Category Archives: Environmental review

Environmentalists play ‘Whac-A-Mole’ to stall crude-by-rail projects

Repost from Environment & Energy Publishing (EEnews.net)

Environmentalists play ‘Whac-A-Mole’ to stall crude-by-rail projects

By Ellen M. Gilmer and Blake Sobczak, March 20, 2015
(Second of two stories. Read the first one here.) [Subscription required]

When an oil company’s expansion plans for Pacific Northwest crude by rail suffered a major setback last month, environmentalists spread the news just as quickly as they could Google “Skagit County Hearing Examiner.”

The little-known local office about an hour north of Seattle holds the keys to land use in the area, and environmental attorneys saw it as the best shot to stall a rail extension considered critical for the delivery of crude oil to a nearby Shell Oil Co. refinery, but potentially disastrous for nearby estuaries and communities.

The effort was successful: After environmental groups appealed a county-level permit for the rail project, Skagit County Hearing Examiner Wick Dufford sent the proposal back to the drawing board, ordering local officials to conduct an in-depth environmental impact statement to consider the broad effects of increased crude-by-rail throughout the county.

“The environmental review done in this case assumes that the whole big ball of federal, state and local regulations will somehow make the trains safe. And that if an accident happens, the response efforts described on paper will result in effective clean up, so that no significant adverse effects are experienced,” Dufford wrote. “There is no proven basis for such conclusions.”

The decision was an incremental but significant victory for environmental groups, sending a signal to industry that its increasing reliance on railed-in crude could face formidable hurdles.

Skagit County is just one piece of a larger plan to expand crude-by-rail across the country to better connect refineries and ports with prolific oil plays like North Dakota’s Bakken Shale. The use of rail to deliver crude oil has skyrocketed in recent years, rising from 9,500 tank cars of crude in 2008 to nearly 500,000 carloads in 2014, according to industry data. Projects in Washington and other refinery hubs aim to expand facilities and extend rail spurs to handle even more crude deliveries.

Shell spokesman Curtis Smith said the company is “confident that we can satisfy any remaining issues associated with the project” to add rail capacity to its Puget Sound Refinery in Skagit County.

“This project is critical to the refinery, the hundreds of employees and contractors who depend on Shell, and the regional economy,” he said. “We do not feel it should be held to a different standard than the crude-by-rail projects of the neighboring refineries that have been approved.”

Smith added that “we all share the top priority of safety.”

But the new reality of crude-by-rail traffic has environmentalists on edge. Oil train derailments in Illinois, West Virginia, North Dakota and other places have led to fires, spills and, in one case, lost lives. A 2013 crude-by-rail explosion in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, killed 47 people, prompting regulators in the United States and Canada to review the inherently piecemeal rules governing crude-by-rail transportation.

The federal government has authority over certain details, such as standards for tank cars used to haul crude. But most expansion plans and related environmental concerns are left to local agencies situated along oil routes. The result is a hodgepodge of permitting decisions by local authorities following varying state laws, while a team of environmental lawyers challenges expansion projects one by one.

“It’s a little bit like Whac-A-Mole because there isn’t a big permitting scheme,” said Earthjustice attorney Kristen Boyles, who represented six environmental groups in the Skagit County appeal. “It makes it difficult and makes it frustrating for the public.”

State laws in play

So far, the Whac-A-Mole approach is working well for environmentalists.

After three oil refineries in Washington went unopposed in building facilities to receive rail shipments of crude oil, Boyles said environmentalists and community advocates began tracking local land-use agencies more closely.

Earthjustice and the Quinault Indian Nation successfully challenged two proposed crude projects in Grays Harbor County, southwest of Seattle, leading a review board to vacate permits and require additional environmental and public health studies. A third Grays Harbor project is also preparing a comprehensive environmental review.

The next project on environmentalists’ radar is in Vancouver, Wash., just across the Columbia River from Portland, Ore., where Savage Cos. and Tesoro Refining and Marketing Co. have proposed building a new terminal to transfer railed-in crude oil to marine tankers bound for West Coast refineries. The Sierra Club, ForestEthics and several other groups earlier this month moved to intervene in the state agency review process for the project, citing major threats to the Columbia River and public health.

The key to all of these challenges is Washington’s State Environmental Policy Act (SEPA). Similar to the National Environmental Policy Act, SEPA requires government agencies to conduct a broad environmental impact statement for any major actions that may significantly affect the environment.

For projects in Skagit County, Grays Harbor and now Vancouver, state and local officials considering challenges look to SEPA to determine how rigorous environmental review must be, based on whether projects are expected to have major impacts. To Dufford, the Skagit examiner, the answer is plain.

