up shop in Washington County, while residents of the county will likely be taking some of the jobs created.
"The construction will employ people on both sides of the river," Roush said. "On any given day, (roughly) 50% of the people that live here in Washington County travel out of Washington County, with a statistical majority of them going to work in Wood County."
Greg Kozera has been touting the advantages of manufacturing in West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania for several years as director of marketing and sales for Shale Crescent USA, a nonprofit organization advocating for development around the gas-rich shale formations in the region. He said the hub's developments won't be confined to a single place and related businesses are likely to develop throughout the region.
"The Hydrogen Hub allows us to be on the cutting edge of energy transition," Kozera said.
It's a process that won't be quick, he said, although there are already two facilities in the area working toward using hydrogen to generate power.
Hydrogen fuel is being tested in generators at Long Ridge Energy in Hannibal, Ohio, Kozera said, and California-based Omnis Fuel Technologies is transitioning the Pleasants Power Plant over to clean hydrogen.
"In a perfect world, what we want to see is if Pleasants is going to burn hydrogen, we want to produce it close to there," he said.