Oakland City Council votes to oppose coal, crude oil trains
By Rory Carroll, San Francisco, June 18, 2014
(Reuters) – The Oakland City Council has unanimously backed a resolution opposing the use of the city’s rail lines to transport crude oil and coal, a move that supporters hope will call attention to proposed projects that would sharply increase the amount of such cargo rolling through the densely populated city.
The resolution will not halt crude oil trains from entering Oakland since U.S. railroads are federally regulated, but backers hope it will stoke debate about plans for export facilities that would boost demand.
Backers of the resolution are particularly concerned about a proposed upgrade to Phillips 66’s Santa Maria refinery that would allow it to take in more crude oil from North Dakota on trains that would pass by rail through Oakland.
They are also worried about the redevelopment of the Oakland Army Base, which includes the building of a commodities facility that they believe will be used to export coal. The coal would also be moved through the city by rail.
“These proposed export facilities are a serious threat to Oakland and the East Bay communities,” said Jess Dervin-Ackerman of the San Francisco Bay Chapter of the Sierra Club.
“If oil and coal companies have their way, the Bay Area will become the biggest fossil fuel export hub on the West Coast,” she said.
The fuels will not be consumed in the Bay Area, she added, but would just pass through the area on their way to overseas markets.
California has in recent years seen a surge in crude oil arriving by rail on the back of an oil boom in North Dakota’s Bakken shale formation and in Canada, prompting safety and environmental concerns.
Crude oil-by-rail shipments into California increased from about 70 rail tanker carloads in 2009 to nearly 9,500 carloads in 2013, according to state regulators. They are projected to soar in the next few years.
Last July, 47 people were killed in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, when a freight train carrying Bakken crude oil derailed and exploded. Since then, there have been a number of fiery derailments in the United States that have caused environmental damage, but no fatalities.
Separately, the Oakland City Council on Tuesday night unanimously passed a resolution to divest money from city employees from fossil fuel companies, although none of that money is currently invested in those types of businesses.
The move is intended to put pressure on the California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS), which does hold such investments, to follow suit.
CalPERS is one of the country’s largest managers of public pensions, with $288 billion in retiree assets under management. (Reporting by Rory Carroll, editing by G Crosse)
Repost from Natural Resources Defense Council [Editor: Excellent resources…. Be sure to see the downloadable fact sheet and blast zone maps for Bakersfield, Benicia, Davis, Martinez, Pittsburg, Richmond and Sacramento that follow below this article. – RS]
It Could Happen Here: The Exploding Threat of Crude by Rail in California
Diane Bailey | June 18, 2014
Key Points
More crude oil was transported by rail in North America in 2013 than in the past five years combined. Millions of Californians live near crude-by-rail routes and could face extreme safety risks.
Federal regulators have few safeguards in place to protect communities and the environment from accidents, spills and explosions resulting from the race to move millions of barrels of crude by rail.
NRDC calls on lawmakers to expedite rules mandating commonsense practices, including removal of defective tank cars, rerouting around sensitive areas, and requiring disclosure regarding the content of all shipments and relevant risks to local residents.
Nearly four million Bay Area and Central/San Joaquin Valley residents are at increased risk from oil train accidents occurring with the proliferation of new crude by rail terminal proposals. But dangerous crude oil train derailments are preventable if the mandatory safety measures NRDC recommends are enacted.
Soda cans on wheels. That’s what some call the dangerous rail tank cars that have suddenly become ubiquitous across the American landscape. In the rush to transport land-locked unconventional new crude oil sources, old rail lines running through communities across America are now rattling with thousands of cars filled with crude oil. Neither the cars nor the railroads were built for this purpose. Worse, federal regulators have few safeguards in place to protect communities and the environment from accidents, spills and explosions resulting from the race to move millions of barrels of crude by rail.
More crude oil was transported by rail in North America in 2013 than in the past five years combined, most of it extracted from the Bakken shale of North Dakota and Montana. In California, the increase in crude by rail has been particularly dramatic, from 45,000 barrels in 2009 to 6 million barrels in 2013. As “rolling pipelines” of more than 100 rail cars haul millions of gallons of crude oil through our communities, derailments, oil spills and explosions are becoming all too common. Between March 2013 and May 2014, there were 12 significant oil train derailments in the United States and Canada. As oil companies profit, communities bear the cost.
Californians Living Near Crude By Rail Routes
A new report from the State of California Interagency Rail Safety Working Group outlines serious vulnerabilities along California rail lines including close proximity to many population centers, numerous earthquake faults, a shortage of adequate emergency response capacity, many areas of vulnerable natural resources, and a number of “high hazard areas” for derailments, which are generally located along waterways and fragile natural resource areas. Millions of Californians live near crude by rail routes and could face extreme safety risks. Currently, there are five major new crude by rail terminals in the planning stages and two recently converted crude oil rail terminals that could collectively bring in up to seven or more mile long trains each day through metropolitan areas like Sacramento, putting up to 3.8 million people in harm’s way.