“Unquestionably, the potential magnitude and duration of environmental and human harm from oil train operations in Northwest Washington could be very great,” he wrote.

Down the coast in California, environmentalists have an even stronger tool: the California Environmental Quality Act. Considered the gold standard in state-level environmental protection laws, CEQA has already proved useful in halting a crude-by-rail expansion project in Sacramento.

In Kern County, a team of environmental attorneys is also relying on CEQA to appeal construction permits for the Bakersfield Crude Terminal, a project that would ultimately receive 200 tank cars of crude oil per day. The local air quality board labeled the construction permits as “ministerial,” bypassing CEQA review, which is required only for projects considered discretionary. A hearing is set for next month in Kern County Superior Court.

Earthjustice attorney Elizabeth Forsyth, who is representing environmental groups in the Bakersfield case, said the state environmental law has been powerful in slowing down the rapid rise of crude-by-rail operations.

“In California, we have CEQA, which is a strong tool,” she said. “You can’t hide from the law. You can’t site your project out in some town that you think won’t oppose you.”

Unified strategy?

Still, the one-at-a-time approach to opposing crude-by-rail growth is undoubtedly slow-going, and progress comes bit by bit.

Boyles noted that Earthjustice attorneys from Washington to New York frequently strategize to “unify” the issues and make broader advances. On tank cars, for example, environmental groups have come together to press the Department of Transportation to bolster safety rules.

“That at least is some place where you could get improvements that could affect every one of these proposals,” she said.

But for expansion projects, the effort must still be localized.

“You have this giant sudden growth of these sort of projects, and that’s the best we can do at this point to review each of them and comment,” said Forsyth, the California lawyer, who said the end goal is to empower local agencies to control whether proposals move forward and to mitigate the impacts when they do.

Though labor-intense, advocates say the approach has paid dividends. Projects that would have otherwise flown under the radar are now under rigorous review, and industry players no longer have the option of expanding facilities quietly and without public comment.

“If you hadn’t had these citizens challenging these projects,” Boyles said, “they’d be built already; they’d be operating already.”

The delays have set back refiners seeking to use rail to tap price-advantaged domestic crude — particularly in California.

“The West Coast is a very challenging environment,” noted Lane Riggs, executive vice president of refining operations at Valero Energy Corp., which has faced staunch environmentalist opposition at a proposed oil-by-rail terminal in Benicia.

Riggs said in a January conference call that “we’re still pretty optimistic we’ll get the permit” for the 70,000-barrels-per-day unloading terminal at its refinery there, although he added that “timing at this point is a little bit difficult.”

Facing pressure from concerned locals and the Natural Resources Defense Council, Benicia officials last month opted to require updates to the rail project’s draft environmental impact review, further delaying a project that was originally scheduled to come online in 2013.

A Phillips 66 crude-by-rail proposal in San Luis Obispo County, Calif., has encountered similar pushback. If approved, the project would add five 80-car oil trains per week to the region’s track network. The potential for more crude-by-rail shipments has drawn opposition from several local city councils and regional politicians, despite Phillips 66’s pledge to use only newer-model tank cars (EnergyWire, Jan. 27).

Some town leaders have also separately taken action against railroads bringing oil traffic through their neighborhoods, although federally pre-emptive laws leave cities vulnerable to legal challenges (EnergyWire, March 19).

‘Business as usual’

Local, often environmentalist-driven opposition is seen as “business as usual” within the refining industry, according to Charles Drevna, president of the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers.

“This is just another extension of the environmental playbook to try to obfuscate and delay,” said Drevna, whose trade group represents the largest U.S. refiners. “We’ve been dealing with that for years, and we’re going to continue to be dealing with it.”

While Drevna said he doesn’t see lawsuits “holding up any of the plans” for refiners to improve access to North American oil production, environmentalists chalk up each slowdown to a victory.

In New York, a plan to expand a key crude-by-rail conduit to East Coast refiners has been held in limbo for over a year at the Port of Albany, owing to an environmentalist lawsuit and closer public scrutiny.

The proposal by fuel logistics firm Global Partners LP would have added a boiler room to an existing facility to process heavier crude from Canada. But advocacy groups including Riverkeeper have challenged the company’s operating air permit, calling for more review by New York’s Department of Environmental Conservation (EnergyWire, Jan. 13, 2014).

“All of the actions we’ve taken with Earthjustice and others have really ground to a halt DEC’s repeated approvals of these minor modifications,” said Kate Hudson, watershed program director for Riverkeeper. “We have not seen tar sands. … The river has been spared that threat for a year-plus, at this point.

