Tag Archives: Federal Regulation (U.S.)

Rep. Garamendi and area leaders call for safer crude-by-rail transport

Repost from The Benicia Herald
[Editor:  Significant quote: “Garamendi has introduced House Bill 1679 that would prohibit the transport of North Dakota Bakken crude by train unless it has a maximum Reid vapor pressure (RVP) of 9.5 psi.”  – RS]

Rep. Garamendi to call for safer crude-by-rail transport

By Donna Beth Weilenman, April 7, 2015

U.S. Rep. John Garamendi, D-Fairfield, will join industry leaders in Davis on Wednesday in calling for the U.S. Department of Transportation to make rail delivery of crude oil safer.

“Crude oil is or has until very recently been transported by rail through several cities in Congressman Garamendi’s 3rd Congressional District, including Davis, Dixon, Fairfield, Suisun City and Marysville,” said his media specialists, Donald Lathbury and Matthew Kravitz, in a joint statement on the news conference.

“These routes are very close to residential communities, schools, parks, and businesses.”

Among those joining Garamendi will be Sarah Feinberg, acting administrator for the Federal Railroad Administration, and Paul W. King, deputy director of the Office of Rail Safety at the Safety and Enforcement Division of the California Public Utilities Commission.

Municipal and other leaders also are expected to attend, including Davis Mayor Dan Wolk, Marysville Mayor Ricky Samayoa, Yolo County Supervisor Don Saylor and Solano County Supervisor Skip Thomson.

Also expected to attend are Terry Bassett, Yolo County Transportation District executive director; Dana Carey, Yolo County office of Emergency Services manager; and Terry Schmidtbauer, assistant director of Resource Management in the Solano County Office of Emergency Services.

Garamendi has introduced House Bill 1679 that would prohibit the transport of North Dakota Bakken crude by train unless it has a maximum Reid vapor pressure (RVP) of 9.5 psi.

He said this is the maximum volatility permitted by the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) for crude oil futures contracts.

By comparison, he said, a recent literature review by Sandia Labs indicates that the North Dakota Petroleum Council’s study of 152 Bakken crude samples found an average RVP of 11.7 psi and a max of 14.4 psi. A rule going into effect in North Dakota this month sets the limit at 13.7 psi.

Garamendi and Congresswoman Doris Matsui, D-Sacramento, sent a letter March 3 to the Department of Transportation in which they suggested strengthening safety improvements and asked DOT to drop any plans for weakening regulations.

Instead, they called for stronger safety standards for crude-by-rail transportation.

“Families living near oil-by-rail shipping lines are rightfully concerned about the safety of the trains that pass through their communities,” Garamendi said. “For that reason, I have repeatedly called on the Department of Transportation to use all the tools at their disposal to ensure that these shipments are as safe and secure as possible.

“Every day that strong and effective rules are delayed is another day that millions of Americans, including many in my district, are put at greater risk.”

Garamendi’s announcement will be made at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday next to the Davis Train Depot, near the corner of Second and H streets, Davis.

NTSB: Equip oil trains with fire protection within 5 years

Repost from McClatchyDC
[Editor:   Bloomberg adds coverage of NTSB comments on the inadequacies of the CPC-1232 tank cars.  – RS]

NTSB: Equip oil trains with fire protection within 5 years

By Curtis Tate, McClatchy Washington Bureau, April 6, 2015
US NEWS RAILSAFETY-CA 2 SA
A tanker truck is filled from railway cars containing crude oil on railroad tracks in McClellan Park in North Highlands on Wednesday, March 19, 2014. (Randall Benton/Sacramento Bee/MCT)

The National Transportation Safety Board on Monday called for the nation’s fleet of railroad tank cars hauling crude oil and ethanol to be equipped with fire protection within five years in an effort to eliminate the large explosions associated with recent accidents.

The NTSB cited the performance of tank cars in four recent oil train derailments, two in the U.S. and two in Canada, where fire exposure weakened the bare steel tanks and increased the pressure inside the cars beyond what they were designed to sustain.

The agency called on the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration to require tank cars carrying oil and ethanol to be equipped with a ceramic blanket and high-capacity pressure-relief devices.

The NTSB also for the first time endorsed a five-year timeline for retrofitting or replacing the tank cars, including the goal that 20 percent of the fleet be made compliant per year. Industry groups representing oil producers and refiners have pushed for a 10-year timeline.

“We can’t wait a decade for safer rail cars,” NTSB Chairman Christopher Hart said in a statement. “The industry needs to make this issue a priority and expedite the safety enhancements, otherwise, we continue to put our communities at risk.”

In January, the NTSB added tank cars to its “ Most Wanted” list of safety improvements. But at the time, Hart wouldn’t say what the NTSB considered an appropriate timeline for making the fixes.