Explosions and Spills Threaten Lives
“Each tank car of crude holds the energy equivalent of 2 million sticks of dynamite or the fuel in a widebody jetliner,” write Russell Gold and Betsy Morris in the Wall Street Journal. In July 2013, an unattended oil train carrying 72 carloads of crude oil from North Dakota exploded in the center of Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, near the U.S. border. The resulting inferno killed 47 people and destroyed much of the town center. Some 1.6 million gallons of crude oil was spilled. In the months following this devastating event, several more North American oil train derailments illustrated the sobering recurring public safety and environmental threats of catastrophic derailments due to the virtually unregulated surge in crude by rail. In 2013, rail cars spilled more crude oil than nearly the previous four decades combined (1.14 million gallons in 2013 compared to 800,000 gallons from 1975 to 2012).
Communities Lack Information And Control Over Hazardous Rail Shipments
Municipalities across the country are demanding increased communication about rail shipments of crude oil through their communities. However, crude oil — and other hazardous materials shipped by rail — have been exempted from the disclosure requirement of the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA). While the federal government finally directed rail companies to disclose this critical information to emergency responders, the general public remains in the dark about the nature of mile long tanker trains hurtling through their backyards at dangerous speed. Nobody has a choice about what gets transported through their community, how dangerous the cargo is, how frequently it goes through or whether it could be rerouted to more remote areas. Of the more than 3.8 million Californians who will be put at risk by proposed new crude by rail terminals, most are unlikely to even be aware of the significant new risks that they face.
Outdated and Dangerous Tank Cars Are Used to Carry Crude
Most of the rail tank cars used to carry flammable liquids, including crude oil are old “DOT-111s,” which are widely known to be unsafe. Speaking at a farewell address at the National Press Club in April 2014, outgoing National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) chairwoman Deborah Hersman repeated a long-held NTSB position that unmodified DOT-111 tank cars — non-pressurized rail tank cars that accident investigators report are easily punctured or ruptured during a derailment — are not safe to carry hazardous liquids. “Carrying corn oil is fine, carrying crude oil is not,” she said.
Thus, in 2009, the NTSB recommended these tank cars be equipped with additional safety features. Since October 2011, new rail tank cars built for transporting crude oil have incorporated these features, such as the use of head shields, thicker tank material, and pressure-relief devices. Yet regulators have not eliminated the use of the older, unmodified DOT-111 cars for carrying oil — out of 39,000 DOT-111 tank cars now used to carry crude, two-thirds still do not meet these modern safety standards. The Department of Transportation, simply recommended that shippers stop using these cars to transport oil, but they do not require it.
Commonsense Safeguards for Crude-by-Rail Are Overdue
In the longer term, our health depends on cleaner, renewable energy and moving away from fossil fuels. In the immediate term, we must tighten safety regulations on the rail transport of crude oil, or run the risk of devastating consequences. NRDC calls on lawmakers to expedite rules mandating commonsense practices, including but not limited to the following:
Remove Defective, Dangerous Tankers from Crude by Rail Service: The existing fleet of dangerous DOT-111 tank cars must be taken out of crude oil service immediately.
Impose Safer Speed Limits: Crude oil unit trains must adhere to speed limits that significantly reduce the possibility of an explosion in the event of a derailment.
Reroute Around Sensitive Areas: The National Transportation Safety Board recommendation that crude oil trains avoid heavily populated areas and otherwise sensitive areas must become mandatory.
Require Disclosure: Information regarding the content of all shipments and relevant risks and emergency procedures should be made accessible to local residents.
Provide Emergency Responder Resources: States should assess fees on shippers and carriers to fully cover the costs of providing emergency response services and safeguarding the public from oil trains, and ensure that there is adequate emergency response capacity.
Make Additional Operational Safety and Oversight Improvements: Unit trains of crude oil and other hazardous materials should be placed in the highest risk category of Hazmat shipments; and many other operational improvements should be made. Additional inspections of crude oil trains are also critical, including the funding necessary for more rail safety personnel.
Exercise Local Government Powers:
Local governments and states can require cumulative risk analysis of crude oil rail infrastructure and increased rail traffic.
Local governments should thoroughly evaluate all of the environmental and public health and safety risks of crude oil rail terminals that require land use permits or other forms of local approval.
Local governments should reject any new crude oil rail terminals within one mile of sensitive sites such as homes, schools, daycares, and hospitals.
Crude oil train accidents are preventable. All Californians should be calling for the crude oil and rail safety standards listed here.
By Tony Wade | October 18, 2013
Derailment in Fairfield, CA at 6:30 am on May 29, 1978, Memorial Day.