“We certainly have no regrets,” she said.

Milton Mayor: residents ‘will be lying down on the tracks’ to prevent surprise railyard plan

Repost from The Hamilton Spectator

Milton residents ‘will be lying down on the tracks’ to prevent surprise CN plan

By San Grewal, March 17, 2015
MILTON MAYOR
MILTON MAYOR Gordon Krantz says his town has been “blindsided” by a CN plan to have a facility between Britannia Rd. and Lower Base Line that would bring 1,500 trucks and four additional trains into Milton every day. Zoe McKnight,Torstar News Service

A “David and Goliath” battle is shaping up in Milton, where the Toronto Star has learned CN is about to announce plans for a 400-acre rail distribution centre that throws a wrench into the region’s carefully crafted growth management strategy.

Milton’s mayor and top bureaucrat are vowing the town will not go down without a fight.

“We have 50,000 residents, 20,000 houses planned for the area north of this (intermodal) facility. CN came in last week and pronounced that they are going forward — no formal application, no formal announcement,” said Milton’s chief administrative officer, William Mann.

“We know they are announcing it on Thursday. When Milton residents hear about this, they will be lying down on the tracks.”

Mann said the town, one of Canada’s fastest growing municipalities, has been told that CN, as a former Crown corporation, still has a certain power to circumvent municipal planning as governed by the province of Ontario.

Mann and Mayor Gord Krantz told the Star the town has been “blindsided” by the plan for a facility between Britannia Rd. and Lower Base Line that the town says would operate 24/7, transferring containers between trains and trucks. The town says it would bring 1,500 trucks and four additional trains into Milton every day, on CN-owned land that isn’t supposed to be used for such a facility according to Milton’s planning strategy.

Under Sustainable Halton, the region’s widely lauded plan for growth management, the land has been earmarked for strategic employment, with a mix of residential and commercial development surrounding it, as well as environmentally protected lands.

“It’s completely contrary to what we had planned,” Krantz said. “If I knew what was being proposed by CN I certainly wouldn’t be purchasing. Or if I already purchased one (of the newly built homes) and I wanted to get out from under it — I can imagine the possible legal battles.”

But Krantz is vowing to do everything the town can to fight CN, even if the rail giant has the federal government on its side, along with its powers to ignore local planning jurisdiction.

Referring to the tale of David and Goliath, Krantz said: “We all know how that story ended. I’ve got my one shot ready.”

He said Milton is already working with Halton Region and other partners on a legal strategy, but said he didn’t want to tip his hand.

CN responded to the Star’s questions about the project with a brief statement: “CN owns approximately 1,000 acres of land in the Milton, Ont., area. As part of its ongoing business operations, CN continually reviews its facilities and real estate holdings to ensure they are adequate to accommodate growth in its various businesses. Such is the case with CN’s Milton property. CN has no further comment at this time.”

One of the world’s largest rail companies, CN has a market capitalization of almost $71 billion.

CN had proposed a similar project in 2001 — preceding the province’s strategy to manage growth — that was withdrawn after the town and region identified major issues with it, according to a news release from the Town of Milton.

Multiple sources told the Star the CN plan is to be unveiled Thursday at a breakfast event hosted by the local chamber of commerce. As the MP for Halton riding, Federal Transport Minister Lisa Raitt represents Milton. A statement from the ministry to the Star said only that Raitt would attend the Chamber event Thursday “and looks forward to the presentation.”

The Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing was asked whether the province would guarantee a public consultation and that provincial environmental and safety rules as well as municipal planning processes would be complied with. A spokesperson said the ministry, and the Ministry of Transportation, “have been advised by CN that they are revisiting the need for an intermodal yard in the Town of Milton … CN has not provided the province with specific details of their proposal.”

With concern mounting over rail safety in the wake of the Lac-Mégantic disaster and more recent fiery derailments of trains carrying crude oil, Krantz and Mann said they have been disheartened by the province’s unwillingness to address the CN plan.

When asked if he has an idea of what would be passing through the area, Krantz said: “That’s a good question. We don’t know what’s going to be transported.”

Beyond the negative impact on surrounding property values, and environmental and safety concerns, the development industry is going to be extremely upset with CN’s decision, he said.

“You ain’t seen nothing yet. Wait until the developers, especially in the residential sector, hear. I suspect their reaction will be something like mine.”

