Tag Archives: CPC-1232

Bakken Crude, Canadian regulation, CPC-1232, Crude By Rail, Derailment, DOT-111, Explosion, Fire, Rail infrastructure, Tank car design, Tar sands crude, Track maintenance, Train speed

Canada’s Transportation Safety Board points to track issues in derailments

Repost from insideHALTON.com

TSB points to track issues in derailments

By Paola Loriggio, The Canadian Press, March 17, 2015
TSB points to track issues in derailments-Image1
A CN Rail train derailment near Gogama, Ont., is shown in a Sunday, March 8, 2015 handout photo. Canada’s transportation investigator says track infrastructure failures may have played a role in three recent derailments involving oil-laden trains in northern Ontario. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO – Glenn Thibeault

Canada’s transportation investigator says track infrastructure failures may have played a role in three recent derailments involving oil-laden trains in northern Ontario.

The Transportation Safety Board says it wants Transport Canada to review the risk assessments for a stretch of track known as the CN Ruel subdivision following the fiery derailments in Gogama and Minnipuka.

It says trains have already been ordered to travel slowly on the Class 4 welded rail track due to “various infrastructure and track maintenance issues,” but that heavily loaded tank cars often exert “higher than usual forces” on the track.

The board says that exposes weaknesses in the track and makes it more susceptible to failure.

The agency says its preliminary observations on the March 7 Gogama derailment also found the tank cars performed similarly to those involved in the deadly derailment in Lac-Megantic, Que., despite meeting upgraded safety standards for Class 111 tank cars.

Similar observations were made about a Feb. 14 derailment near the same community, which is about 80 kilometres south of Timmins.

The derailments have fuelled the debate over transporting oil by rail and prompted the transportation ministers of Ontario and Quebec to express concern to their federal counterpart.

Last week, Ottawa proposed tough new standards for rail tank cars used to transport crude oil that would phase out the much-criticized Class 111 tank cars by 2025.

The proposal would require the new tank cars to have outer “jackets,” a layer of thermal protection, and thicker steel walls.

The Transportation Safety Board said Tuesday the proposed standards “look promising,” but must be implemented more quickly than suggested “given initial observations of the performance” of the upgraded Class 111 in recent derailments.

“If older tank cars, including the (upgraded cars), are not phased out sooner, then the regulator and industry need to take more steps to reduce the risk of derailments or consequences following a derailment carrying flammable liquids,” it said.

 

CPC-1232, Crude By Rail, Derailment, DOT-111, Explosion, Federal Regulation (U.S.), Fire, Tar sands crude, Train speed

How many explosions before we stop crude-by-rail?

Repost from Oil Change International

How many explosions before we stop crude-by-rail?

Matt Maiorana, March 13, 2015

This past Saturday, it happened again. A train carrying highly volatile crude oil, in this case tar sands crude from Alberta, derailed in Ontario and caught fire, damaging a bridge in the blaze. This is the fourth time in as many weeks an oil train has derailed and caught fire or exploded.

That’s right, there have been FOUR oil train derailments in North America over the past month. Here’s what that looks like:

rail-blog v1

There’s clear outrage at the local level, but, so far, political action in Washington has been nearly nonexistent. Worse, some recent reports suggest the Obama administration ‘balked’ at dealing with the problem when considering it last year.

Government Inaction

The White House is the responsible party here and it’s time this issue be given the level of attention it deserves by President Obama. It has been 20 months since the tragedy in Lac-Mégantic, but the President seems content pushing paper around while meeting with industry representatives.

As recently as last week dozens of industry representatives met with White House officials downplaying the need for strict safety regulations while an oil train in Illinois was still burning.

As it stands, draft safety standards put forth by the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), a part of the Department of Transportation, are awaiting final approval by the Obama Administration.

These new rules are a potentially important step, but the recent accidents make it clear even upgraded safety won’t be enough. All four accidents happened with “safer” oil tank cars, not the DOT-111 tankers widely known to be dangerous — and there are no reports any of the trains were going above the speed limit.

President Obama should adopt the strictest possible safety standards, but, at the end of the day, the only safe place for this oil is in the ground — we simply can’t afford to burn it for climate reasons and there’s no good way to transport it.

