Planning to start construction early next year on its $7-billion natural gas-to-gasoline plant at Penwell, the Houston-based Nacero Inc. announced Monday that it had been granted an air quality permit by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.
Nacero President-CEO Jay McKenna said the permit “is a major step forward in our effort to become the climate solution for millions of everyday drivers across Texas and the United States.”
Referring to the plan to build and operate Nacero’s first low and net-zero footprint carbon footprint gasoline plant, McKenna said the Penwell project “is the first of a series of facilities that will bring affordable lower life cycle carbon Nacero Blue and Nacero Green gasoline to market.”
A company spokesman said a similar plant will be built near Scranton, Pa., and others are in the planning stage around the country. Penwell is eight miles west of Odessa off I-20.
Nacero Blue gasoline will be made from traditional purchased natural gas and Nacero Green from captured flare gas from oil wells and methane from landfills and agricultural facilities, the spokesman said, adding that the plant will produce 70,000 42-gallon barrels per day during its first phase and 100,000 when its phase two expansion is completed.
Nacero Green will be the purer of the two forms and the spokesman said it is as yet undetermined in what relative percentages they will be manufactured. “Both gasolines will be able to go into your car without modifications,” he said.
The construction phase will require 3,500 workers and the plant will employ 350 when it becomes operational.
Nacero Project Integration Director Wesley Burnett, the Odessa Chamber of Commerce’s former director of economic development, said Monday that site preparation will proceed. “We expect to break ground on this transformational project in the first quarter of 2022,” Burnett said.
The company spokesman said Nacero “plans to build additional U.S. production facilities where it can create environmental and economic benefit for its consumers, host communities, commercial counterparties and shareholders.
“Founded in 2015, Nacero is led by a team with more than 400 years of combined successful project experience across the clean power, renewables, liquefied natural gas, fuels and petrochemicals sectors,” he said. “We will have more details in the near future about construction, including hiring.”
Nacero is a Spanish word meaning “born.”
The spokesman said the plant will be revolutionary notwithstanding the advent of electric vehicles, which he said will not substantially reduce the national demand for gasoline. “Even with the rosiest projection for EVs,” he said, “the demand will remain strong for decades to come,” he said.
