YOUNGSTOWN — The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency granted “trade secret protection” to SOBE Thermal Energy Systems LLC for its proposed method of converting rubber tire chips into synthetic gas at its Youngstown facility, a process that raises objections from city officials and residents.

Youngstown City Council on Nov. 20 approved a second one-year moratorium on the process SOBE plans to use at its 205 North Ave. plant, which is a short distance from downtown. Council members at the meeting said the process is dangerous, untested and harmful to the environment. They also said they don’t ever plan to lift the moratorium that initially was passed Dec. 20, 2023.

Based on correspondence with the Ohio EPA, SOBE is still moving ahead, albeit slowly, with its plans to use pyrolysis, which is the gasification or combustion of tires, chipped tires, plastics and electronic waste into synthetic gas.

David Ferro, SOBE’s CEO, has said the company planned to only use shredded tires, and it would be “very clean with zero hazardous waste and zero hazardous emissions.”

The gas would be used for steam energy for downtown businesses as well as sold to companies for other purposes.

In a Dec. 6 letter to an EPA official, Ferro requested protection from disclosing the details of the process to be used because it’s a trade secret.

“This information derives independent economic value, actual or potential, from not being generally known to, and not being readily ascertainable by proper means by other persons, who can obtain economic value from its disclosure or use,” Ferro wrote.

He added, “The information derives its independent economic value because it details a highly protected process flow and design, and related technical information, that is new, unknown to potential competitors and not available elsewhere. SOBE has provided the said information under claims of trade secret and CBI,” confidential business information.

In a Monday response, Matt Glasgow, Ohio EPA supervising attorney, agreed to “hold this information as confidential and will exempt it from general disclosure, unless otherwise authorized by SOBE or by federal or state laws.”

Glasgow wrote that should the designation be challenged “in any judicial or quasi-judicial forum, or in any other legal proceeding, SOBE bears the sole responsibility of proving that the information meets the standards for trade secret protection under state and / or federal law.”

The Ohio EPA on Feb. 14 issued an “air permit to install and operate” to SOBE to shred tires that would be converted into gas at the plant over numerous objections from city officials and residents. SOBE applied for the permit in September 2022.

City officials repeatedly have said the project needs approval from Youngstown for a zoning change to move forward, and they oppose that.

Opponents of the project have said the synthetic gas is toxic and a highly explosive hazardous material and that air emissions would threaten public health. Nearly 100 people attended an Aug. 10, 2023, public hearing to express opposition to the EPA granting the permit to SOBE.

The EPA stated Feb. 14 it would allow SOBE to install a “thermolyzer unit to process tire chips. The unit will produce a synthetic gas that would serve as a supplemental fuel in two existing natural gas-fire boilers that are already installed, operated and permitted. The permit does meet the applicable Ohio environmental rules and regulations so Ohio EPA is obligated to issue a permit.”

John Mooney, director of the federal EPA’s air and radiation division for the region that includes Ohio, sent a Sept. 11, 2023, letter to the state EPA writing the federal agency “determined that the draft permitting action raises potential environmental justice concerns,” and that he urged the state to not grant the permit.

SOBE has more than 40 heating and cooling customers in the downtown area as well as Youngstown State University.

Based in Dublin, Ohio, SOBE acquired the former Youngstown Thermal LLC and Youngstown Thermal Cooling LLC in November 2021 for $250,000. The company had managed the facility for about two years prior.