These Were No Minor Accidents

Let’s take a look at the recent derailments and why this past month demands more of a public response from Washington than it has received thus far:

  1. February 14, Ontario #1:
    • The train was going within the speed limit
    • The train was hauling newer model tank cars (CPC-1232s)
    • The train was carrying tar sands crude
    • The resulting fire destroyed 900 feet of track and burned for 6 days
  2. February 16, West Virginia:
    • The train was going within the speed limit
    • The train was hauling newer model tank cars (CPC-1232s)
    • The train was carrying Bakken oil
    • There were multiple massive explosions
    • The fires burned for days
    • Hundreds of families were evacuated and one person nearly lost his life
  3. March 5, Illinois:
    • The train was going within the speed limit
    • The train was hauling newer model tank cars (CPC-1232s)
    • The train was carrying Bakken oil
    • The fire burned for days
    • Firefighters could only access the derailment site by a bike path
  4. March 7, Ontario #2:
    • The train was going within the speed limit
    • The train was hauling newer model tank cars (CPC-1232s)
    • The train was carrying tar sands crude
    • Canadian National Railway Co. is building a new 1,500ft track of railroad around the burning train wreckage. Seriously.

It is clear from this most recent spate of accidents that neither “safer” tank cars or the current speed limits are limiting the threat crude-by-rail poses to our communities. But that wasn’t the only lesson to be taken from these derailments. The other, just as significant, is that transporting tar sands isn’t necessarily safer than transporting Bakken crude — which we explain in detail in our recent blog post.

Up until now it had been widely believed that tar sands crude wasn’t as explosive or combustible as the oil coming from the Bakken region in North Dakota. The recent accidents have blown this assumption to pieces.

The New Normal?

If the oil industry gets its way, accidents like these will become the new normal. The Department of Transportation itself has found that crude oil trains are likely to derail an average of 10 times a year over the next two decades — and that’s a conservative estimate made with old data. This would cause more than $4 billion in damage and possibly kill HUNDREDS.

This is a government agency saying hundreds of people might die in fiery explosions because of the greed of a few private corporations, yet there has been little action taken to slow or stop the oil industry’s efforts.

Communities Take A Stand

While exploding oil trains are a frightening proposition, none of this should suggest pipelines are any better. Choosing between one or the other, as many oil insiders have suggested is necessary, is like choosing to get hit by a bus or a truck.

What’s needed is an urgent and rapid transition to renewable energy that doesn’t devastate the landscape, trample on indigenous and community rights, or cook the planet. Put simply: we need to keep the oil in the ground.

That’s the message President Obama needs to hear. While he considers the best course of action on the proposed PHMSA rules, it’s important for him to know that communities all over the country are rising up and taking a stand.

In some places they’re already winning, blocking oil terminals and getting in the way of proposed expansions.

Near Seattle, local organizers won a victory over Shell, which wants to build an oil train terminal to supply its Anacortes refinery. Shell’s plans now require a full-blown environmental review. And in California, communities are standing in the way of terminal expansions across the state.  (See  here, here and here.)

Even Governors, like Pennsylvania’s Tom Wolf, are asking the federal government for stronger oil train safety standards.

Our message is simple. If transporting oil can’t be done safely, don’t do it. Keep it in the ground. It’s time for President Obama to take this issue seriously and put in place a moratorium on all crude-by-rail shipments until community and climate safety can be guaranteed.

Derailments like the four over the past month are what an “All of the Above” energy strategy looks like and we’re not going to take it.

–––

Update: While writing this article, another oil train derailed in Manitoba. Information is still coming out about this latest accident, though it appears to be smaller in scale. Still, that makes FIVE derailments involving trains carrying crude oil or refined oil products in under a month.

Bakken Crude, Canadian regulation, CPC-1232, Crude By Rail, Federal Regulation (U.S.), Tank car design, Tar sands crude, Train braking systems, Train speed

Canada proposes tough new oil tank standards after string of crashes

Repost from CTV News

Canada to propose tougher oil tank standards after a string of crashes

Rob Gillies and Joan Lowy, March 12, 2015 1:22AM EDT              
CN Rail derailment
A CN Rail train derailment near Gogama, Ont., is shown in a Sunday, March 8, 2015 handout photo. (THE CANADIAN PRESS / HO – Glenn Thibeault)

TORONTO — The Canadian government has proposed tough new standards for rail tank cars used to transport crude oil in response to a string of fiery crashes. The proposal, posted online Wednesday by Transport Canada, would require the cars to have outer “jackets,” a layer of thermal protection, and thicker steel walls.