The independent board, which has only advisory power, has been recommending upgrades to the nation’s workhorse tank car, called the DOT-111, for more than 20 years.

The car’s design became an issue after railroads across North America began hauling exponentially larger volumes of crude oil and ethanol. An oil train derailment that killed 47 people in Quebec in July 2013 galvanized a new effort on both sides of the border to improve the cars.

In February, the Transportation Department sent a package of proposed regulations to the White House Office of Management and Budget for review. They include requirements for thermal protection on the tank cars and are similar to a tank car design the Canadian government proposed last month. The final rule is scheduled for publication next month.

In the meantime, four trains carrying different types of crude oil derailed in the span of four weeks. The derailments, two in Ontario, and one each in West Virginia and Illinois, led to spills, fires and evacuations.

Oil industry groups have called for more attention to preventing derailments and less emphasis on the cars and what’s in them. But the tank car improvements have widespread support from lawmakers, regulators, mayors and governors, the rail industry and the NTSB.

In statements Monday, Sen. Ron Wyden and Rep. Peter DeFazio, both Oregon Democrats, praised the NTSB’s recommendations.

“I am very happy to see that they recommended thermal protection for cars carrying hazardous materials, an aggressive retrofit or replacement schedule, and a transparent, publicly available reporting mechanism to report tank car replacement,” DeFazio said.

“It is my hope that the next step from the administration will be a strong DOT rule that will get these cars upgraded quickly, or get them off the tracks completely,” Wyden said.

The railroad industry’s leading advocacy group in Washington echoed those calls.

“The freight rail industry supports an aggressive retrofit or replacement program and believes final regulations on new tank car standards will provide certainty and chart a new course in the safer movement of crude oil by rail,” said Ed Greenberg, a spokesman for the Association of American Railroads, in a statement.

Why more pipelines won’t solve the problem of oil-train explosions

Repost from Grist

Why more pipelines won’t solve the problem of oil-train explosions

By Ben Adler on 6 Apr 2015
Shutterstock | Shutterstock
In the last few years, the grassroots environmental movement has energetically opposed constructing big new oil pipelines in North America. Their opposition is understandable, since, on a global level, fossil fuel infrastructure encourages fossil fuel consumption, contributing to climate change, and, on a local level, oil pipelines leak and explode. But conservatives have been delighted to argue that greens are endangering the public and being short-sighted. Oil that comes out of the ground has to get to market somehow, and currently a huge amount of it is being shipped on freight trains. The result? An epidemic of oil train derailments, causing spills and even deadly explosions.

Is it fair to blame activists for this? Should climate hawks throw in the towel and accept Keystone XL as the lesser evil?

No and no — and I’ll explain two key reasons why.

First: Much of the oil criss-crossing the U.S. on trains is coming from North Dakota and traveling out along east/west routes where there aren’t even any proposals for big new pipelines. You can’t blame activists for that. Keystone would connect the Alberta tar sands to refineries on the Gulf Coast, but wouldn’t do anything to help move North Dakota’s fracked bounty. Right now rail is the main option for that. “Keystone XL would enable tar-sands expansion projects, but is unlikely to reduce crude-by-rail,” says Anthony Swift, an attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council. But don’t just take his word for it. Oil-loving, Keystone-supporting North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D) makes the same point: “I am not someone who has ever said that the Keystone pipeline will take crude off the rails. It won’t,” Heitkamp said in November. “Our markets are east and west and it would be extraordinarily difficult to build pipelines east and west.”

Second: Climate activists are supporting something that actually would go a long way toward solving the problem of dangerous oil trains: strict regulation of those trains.

In the long term, of course, climate hawks want to keep the oil in the soil, and they are pushing for structural changes — like an end to federal leases for oil drilling offshore and on federal land — that would reduce the amount of oil we produce in the U.S. But in the short term, they’re not just being unrealistic and saying “no” to all oil transport — they’re pushing to make that transport safer.

The Department of Transportation has the authority to impose rules on oil trains’ design and speed, which would reduce the risk of them leaking and exploding when they derail or crash. DOT made an initial proposal in July of last year and is expected to finalize it in May. Green groups have been disappointed by the proposal, though — both the weakness of the rules and the slowness of the timetable. If all goes according to plan, the rules would be implemented later this year, but their requirements would still take years to phase in.

Fortunately there’s now a stronger proposal that climate hawks can get behind: a new Senate bill that would impose stiffer requirements than those being proposed by the Obama administration. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) introduced the Crude-By-Rail Safety Act late last month, along with three Democratic cosponsors: Tammy Baldwin (Wis.), Patty Murray (Wash.), and Dianne Feinstein (Calif.). It got immediate backing from big green groups.