At 6:30 am on May 29, 1978, Memorial Day, a thunderous noise that neighbors later described as sounding like an earthquake, nuclear explosion and the end of the world all at once occurred.
I was 14 years old and evidently enjoying my exquisite recurring Lynda Carter dream because I heard absolutely nothing.
The deafening din was the derailment of a Southern Pacific train on the tracks that ran right behind my family’s Davis Drive home. The westbound train had 24 of its 66 cars (each 93 feet long and weighing more than three tons) jump the tracks when the rear wheel assembly on the lead car broke.
When we looked out over our back fence, there were rail cars and debris scattered everywhere. With houses abutting the tracks on both sides, it was a miracle no one got hurt. It did knock down a power line, which caused both a blackout for more than 2,600 Pacific Gas & Electric Co. customers for more than an hour and sparked a 200-square-foot grass fire.
I have several photos from back then. My favorite is one of me playing basketball against my dad in the backyard and peeking over the fence are the wrecked cars. A couple of days later, my best friend Wayne Thomas and I sneaked inside one of them and rode our bikes down its length.
Since that derailment happened literally in our backyard, it is memorable for me personally, and others who lived near it, but it had nothing on a derailment that happened in Solano County in 1969.
I am not usually one given to sensationalism, but in this case it is warranted. The other derailment involves: The FBI! U.S. Navy SEALs! White Phosphorus! Sabotage! Really!
At approximately 1 a.m. on March 19, 1969, a southbound 40-car train derailed in a remote area near Chadbourne Road adjacent to the Suisun Marsh. Thirty-one cars went a-flyin’ and unfortunately two of them contained 90 tons apiece of liquid white phosphorus, and they ruptured.
White phosphorus ignites when it comes into contact with the air and the resultant firestorm was fierce. The Solano Fire Protection District was aided in the firefight by U.S. Navy SEAL underwater frogmen from Mare Island who happened to be training nearby when the derailment occurred.
Once the flames were extinguished, there was still the matter of what to do with the two cars nearly filled with white phosphorus that were half-buried in the mud. Twenty-eight hours after the derailment, the decision was made to bury them there and cover them with an unreinforced concrete cap and fence it off with obvious warning signs.
By the way, a third car was buried as well, but it only had corn in it.
After a preliminary investigation by the Solano County Sheriff’s Office and Southern Pacific, foul play was suspected and (cue the Efrem Zimbalist Jr. show’s music) . . . the FBI was notified.
Evidence that the track had been altered was found. Rails on the track were disconnected and a heavy object had been placed on them. The FBI called it “an intentional derailment.”
It looked like a case of (cue the Beastie Boys’ song) . . . Sabotage.
It could have been much worse because that track was Southern Pacific’s main line for passenger trains entering and leaving San Francisco. No one was ever caught for the crime.
Meanwhile, the phosphorus train cars (and the harmless corn one) remained buried for decades. In fact, they are still there.
I was intrigued when I learned about the white phosphorus crash site and went directly from the microfilm machine at the Civic Center Library to the site at the end of Chadbourne Road. You just keep going past where the road is no longer paved and come to a dead end and you will see the fenced-in area with the signs warning of white elemental phosphorus.
The site is monitored annually and in 1998 a deed restriction was recorded that bars it from ever being developed. It lists specific things that can never be built there just in case someone gets a wild hair to plant a day care center, school or hospital in a marsh area, right next to the train tracks where white phosphorus is buried.
Repost from TribLive.com, Pittsburgh, PA [Editor: This recent update about the February derailment and spill in Vandergrift, PA was sent to me by a Benicia Independent reader who grew up in Vandergrift. She reports, “Here is a recent article citing the Vandergrift spill was actually 10,000 gallons of crude oil (way above initial estimates and reports) and has been dubbed ‘among the nation’s worst in recent years.’ Norfolk Southern is sweeping this under the rug. Please help to expose this catastrophe for what it is. I have asked them repeatedly to please help fund an emergency evacuation plan for my hometown of East Vandergrift, PA that has an emergency preparedness budget of $100 per year. Norfolk Southern now refuses to answer or acknowledge my emails.” – RS]
Vandergrift’s 10,000-gallon oil spill among nation’s worst in recent years
By Mary Ann Thomas | May 29, 2014
The railroad tracks next to the MSI Corp. building in Vandergrift where a train derailed in February as seen on Wednesday, May 21, 2014. Jason Bridge | Valley News Dispatch
The federal government recently ranked the train derailment in Vandergrift in February that spilled thousands of gallons of crude oil as one of the 14 worst spills over the past eight years nationwide.
Additionally, preliminary estimates of the spillage were woefully short as government records now show that close to 10,000 gallons of heavy crude oil was released — twice the amount initially reported.