The requirements are tougher than the oil industry wanted. But the proposal doesn’t include electronically controlled brakes that automatically stop train cars at the same time instead of sequentially, which are opposed by freight railroads. Regulators said they will take that issue up separately

Final regulations are expected by mid-May. U.S. officials have been working closely with Canada on the regulations and the White House is reviewing a draft proposal.

There have been four oil train derailments in the U.S. and Canada since mid-February. A runaway oil train derailed in Lac-Megantic Quebec in 2013, killing 47 people.A U.S. Transportation Department analysis predicts that trains hauling crude oil or ethanol will derail an average of 10 times a year over the next two decades, causing more than $4 billion in damage and possibly killing hundreds of people if an accident happens in a densely populated part of the U.S.

New standards were enacted after Lac Megantic, but safety officials on both sides of the border called for even stronger measures after fiery derailments continued to happen despite the new tank cars standards.

The newest standard calls for a hull thickness of 9/16th of an inch, up from 7/17th of an inch and makes thermal jackets mandatory.

“The proposed requirements are still subject to final approval,” said Zach Segal, a spokesman for Transport Minister Lisa Raitt. “We are working to have this done in an expedited manner.”

Segal said Transport Canada is working in collaboration with the U.S and “wants this done and published as soon as possible.?” Segal said Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s cabinet will have final approval.

The Transport Canada proposal is a “pretty clear indication” of what final regulations are likely to look like, said Ed Hamberger, president of the Association of American Railroads.

“These are important protections to both help mitigate the potential for rupture of a tank car, as well as limiting the severity of an incident,” he said.

The oil and rail industries want thinner tank walls — half an inch thick, instead of the 9/16ths-inch that regulators propose. The thicker the shell, the less oil a tank car can hold, and with about a half-million carloads of crude hauled by rail in the U.S. and Canada last year, the cost difference could add up.

The tank cars in the recent accidents were built to a voluntary standard written by industry representatives in 2011 to answer criticism that cars used to transport flammable liquids were prone to rupture in an accident and spill their contents and ignite spectacular fires. But most recent accidents show that the newer cars — known as 1232s — also are prone to rupture, even at slow speeds. Trains involved in four recent accidents were travelling under 40 mph (64 kph).

The White House budget office is reviewing a draft proposal for a sturdier tank car design, as well as other safety proposals. U.S. and Canadian officials have been working closely together to co-ordinate the regulations since the tank cars move back and forth across the border. Railroads and shippers have said if there were separate regulations in each country it could cause significant shipping delays and raise costs.

The railroad association and officials from CSX, Norfolk Southern and Burlington Northern-Santa Fe argued against requiring the electronically controlled brakes in a meeting with White House officials last week, according to a document posted online by the government. They say the government has underestimated the cost of equipping tank cars with the brakes and overestimated the safety benefits. Railroads complain that electronically controlled brakes would cost them $12 billion to $21 billion.

The oil industry has rapidly moved to using trains to transport oil, in part because of oil booms in North Dakota’s Bakken region and Alberta’s oil sands, and because of a lack of pipelines.

Bakken Crude, Benicia City Council, Benicia Planning Commission, CPC-1232, Crude By Rail, Derailment, Explosion, Federal Regulation (U.S.), Oil stabilization, Positive Train Control, Tank car design, Train braking systems, Valero Benicia Refinery, Valero Crude By Rail, Valero Energy Corporation

BENICIA HERALD LETTER TO THE EDITOR: Dr. James Egan: Deny Valero’s application

From The Benicia Herald (Benicia Herald letters appear only in the print edition)
[Editor:  Dr. Egan’s letter is a welcome contribution, expressing the growing conviction of many throughout North America, that crude-by-rail is simply unsafe under current conditions, and should be not be permitted at this time.  See also Dr. Egan’s 9/14/14 comments addressing the Valero Crude By Rail Draft EIR.  – RS]