Here are four critical things that need to be done to make oil trains safer, three of which are included in Cantwell’s bill:

  1. Stop the transport of oil in an old model of rail car, called the DOT-111, that was designed back in the ‘60s. DOT-111s “have a number of manufacturing defects that make them much more likely to rupture in a derailment,” says Swift. So environmentalists want to get 111s off the rails immediately. That’s exactly what Cantwell’s Senate bill would do. DOT, in contrast, proposes to delay that transition. “DOT only slowly phases out 111s by 2017 and the rest of fleet by 2020, and we think the industry is pushing to move the phaseout to 2025,” says Devorah Ancel, an attorney at the Sierra Club. “It’s very concerning.”
  2. Require steel jackets around vulnerable rail cars that carry oil. DOT would require freight companies to transition to a newer, sturdier model of car called the CPC-1232, but even those cars aren’t sturdy enough — they have already been involved some fiery accidents, including one in West Virginia in February and one in Illinois in March. Cantwell’s bill would go further, requiring CPC-1232s to be jacketed, and then calling for “new tank car design standards that include 9/16th inch shells, thermal protection, pressure relief valves and electronically-controlled pneumatic brakes.”
  3. Clamp down on the amount of flammable gases permitted in the oil on train cars. Oil fracked in North Dakota’s Bakken shale carries more volatile gases with it than your average crude, making explosions more common. DOT’s proposed rules do nothing to curb that. Cantwell et al would limit the volatility of the oil being transported and increase fines for violations.
  4. Reduce train speeds. Currently, the speed limit for crude-by-rail is 50 mph, and that’s voluntary. DOT would make a speed limit mandatory, but would only lower it to 40 mph, and even that may only apply in “high threat urban areas” with more than 100,000 people. “The question of speed limits is crucial,” says Swift. “You need to dramatically reduce the speed at which these trains are moving.” Swift notes that CPC-1232s may puncture when going above 18 mph, but environmental groups stop short of explicitly calling for that speed limit. NRDC says, “Crude oil unit trains must adhere to speed limits that significantly reduce the possibility of an explosion in the event of a derailment.” That would presumably fall somewhere between 18 mph and 40 mph. Stricter speed limits is the one major needed reform that the Senate bill doesn’t address.

Cantwell’s bill also doesn’t compensate communities when accidents happen (the DOT proposal doesn’t either). But the bill’s sponsors intend to introduce future legislation to establish an oil spill liability trust fund paid for by fees from the companies moving crude oil. “Taxpayers should not be on the hook to bail out communities after a disaster caused by private companies,” said Cantwell.

It’s hard to imagine this bill passing both houses of an intensely pro-business, pro–fossil fuel Republican Congress. But Senate Democrats hope that by raising the issue they can build public awareness and support for stronger rules.

The bill could put pressure on the Obama administration to adopt the strongest possible version of its proposal. During the public comment period on DOT’s draft rules, the oil and rail industries argued for the weakest rules under consideration. Now the plans are being reviewed by the White House Office of Management and Budget, which tends to scale rules back in order to reduce their cost to business. Representatives from the oil and rail industries have been meeting with OMB to lobby for weaker rules.

Late last month, Chuck Schumer (N.Y.), who will take over as Senate Democratic leader after Harry Reid (Nev.) retires next year, announced that he and six colleagues — including Baldwin and Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (Ill.) — had sent a letter to OMB Director Shaun Donovan asking him to ensure “the rule is strong and comprehensive and that it is finalized as quickly as possible.” If nothing else, Schumer’s push and Cantwell’s bill will set up a countervailing force to the industry voices that the Obama administration is listening to.

The administration should protect public safety without being pushed by fellow Democrats — in this case, it has the power to do so without congressional approval. There is definitely a clear alternative to the false choice between pipelines and dangerous oil trains.

Forbes: Senators Try To Stop The Coming Oil Train Wreck

Repost from Forbes
[Editor:  Significant quote: “And the returning empty trains are not quite empty. They have enough oil remaining in them to produce highly volatile vapors that make them even more prone to explosions than the full cars.”  – RS]

Senators Try To Stop The Coming Oil Train Wreck

By James Conca, 4/06/2015 @ 7:45AM

Spearheaded by the Senators from Washington State, legislation just introduced in the United States Senate will finally address the rash of crude oil train wrecks and explosions that have skyrocketed over the last two years in parallel with the steep rise in the amount of crude oil transported by rail (Tri-City Herald).

Oil production is at an all-time high in America, great for our economy and energy independence, but bad for the people and places that lie along the shipping routes.

Just since February, there have been four fiery derailments of crude oil trains in North America (dot111) and many more simple spills.

More shale crude oil is being shipped by rail than ever before – every minute, shipments of more than two million gallons of crude are traveling distances of over a thousand miles in unit trains of more than a hundred tank cars (PHMSA.gov).

