Tag Archives: Department of Transportation

Bay Area Refineries, California Energy Commission, California Regulation, Federal Regulation (U.S.), Public Health, Public Safety, Rail industry, Rail Safety, Spill prevention and response

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

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.

 

Bakken Shale, DOT-111, Federal Regulation (U.S.), Local Regulation, Rail industry, Rail tanker cars

NY locals, state and feds join together to demand rail reform

Repost from lohud.com The Journal News

Fast-track oil train standards, Rockland officials say

Khurram Saeed, The Journal News    11:20 p.m. EDT March 17, 2014

Officials want tighter regulations and safer tank cars in place for freight trains transporting crude oil through Rockland County.

Congresswoman Nita Lowey and local elected officials and community leaders at a press conference in West Nyack March 17, 2014 demanded new rules to ensure the safe transport of crude oil through the region.(Photo: Ricky Flores/The Journal News)

WEST NYACK –  A small cadre of federal, state and Rockland officials on Monday demanded that the U.S. transportation department boost safety standards for trains that carry crude oil through local communities and environmentally-sensitive areas.

At one point during the press conference held at the rail crossing on Pineview Road, a southbound oil train slowly rolled past. It was hauling dozens of the tank cars, known as DOT-111s, that are prone to rupturing following derailments or collisions.

In December, a train moving 99 empty oil tank cars — each large enough to carry about 30,000 gallons — hit a car carrier at the site but did not derail.

About 14 oil trains move through Rockland each week on CSX tracks, shuttling between Chicago and refineries along the East Coast, a recent Sunday story in The Journal News detailed.

The U.S. Department of Transportation is currently working on stricter standards for transporting crude oil by rail and the tank cars that carry them.

Safe transport of the more volatile crude oil from the Bakken formation in North Dakota must be “fully tackled” by the DOT, U.S. Rep. Nita Lowey said. She said voluntary initiatives by the oil and rail industries were a good start but called for better planned routes, more transparency and improved tank cars.

“The promises of industry just aren’t enough to safeguard the public,” said Lowey, D-Harrison.

Rockland Legislators Alden Wolfe, D-Montebello, and Harriet Cornell, D-West Nyack, on Monday sent a letter to U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx asking his office to “fast-track rule changes” endorsed by Lowey and New York senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand.

Several speakers noted CSX’s River Line passes near Lake DeForest and the Hackensack River, which supply hundreds of thousands of residents in Rockland and Bergen County, N.J., with drinking water. An oil spill in the reservoir would be devastating, they said.

“Guess who pays for the catastrophes and clean-ups?” asked Cornell — before explaining it would primarily fall to taxpayers.

Rockland Sheriff Louis Falco said he planned to meet with CSX in the coming weeks. His officers have been checking speeds of trains during the day — they have largely been in compliance, he said — and would soon begin observing them at night.

He also wants CSX to provide a daily list of what is aboard the trains so he can notify local police and fire departments.

“It takes a lot of people working together to make it clear that this is unacceptable,” Lowey said.

Oil Industry, Rail Safety, Rail tanker cars

Washington Senator Cantwell calls for elimination of DOT-111 tanker cars

Repost from Longview Daily News, Longview, WA

Sen. Cantwell presses oil executives to fast-track use of safer rail cars

March 8, 2014 By Erik Olson

U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., is demanding the oil industry eliminate older, unsafe tanker cars that are hauling crude oil through the Pacific Northwest, including those that pass oil through Cowlitz and Columbia counties.

At a Senate hearing Thursday on rail safety in Washington, D.C., Cantwell pressed industry executives on when they will pull cars known as “DOT 111” off the rails in favor of newer, sturdier models that are less likely to be punctured and spill.

The safety of oil trains has come under increasing scrutiny following the increase in drilling from the Bakken shale fields centered in North Dakota. Communities on rail lines have expressed concerns of a growing risk of fiery explosions if oil trains derail and detonate highly flammable Bakken sweet crude, and regulators have been slow to respond.

Critics warn about the possibility of disasters like last year’s crude oil train derailment in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, which caused an explosion that killed 47 people.

“We’ve gone from four years ago — having basically nothing on rail by crude — to now having something like 408,000 carloads of crude. Knowing when those cars are going to be off those rails — these cars that the National Transportation Safety Board has already said are unacceptable — this is a key issue for me and for my state,” Cantwell said in a written transcript.

Oil industry executives, who own most of the tanker cars, told Cantwell said they hope to phase out 60 percent of the older cars by 2015 but couldn’t say when they’d all be off the rails.

In the Pacific Northwest, most of those trains are headed to the BP oil refinery in Anacortes near the San Juan Islands and to a converted ethanol production facility at Port Westward owned by Boston-based Global Partners.

Some of those trains pass through Cowlitz County on the way to the refinery, and other oil trains pass through Rainier en route to the oil export terminal at Port Westward.

