Repost from CBS5 KPIX San Francisco
Opposition Grows Over Plan To Bring Crude Oil Into Bay Area By Rail
Expect more pushback this week against a plan to roll highly-flammable fracked oil by rail into the Bay Area. Anne Makovec reports
SF Chron: flood of oil tank cars “potential environmental disasters on wheels”
Repost from The San Francisco Chronicle, SFGate.com
Lots of oil in rail tank cars about to be coming to Bay Area
Phillip Matier And Andrew Ross
Sunday, March 23, 2014
Oil is flooding into the Bay Area – in rail tank cars that amount to potential environmental disasters on wheels.
In 2011, about 9,000 tank cars filled with crude oil were shipped into California by rail. In the next two years, thanks to the oil boom in North Dakota and Canada, the number is expected to jump to more than 200,000, according to the California Energy Commission.
About 10 percent of the oil will be headed to the five Bay Area refineries, which means traveling through Contra Costa and Solano counties. The question is, are we prepared to handle the spills or fires if there is a derailment?
“No,” said state Sen. Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, after listening to 2 1/2 hours of testimony from emergency responders the other day at a hearing in Sacramento.
In a nutshell, the state has plenty of money for responding to waterborne accidents like the Cosco Busan oil spill in the bay in 2007 – but virtually nothing for handling spills on land.
“It’s not that crude oil is any more dangerous than ethanol or other products that we currently see on the rails,” said Chief Jeff Carman of the Contra Costa County Fire Protection District. “It’s just that with the sheer volume that will be coming in, we are going to see more accidents.”
First on the scene of any accident is likely to be the local fire department – but in Contra Costa and Solano, some agencies have closed fire stations in recent years or reduced the number of personnel per shift to deal with budget cuts.
Contra Costa Fire, for example, is down to 75 on-duty firefighters a day to cover 400 square miles and 600,000 people, compared with the 90 firefighters a day just two years ago.
To give an idea of the potential scale of an accident, the amount of oil that spilled from the Cosco Busan equals about 1 1/2 tank cars of crude. A full train could carry 60 times that amount.
“There is a potential for very serious problems and very disastrous problems,” Hill said.
San Francisco Chronicle columnists Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross appear Sundays, Mondays and Wednesdays. Matier can be seen on the KPIX TV morning and evening news. He can also be heard on KCBS radio Monday through Friday at 7:50 a.m. and 5:50 p.m. Got a tip? Call (415) 777-8815, or e-mail matierandross@sfchronicle.com.CCTimes editorial: Officials must oversee dangerous crude oil trains
Repost from a Contra Costa Times Editorial
Despite unknown risks, highly volatile crude shipments suddenly routing through the East Bay
Contra Costa Times editorial © 2014 Bay Area News Group
Posted: 03/21/2014
Posted: 03/21/2014
Crude oil is not normally considered explosive. But lighter crude from the Bakken Shale formation of North Dakota, suddenly being shipped through the East Bay, is entirely different.
It contains several times the combustible gases as oil from elsewhere, according to a recent Wall Street Journal analysis. Randy Sawyer, Contra Costa County’s hazardous materials chief, considers it as explosive as gasoline.
In Quebec last summer, a train carrying Bakken crude derailed, exploded and killed 47 people. Subsequently, derailed trains in Alabama and North Dakota exploded.
“Given the recent derailments and subsequent reaction of the Bakken crude in those incidents, not enough is known about this crude,” Sarah Feinberg, chief of staff at the U.S. Transportation Department, told the Journal.
Yet, long trains carrying the volatile cargo started traveling through the East Bay last year. This calls for aggressive oversight from Martinez to Sacramento to Washington — before we have a disaster on our hands.
According to the governor’s office, rail shipments of oil into the state, including Bakken crude, are expected to increase from 3 million barrels to approximately 150 million barrels per year by 2016.
Kinder Morgan is unloading some of that cargo in Richmond, just blocks from an elementary school and the Point Richmond and Atchison Village neighborhoods, and transferring it to tanker trucks.
At least some of it is going to Tesoro Refinery near Martinez, according to Sawyer and a report by KPIX Channel 5. Tesoro — which recently demonstrated its lack of candor after two acid spills that sent four workers to hospitals — refuses to say whether it’s processing Bakken crude.
The implications are profound. The notion of transporting massive quantities of highly combustible crude through local neighborhoods should alarm the federal Department of Transportation, which regulates rail shipping.
The long trains are going right through the districts of Reps. George Miller, D-Martinez, and Mike Thompson, D-Napa. They must demand answers from the administration about why it allows this to proceed when so little is known.
At the local level, the Contra Costa Board of Supervisors must examine the adequacy of the county’s Industrial Safety Ordinance to make sure it can ensure that Tesoro and any other refinery that uses Bakken crude has taken adequate precautions.
Sawyer, the county’s environmental hazards chief, didn’t even know Bakken fuel was coming into the county until he saw recent press reports. Clearly the system is broken.
Roseville Firefighter: increased risk. Senator Wolk: no unified response
Repost from KCRA Sacramento
State lawmakers worried about oil trains
More crude arriving by rail from fracking fields
Mar 20, 2014
ROSEVILLE, Calif. (KCRA) —California lawmakers have expressed concern about a growing influx of freight trains loaded with oil and the state’s ability to handle a major rail disaster.
“Right now we’re seeing approximately 30 to 40 (cars) a day,” said Peter Hnat, of the Roseville Fire Department.
Hnat said the tanker cars are passing through Roseville’s busy Union Pacific railyard on their way from North Dakota to oil refineries in the Bay Area.
He said railroad companies have told the city that the number of cars is eventually expected to reach 120 a day.
“The increased volume coming through town obviously increases the risk,” Hnat said.
Hnat said the risk also comes from the fact that these tankers are not carrying typical crude, but rather oil produced from the drilling process known as fracking.
Fracking, also known as hydraulic fracturing, is the fracturing of rock by a pressurized liquid to extract oil and natural gas.
Hnat said the oil produced by fracking is more volatile than typical crude.
Last summer, a train loaded with fracked oil derailed and exploded in Lac-Mégantic, Québec, and killed 47 people.
A similar accident happened last December in Casselton, N.D.
Kim Zagaris, fire chief for the state emergency management department, said he is most concerned about specific rural areas where derailments have been more frequent.
Zagaris pointed to a map that included such areas near the foothills town of Colfax, east of Chico and through a stretch of Plumas County.
He said these areas were also more likely to be hours away from specially trained hazardous materials crews.
“We have gaps in our system,” Zagaris said. “And like I said, the more rural the area, the longer the response will take.”
Zagaris said Gov. Jerry Brown’s budget proposal includes a plan to charge a tax on oil transported by rail, similar to a tax that already applies to maritime shipments.
He said the money would be dedicated to purchasing equipment and providing training for vulnerable areas.
According to the California Energy Commission, the amount of oil imported to the state by rail increased from more than 155,000 barrels in January 2013 to nearly 1.2 million barrels in December 2013 — a more than sevenfold increase.
State lawmakers held a hearing Thursday to discuss the issue of oil train safety.
“I’m not at all convinced that there’s a unified response by the state to this new challenge,” said Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis.
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