U.S. railroads delivered 7 million barrels of crude in 2008, 46 million in 2011, 163 million in 2012, and 262 million in 2013, almost as much as that anticipated by the Keystone XL Pipeline alone.

Diagram of a non-jacketed, non-pressure Rail Tank Car. According to the U.S. DOT regulations, “A tank car used for oil transport is roughly 60 feet long, about 11 feet wide, and 16 feet high. It weighs 80,000 pounds empty and 286,000 pounds when full. It can hold about 30,000 gallons or 715 barrels of oil, depending on the oil’s density. The tank is made of steel plate, 7/16 of an inch thick.” “The FRA and PHMSA have questioned whether Bakken crude oil, given its characteristics, would more properly be carried in tank cars that have additional safety features, such as those found on pressurized tank cars used for hauling explosive liquids. Pressurized tank cars have thicker shells and heads, metal jackets, strong protective housings for top fittings, and no bottom valves.” Source: U.S. CRS R43390

Amid a North American energy boom, our pipelines are at capacity and crude oil shipping on rail is dramatically increasing. The trains are getting bigger and towing more and more tanker cars. From 1975 to 2012, trains were short and spills were rare and small, with about half of those years having no spills above a few gallons (EarthJustice.org).

Crude is a nasty material, very destructive when it spills into the environment, and very toxic when it contacts humans or animals. It’s not even useful for energy, or anything else, until it’s chemically processed, or refined, into suitable products like naphtha, gasoline, heating oil, kerosene, asphaltics, mineral spirits, natural gas liquids, and a host of others.

But every crude oil has different properties, such as sulfur content (sweet to sour) or density (light to heavy), and requires a specific chemical processing facility to handle it (Permian Basin Oil&Gas). Different crudes produce different amounts and types of products, sometimes leading to a glut in one or more of them, like too much natural gas liquids that drops their price dramatically, or not enough heating oil that raises its price.

Thus, the push for more rail transport and pipelines to get it to the refineries along the Gulf Coast than can handle it.

Ensuring that these crude shipments are safe is the responsibility of the United States Department of Transportation, specifically the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) and Federal Railroad Administration (FRA).

Unfortunately, the shipments aren’t really that safe. We don’t have the correct train cars to carry this unusual freight. The United States now has 37,000 tank cars with thin-walls that puncture easily after which the vapors can cause massive explosions.

And the returning empty trains are not quite empty. They have enough oil remaining in them to produce highly volatile vapors that make them even more prone to explosions than the full cars.

A clear example of this danger came on July 6, 2013, when a train carrying 72 tank cars, and over 2,000,000 gallons of Bakken oil shale crude from the Williston Basin of North Dakota, derailed in the small town of Lac-Megantic, Quebec. Much of the town was destroyed and forty-seven people were killed.

This disaster brought the problem of rail transport of crude oil to the forefront of the news and of the State and Federal legislative bodies, and brought calls for safety reforms in the rail industry.

PHMSA undertook a series of unannounced inspections, testing, and analysis of the crude being transported (PHMSA.gov). While PHMSA found that Bakken crude is correctly classified chemically under transportation guidelines, the crude does have a higher gas content, higher vapor pressure, lower flash point and lower boiling point, so it has a higher degree of volatility than most other crudes in the United States. These properties cause increased ignitability and flammability.

PHMSA now requires extensive testing of crude for shipping, but the real problem remains – most of our tank cars are not safe to transport this stuff at all and should be taken out of service.

But that may change. Senators Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Patty Murray (D-WA), Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) and Dianne Feinstein (D-CA CA+0.48%) introduced the Crude-By-Rail Safety Act of 2015.

It’s no coincidence that the first two Senators listed are from Washington State. Trains hauling this type of flammable crude pass through our state every day, right through population centers totaling over a million people (Cantwell.Senate).And the number of oil trains will double next year.

This is strange for WA State because it’s the least carbon emitting state in the union and has already satisfied any and all carbon goals one could reasonably think up for any other state. And the state is poised to go even further. So increased oil and coal shipments across its length has the people of Washington State a bit concerned.

The rail standards set by the proposed legislation would require thermal protection, full-height head shields, shells more than half an inch thick, pressure relief valves and electronically controlled pneumatic brakes.

The Senators’ legislation would also authorize $40 million for training programs and grants to communities to update emergency response and notification plans.

According to Cantwell, “Firefighters responding to derailments have said they could do little more than stand a half-mile back and let the fires burn” (Tri-City Herald).

Rail carriers would be required to develop comprehensive emergency response plans for large accidents involving fire or explosions, provide information on shipments to state and local officials along routes — including what is shipped and its level of volatility — and to work with federal and local officials on their response plans.

“We want to make sure that we are doing everything we can to protect our communities and give first responders the tools they need,” Cantwell said.

It’s certainly time for some decent regulations on this increasing risk.