A new midstream service complex in Ohio is the subject of a recent deal that underpins a wider resurgence activity in the industrial sector driven by shale gas discoveries across the country, but particularly in the states underlying the Utica and Marcellus Shales.

An unexpected but common theme at the Wall Street Green Summit going on this week in New York is how unconventional natural gas development is strengthening the US manufacturing sector.

Now a subsidiary of independent natural gas producer Chesapeake Energy is teaming up with M3 Midstream and EV Energy Partners to build a complex that will provide necessary infrastructure to process natural gas and natural gas liquids (NGL) in the Utica Shale play.

The complex will include natural gas gathering, compression, processing, NGL fractionation, loading and rail terminal facilities. The NGLs will be transported to a central hub in Harrison County that will initially feature 870,000 barrels of NGL storage capacity and 90,000 barrels per day of fractionation capacity. The partners plan to invest roughly $900 million over the next five years. Engineering and procurement work is underway, with the first processing and fractionation plants expected to come on stream by the second quarter of 2013.

Chesapeake Midstream Development President Mike Stice said the company is pleased to partner on this “important link in the value chain for the rapidly developing Utica Shale play …The scope of this project will provide an economic boost for companies and residents throughout Ohio as well as hundreds of high-quality, well-paying, new jobs for Ohioans.”