The amounts of crude oil transported these days and the danger in doing so have been increasing dramatically. Of the greatest concern is Bakken shale crude, which can be explosive.
Last July, a runaway train crash in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, involving Bakken oil, incinerated much of the downtown, killing 47 people.
The train in which 21 railroad cars derailed in Vandergrift was carrying a far less volatile form of crude.
The U.S. Department of Transportation Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration determined the Vandergrift derailment to be the 14th most significant involving crude oil or ethanol in the past eight years. The most recent seven major derailments occurred within the past 11 months, and all involved crude oil.
Although no one was injured and there were no explosions in Vandergrift, the safety issues are the same ones currently being debated by the federal government, industry and activists:
The three railroad cars that released heavy crude oil and butane in Vandergrift were of the controversial variety known as DOT-111, according to Norfolk Southern. The railroad did not own those tankers, according to a spokesman. Critics dub these old-style tankers as flimsy as soda cans.
The federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration issued an advisory urging industry to voluntarily use sturdier tankers for Bakken crude oil transportation.
The federal government issued an emergency order in early May requiring railroads to alert state emergency agencies about large Bakken crude shipments traveling through local communities. Shipping of crude has become widespread: In 2008, major rail companies hauled about 4,500 tanker carloads of crude, according to the Washington-based Association of American Railroads.
Because of skyrocketing petroleum production in the Dakotas and Canada, the group estimated that trains transported more than 400,000 tanker cars of oil last year, many of them crossing Western Pennsylvania to reach refineries farther east.
Environmentalists as well as industry experts complain that the federal government is not doing enough quickly enough to increase safety.
The Vandergrift derailment
In the Vandergrift derailment, 21 of the 130 railroad cars jumped the track just before 8 a.m. on Feb. 13 in an area between the Kiski River and the Sherman Avenue neighborhood.
One of the derailed tanker cars slammed into a business and three others broke open, leaking thousands of gallons of oil. An undisclosed amount of contaminated soil had to be removed from the site, according to the state Department of Environmental Protection.
However, major damage was averted. The crude oil was not of the Bakken variety and not easily combustible. The spillage didn’t foul the nearby Kiski River. Residents did not have to be evacuated. The town was spared.
Final reports on the cleanup from DEP and the cause of the derailment are expected to be released within the month.
“We had a lot of things in our favor that day,” said Dan Stevens, spokesman for Westmoreland County Emergency Management.
“We had the wind blowing in a direction that was not affecting homes and it was 17 degrees,” he said.
The cold weather thickened the crude oil, further slowing any complications from the oil.
“If it would have been July 4, things could have been different,” he said.
Initial estimates shortly after the derailment, originally pegged that spillage at more than 1,000 gallons. As the day went on, that figure jumped to 4,500 gallons.
But the figure of almost 10,000 gallons was not released until it was referenced in a report earlier this year from the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.
Norfolk Southern, which provided the estimates, did the best that it could at the time, according to Norfolk Southern spokesman David Pidgeon.
“When you are dealing with hazardous materials, you don’t just rush in,” he said. The tanker cars don’t have windows, and emergency responders don’t easily know how much exactly had been discharged.
“It takes a long time to unload material from derailed cars,” he said. And when responders can assess all of the derailed cars, that’s when the railroad is better able to calculate the spillage, he said.
John Poister, spokesman for the state Department of Environmental Protection, noted that by the time a more accurate figure for the spillage was available, there weren’t follow-up media reports.
Future protection
Although, the federal Department of Transportation issued a voluntary request for shippers to use sturdier tankers than the DOT-111, many are not satisfied.
Even some railroads aren’t satisfied.
The tank car safety requirements are set by two agencies, the U.S. Department of Transportation Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration and the Association of American Railroads Tank Car Committee.
“That committee has for many years pushed for stricter standards for cars than those set by PHMSA,” said Pidgeon.
Last November, the Association of American Railroads urged U.S. Department of Transportation’s hazmat administration to increase federal tank car safety by requiring that all tank cars used to transport flammable liquids be built to a higher standard.
It also is calling for all existing cars to be retrofitted to this higher standard or phased out of flammable service, according to the Association of American Railroads website.
But the fear of explosion shouldn’t be the only incentive, according to activists.
“We’ve seen the spills happen with these kinds of rail cars,” said Joanne Kilgour, director of the Pennsylvania chapter of the Sierra Club.
“The spill in Vandergrift – 10,000 gallon is still significant,” she said.
“Even though there wasn’t an explosion, it shouldn’t have required an explosion and the loss of the life to retire outdated rail cars,” she said.
The recent requirement for notification of the shipping of Bakken crude is good for awareness but it isn’t going to change much, according to Stevens.
“If a train derails, it derails. What are you going to do? It doesn’t matter what is hauling,” Stevens said. “At the county level, our guys prepare for the worst and hope for the best.”
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