On December 1, 2012 United States Steel laid off 142 worker due to the drop in production at the McKeesport plant. US Steel had seen a jump in production at the McKeesport plant which make tubing used in the Hydraulic Fracturing process. However, do to the high importing of Chinese tubing there has been a dramatic drop in their production.
Times-Trib
Spokeswoman Courtney Boone says the company believes the supply-and-demand problem is driven largely by subsidized imports which U.S. Steel contends violate trade laws.
The tubular business had been benefiting from the Marcellus Shale drilling boom. But when the steel giant forecast its fourth-quarter earnings last month officials said they expected the tubular business to turn a profit, but on far less the $102 million operating income reported in the previous quarter.
U.S. Steel says in a statement that it can't speculate on what might happen to the plant in the future.
Now I am not blaming the Industry for the lay off of those 142, but there is a slowdown because there is a glut of cheap Chinese steel in the US market. With all the pipeline companies out there bidding for those industry jobs, they have to;
A. Know someone in high places.
B. Come in with the low bid.
The easiest way to do that is cheap materials and or cheap labor. So if you by cheap Chinese pipe you can save a bundle. (Just say’en)
But how insensitive is it that Range Resources keeps running the ad where the old steelworkers hand off a piece of Steel tubing to Rage Resource employees. Oh you haven’t seen it. Well you don’t live in Western Pennsylvania do you?
Below is the commercial I was talking about.
Well much to my surprise, I went to YouTube to embed the ad here and this is what I found,
Embedding disabled by request
Well I wonder why they disabled embedding, you would think they would want their feel good Champaign spread around. So instead, you will have to go Here to see the Range ad.
Well as you can see, Range is spending millions in a PR Champaign and considerably less in fixing or even admitting to the problems that are causing health issues in the fracking zone that Western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio have become.
There is a video out there that should be seen more than the happy feel good propaganda that Range and others are putting out and that one I know I can put here. Parts of this were shot around here.Please Watch
More below video.
As I was reading this unbiased article in The Pittsburgh Tribune about a documentary about the effect of the Marcellus boon on the State;
Organized by photographer Brian Cohen and Pittsburgh Center for the Arts director Laura Domencic, it features more than 50 photographs that, seen together, flesh out the environmental, social and economic impact of natural-gas drilling in Pennsylvania.
I was impressed with this section of the article about, Columbus based photographer Noah Addis, who seems to understand what has been promised and what will actually happen in the near future and the distant future as well.
“Energy is often a boom-and-bust business, so it makes me wonder about the huge infrastructure being built up around drilling sites in the Marcellus Shale region,” Addis says.
“The rigs are the most obvious symbol of the drilling boom, but they’re temporary. The wells themselves, however, as well as the miles of pipelines, pumping and compressor stations and other facilities will remain long after the initial drilling boom is over. I wonder what will happen to that huge infrastructure once the wells have stopped producing gas?”
Addis says there has been talk of reusing the Marcus Hook refinery as a liquefied natural-gas export facility that could be used to ship Marcellus gas overseas.
“It’s just interesting because one of the big selling points of drilling in the Marcellus Shale was that it would help the U.S. become more energy independent,” he says. “But really, energy is a global marketplace and, of course, the gas will eventually be sold where it can make the most profit.”
Well if you don’t know about Fracking, (Hydraulic Fracturing) . First where have you been? But not to worry, here is a good video by Shale Shock Media. It’s not long, but informative. So take 7:39 and see what is going on with FRACKING.
ABA