By: Jared Jorden
Under the 2017 deal between the United States and China, China’s largest energy company would spend nearly $84 billion in West Virginia over the next 20 years to build facilities that extract natural gas to generate power.
It sounds too good to be true. The potential value of the China Energy deal is greater than everything the state of West Virginia produces in a year. In the previous years our state budget was only $4 billion.
In celebrating the announcement, West Virginia officials promised that these projects would be underway within a year. “This time next year, you will see construction activity taking place,” the state’s former Commerce secretary, Woody Thrasher, told reporters on Nov. 13, 2017. A month later, Gov. Jim Justice confirmed that timeline. “It would not surprise me, within my 10-month window of today, to see shovels in the ground,” Justice told a town hall on WSAZ television.
However, there was skepticism from Senator Manchin about the deal that surfaced almost immediately, and for good reason. Officials talked about the general areas where China Energy would invest but didn’t provide a detailed list of projects or an accompanying timeline. The details of the plan have never been make public.
Lawyers have gotten involved to see if this money will actually turn up. Appalachian Mountain Advocates filed a brief with the state Supreme Court in June, requesting a Freedom of Information Act request aimed at finding out more about the deal.
It’s now two years later and the $84 billion seems to have been an empty promise for West Virginia.
Almost Heaven, Almost Hell 