Rainier Mayor Jerry Cole said he supports Cantwell’s efforts but trusts Global to operate safely while creating jobs in the area. He said a Global official called him this week and said the company is moving the oil as safely as possible. About a dozen trains with about 100 cars each currently come through downtown Rainier per month, 22 fewer than Global is allowed by its permit.

“The safer rail cars, at the end of the day, are good for everyone along that line, from their end destination to the beginning,” Cole said.

The legality of some of those shipments remains under dispute. Oregon state regulators said this week that Global has violated its permits by moving 297 million gallons of oil to Port Westward between December 2012 and November 2013 when its permit allowed 50 million gallons. The company is disputing the claim.

Railroad officials note that they don’t own tanker cars — the oil companies do — but they are installing safety measures on unit trains and mainlines, such as better brakes and additional locomotives. They said they applauded Cantwell’s call for increased safety.

“If something is on our rails, and we’re carrying it, we’re going to do it in the safest ways possible,” Burlington Northern Santa Fe spokeswoman Courtney Wallace said.

Federal Regulation (U.S.), Rail Safety, Rail tanker cars

Unsafe rail cars remain in service, Senators angry

Repost from The Star Tribune, Minneapolis, MN

Slow pace of oil train fixes draws Senate ire

Article by: JIM SPENCER, Star Tribune
Updated: March 7, 2014

On Capitol Hill, senators were told that none of the thousands of inadequately protected rail cars has been removed from service.

OilTrainAn oil train headed for Minnesota rolled through Casselton, N.D., scene of an explosive rail accident in December. Photo: New York Times file.

WASHINGTON – Virtually all of the potentially unsafe rail cars carrying crude oil across the country remain in service, hauling highly flammable liquid, an official from the American Petroleum Institute (API) testified at a Senate hearing on rail safety Thursday.

API official Prentiss Searles told Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., that to his knowledge the oil and gas industry had retired none of the puncture-prone tankers from their fleets.

The issue arose after Searles testified that 40 percent of the rail cars now hauling crude have updated superstructures designed to keep them intact if they derail.

Heitkamp pressed Searles to clarify his point. The senator explained that crude oil shipments from her state’s Bakken formation are growing so fast that all the newer, safer tanker cars being produced are needed for increased capacity, not replacement.

The tanker fleet “has grown,” Heitkamp said to Searles. “You haven’t taken any [of the more vulnerable cars] off the rails.”

“Not to my knowledge,” Searles replied.

Those cars continue to carry crude oil despite a National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) determination that “multiple recent serious and fatal accidents reflect substantial shortcomings in tank car design that create an unacceptable public risk.”

There were 27,130 substandard cars carrying crude oil as of the third quarter of 2013, according to the Railway Supply Institute. Another 29,071 carried ethanol, which also is flammable.

Frustration with the speed at which safety reforms are being implemented dominated Thursday’s hearing, which came in the wake of fiery oil train derailments in North Dakota and Canada.

Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat, pointed out to a panel of government regulators and private industry representatives that federal rules for safer tank cars have been 2½ years in the making with no resolution.

“We’re moving as fast as we can,” answered Cynthia Quarterman, head of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

Her response and those of leaders of the Federal Railroad Administration and Federal Communications Commission, drew an exasperated rebuke from Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., who chaired the hearing.

“We need to get it right, but we need to get it done,” Blumenthal said.

The volume of crude oil moved by train from production points in the United States to refineries grew from about 9,500 carloads in 2008 to 400,000 carloads in 2013. Each tank car holds 25,000 to 30,000 gallons of crude oil.

Virtually all of that oil gets where it is going without incident. But in the very rare exceptions, consequences have been destructive and sometimes deadly. The danger raises the stakes for people living near rail lines in states like Minnesota, where eight oil trains pass on a daily basis, six through the Twin Cities.

The oil and gas industry, which owns or leases most of the rail cars used to ship crude oil, developed a set of voluntary standards for more puncture-proof and leakproof tanker cars. But the NTSB considers the new design inadequate, something the petroleum institute disputes.

“This is shaping up as a regulatory fight,” Heitkamp observed. “This is very problematic from a public ­perspective.”

Besides the structure of rail cars, lack of computerized control of trains — called positive train control — and the unique volatility of oil drawn from the Bakken Formation were sore points at the hearing.

Positive train control will require installation of roughly 22,000 antennae near tracks across the country. The Federal Communications Commission has delayed antenna  deployment while it checks to see if any of the sites violate environmental and historic preservation laws. Several senators blasted the FCC for bureaucratic foot-dragging.

The unique volatility of Bakken oil also remains in dispute. The oil and gas industry denies it, but the Department of Transportation has said the oil drawn from North Dakota “may be more flammable than traditional heavy crude oil.”

Quarterman of the Hazardous Materials Safety Administration said the government has moved from testing its flash point and boiling point to looking at its vapor pressure and sulfur and flammable gas content. Still, regulators and industry have not settled on a new testing or classification regimen.

“It’s a learning process,” Quarterman said