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Beneath a towering webwork of pipes, valves and flashing lights, Captain Evan Clark steered his 16-foot skiff toward an outfall beneath Shell’s new ethane cracker plant.
An acrid scent wafted off of the river’s surface. “Can you smell it?” he asked. Clifford Lau, a chemist, stood to ready his equipment to capture an air sample that would later be tested for contaminants.
As Shell’s hulking petrochemical plant slowly scales toward full capacity, Lau is working with a growing network of local Beaver County citizens doggedly watching the facility. Some are installing air monitors and cameras. Others are gathering samples from the water’s edge. Many are documenting their experiences and observations as the plant spurs changes to their neighborhoods.
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