Timely decision on crude by rail warranted: Deny Valero’s application

By James Egan, M.D., Benicia, March 10, 2015

The headline in the Feb. 5, 2015 edition of The Herald, “Another delay as crude-by-rail project debate enters 3rd year,” signals sympathy toward the Valero Benicia Refinery as regards its Crude by Rail (CBR) Use Permit Application, currently before the Planning Commission.  While it is difficult working up crocodile tears for a multi-billion-dollar international oil corporation, the energy and expense invested in forwarding this project bear acknowledgement, and a timely decision on the application should be made out of fairness to the applicant.  To that end, I would like to suggest that the Planning Commission and the City Council have enough information available to take action at any time.  The application should be denied on the basis of rail safety.

On Feb. 17 of this year a crude oil train derailed and exploded in Mount Carbon, W.Va.  Three million gallons of Bakken crude spilled from 26 ruptured tank cars, forcing the evacuation of two nearby towns.  Two days prior, another oil train derailed and caught fire in Ontario, Canada.  Last Thursday, March 5, 21 cars carrying Bakken crude derailed, split and exploded near Galena, Ill.  Another of the dozens of oil- or ethanol-train accidents involving a fire, derailment or significant fuel spill reported in the U.S. or Canada since 2006 was the Lynchburg, Va. derailment and fire in April 2014.

The significance of this particular series of railway disasters to the citizens of Benicia is that they all involved CPC-1232 tank cars, the same cars that Valero would use for the transportation of crude to its facility in Benicia, according to the Draft Environmental Impact Report.

In a Feb. 23 editorial titled, “Get rid of exploding tank cars,” the San Francisco Chronicle states that “Valero Energy Co. has agreed to haul Bakken crude to its Benicia bayside refinery in the newer CPC-1232 cars as part of its city permit application to revamp its facilities to receive crude by rail rather than by oceangoing tanker.  But that promise now appears inadequate to protect the safety of those in Benicia as well as in other communities – Roseville, Sacramento, Davis – along the line.”

The same edition of the Chronicle details a report from the Department of Transportation predicting that trains hauling crude oil or ethanol will derail 15 times in 2015 and average 10 times yearly over the next two decades, causing $4.5 billion in damage with potential fatalities of more than 200 people in a given accident.  This may actually be an underestimate based on recent major derailment rates.

Friends and foes of CBR alike agree that the transportation of crude oil by rail involves inherent risk.  Can’t we also agree that the risk should be reduced to the greatest extent possible before inviting these potentially explosive trains to Benicia?  Lowering the risk of tank car derailment, rupture and explosion now should translate into saved human lives and prevention of environmental disasters in the future.

The danger can, in fact, be mitigated.  The crude can be stabilized prior to its transportation by extraction of its most volatile components.  North Dakota has implemented standards making this mandatory for Bakken crude, but many feel that their new guidelines are overly lax.  New federal regulations due to be released in May could further address this, as would rail safety measures such as Positive Train Control and electronically controlled pneumatic brakes.  New, safer tank cars designed specifically to carry this type of crude have been designed and are in production.

Unfortunately, the new federal guidelines will likely require years for full enforcement, and complete phaseout of the existing, unreliable tank car fleet by newer, stronger cars, such as the Greenbrier HM-251, will also require years of effort.

Accordingly, if we agree that the risks of transportation of crude by rail should be absolutely minimized prior to approving the CRB project, we have to acknowledge that this is currently beyond Valero’s reach and the Use Permit Application should be denied.

Those who would roll the dice and approve the current application should consider how comfortable they will feel with that decision once they find themselves in a front row seat at the Park/Bayshore railroad crossing watching fifty tank cars containing 1,470,000 gallons of potentially explosive crude rumble by on the same spur line that has seen derailment of five train cars since Nov. 4, 2013 (in addition to the two locomotives that derailed on Sept. 7, 2014 near the port).

Kudos to Planning Commission members for the time and energy spent on fairly evaluating this project.  It would seem that as time has passed the correct path forward has become much clearer.  At this point, the ongoing health and well-being of all Benicians should hold foremost importance in the decision-making process.  Their protection is the least we can expect from our city government.

James Egan, M.D.