Mann said Milton has behaved like the model municipality for Ontario’s Places to Grow Act, which established managed population growth targets throughout the GTA. The town has grown from about 7,000 residents in 1971 to 84,362, according to the 2011 census.

“We could go to over 400,000 under Places to Grow. Places to Grow is all about taking your fair share. Now, upward of 500 acres of employment land and all the residential around it, could be taken out of the picture. That means the rest of the GTA will have to pick up that population.

“This plan has nothing but negative consequences for Milton, from a community perspective.”

San Luis Obispo Tribune: Benicia to recirculate Valero DEIR

Repost from the San Luis Obispo Tribune
[Editor: Nice to know that the folks in San Luis Obispo (home of Phillips 66 Santa Maria Refinery) are keeping an eye on Benicia….  – RS]

California city plans more study of crude-oil rail shipments

The Associated PressFebruary 4, 2015

BENICIA, Calif. — The city of Benicia is planning further review of a refinery’s plan to move as many as 100 train cars of flammable crude oil daily through Northern California communities.The Sacramento Bee reports (http://bit.ly/1LLESFw ) Benicia officials said Tuesday that they have decided to redo some sections of an environmental impact analysis of the project. The city plans to release a rewritten report June 30 for public review.

The decision comes after numerous groups, including Attorney General Kamala Harris, called the city’s review of the project inadequate.

The Valero Refining Company in Benicia plans to have trains travel on the Union Pacific line that runs through downtown West Sacramento and Davis, along the same tracks that carry Capitol Corridor passenger trains between Sacramento and the Bay Area.

Information from: The Sacramento Bee, http://www.sacbee.com

Sacramento Bee: Benicia plans more study of crude-oil train impacts

Repost from The Sacramento Bee
[Editor: The Bee presents a good summary of uprail critiques of Valero’s plan, quoting City staff, Valero and the CEO of the American Petroleum Institute.  Note that organized local opposition has also been strong and persistent.  – RS]

Benicia plans more study of crude-oil train impacts

By Tony Bizjak, 02/03/2015
In this July 24, 2014 file photo, an investigator photographs the scene where a locomotive and cars carrying crude oil went off the track beneath the Magnolia Bridge in Seattle.
In this July 24, 2014 file photo, an investigator photographs the scene where a locomotive and cars carrying crude oil went off the track beneath the Magnolia Bridge in Seattle. Mike Siegel / AP Photo/The Seattle Times

A controversial proposal by the Valero Refining Company in Benicia to run two 50-car crude-oil trains a day through Sacramento and other Northern California cities to its bayside refinery has hit another slowdown.

Benicia officials on Tuesday said they have decided to redo some sections of an environmental impact analysis of the project. The city plans to release a rewritten report June 30 for public review and comment over the summer.

The city’s decision comes after numerous groups, including Sacramento leaders, state Attorney General Kamala Harris and state oil spill prevention officials, called Benicia’s review of the project inadequate.

Those critics said Benicia failed to analyze the potential impacts of an oil spill and fire in cities, waterways and rural areas along the rail line, and also did not analyze the project’s potential impacts east of Roseville in environmentally sensitive areas such as the Feather River Canyon. They also challenged Benicia’s assertion that an oil spill between Roseville and Benicia would be a once-in-a-111-year event.

Crude-oil rail shipments have come under national scrutiny in the last year. Several spectacular explosions of crude oil trains, including one that killed 47 in a Canadian town in 2013, have prompted a push by federal officials and cities for safety improvements.

Sacramento and Davis leaders have called on Benicia to require the Union Pacific Railroad to give advance notice to local emergency responders, and to prohibit the railroad company from parking or storing loaded oil tank trains in urban areas. Local officials want the railroad to use train cars with electronically controlled brakes and rollover protection. Sacramento also has asked Benicia to limit Valero to shipping oil that has been stripped of highly volatile elements, including natural gas liquid.

Valero officials had said they hoped to begin receiving crude oil by trains early this year. In an email to the Bee, Valero spokesman Chris Howe said, “The proposed steps (by Benicia) are part of the process which we expect will allow the city to grant us a use permit for the project.”

In a hearing Tuesday in the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington, D.C., Jack Gerard, the president and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute, lamented that lengthy reviews were holding up the development of the country’s energy resources, including the Keystone XL pipeline, which has been under review by the State Department for seven years.

Gerard said some opponents were turning the process into a referendum on fossil fuels. “What we’re seeing across the country today is there’s a small group of individuals who are using permitting processes and infrastructure as surrogates to stop economic activity that they disagree with,” he told the House Subcommittee on Railroads, Pipelines and Hazardous Materials.