Category Archives: Bakken Crude

Bakken Crude, Crude By Rail, Hazmat notification, Oil train contents, Rail routing

North Dakota Oil-By-Rail Routes & Chemical Composition Published for First Time

Repost from DESMOGBLOG
[Editor: This is an incredibly detailed report on North Dakota train routes and contents.  I am seeing similar reports for Washington State, Illinois and points east.  I am assuming – and hoping – that we will see something like this for California soon.  – RS]

Exclusive: North Dakota Oil-By-Rail Routes Published for First Time

Fri, 2014-06-27, Steve Horn

For the first time, DeSmogBlog has published dozens of documents obtained from the North Dakota government revealing routes and chemical composition data for oil-by-rail trains in the state carrying oil obtained via hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) in the Bakken Shale.

The information was initially submitted to the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) under the legal dictates of a May 7 Emergency Order, which both the federal government and the rail industry initially argued should only be released to those with a “need-to-know” and not the public at-large.

North Dakota’s Department of Emergency Services, working in consultation with the North Dakota Office of the Attorney General, made the documents public a couple weeks after DeSmogBlog filed a June 13 North Dakota Public Records Statute request.

“There is no legal basis to protect what they have provided us at this point,” North Dakota assistant attorney general Mary Kae Kelsch said during the June 25 Department of Emergency Service’s quarterly meeting, which DeSmogBlog attended via phone. “It doesn’t meet any criteria for our state law to protect this.”

Initially, oil-by-rail giant Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) and other rail companies sent boilerplate letters — one copy of which has been obtained by DeSmogBlog from the Idaho Bureau of Homeland Security through the state’s Public Records Act — to several State Emergency Response Commissions (SERCs), arguing train routes should be kept confidential.

BNSF also sent several SERCs a boilerplate contract proposal, requesting that they exempt the information rail companies were compelled to submit to the SERCs under the DOT Emergency Order from release under Freedom of Information Act. A snippet of the proposed contract can be seen below:

Dan Wilz, homeland security division director and state security advisor of the Department of Emergency Services, said the claims did not hold legal water.

“Joe can stand on a street corner and figure that out within a week’s period,” Wilz said at the quarterly meeting. “They watch the trains go through their community each and every day.”

BNSF, Canadian Pacific Railway (CP Rail) and Northern Plains Railroad all submitted information to the Department of Emergency Services.

CP Rail: 7 Trains/Week, “Highly Flammable”

In its submission to the North Dakota Department of Emergency Services, CP Rail revealed it sent seven oil-by-rail trains through 13 counties in North Dakota the week of June 9-15. CP Rail also estimated it generally sends 2-5 trains through those same counties during an average week.

Some oil-by-rail trains, dubbed “bomb trains” by some due to their propensity to explode, carry over 2,677,500 gallons of fracked oil. The trains are often over a mile in length and contain over 100 cars.

The company also released information on the chemical composition of the Bakken oil it sends on its rail cars, conceding that Bakken oil is “highly flammable” and “easily ignited by heat, sparks or flames.”

Further, CP Rail admitted that Bakken oil has “a very low flash point” and that “water spray when fighting [its] fire may be inefficient.”

BNSF: Bakken Oil-By-Rail King

BNSF, owned by Warren Buffett — a major campaign contributor to President Barack Obama both in 2008 and 2012 and one of the richest men on the planet — is widely considered the king of oil-by-rail in the U.S. The documents BNSF released to the Department of Emergency Services back up the notion.

One document shows BNSF sent 31 oil-by-rail trains through Cass County, North Dakota during the week of May 29 – June 4, also saying it sends between 30-45 trains per week on average through the County. That same week, 30 BNSF trains zoomed through Barnes County, North Dakota.

A document filed the next week, covering June 5 – June 11, shows 45 trains passed through Cass County that week. Another 37 passed through Ward County, North Dakota and another 33 through McHenry, Pierce and Mountrail counties.

Northern Plains: Chemical Composition Revealed

In its DOT submission, Northern Plains included an expansive Bakken crude oil sample chemical composition test submitted by Musket Corporation, which has a terminal and transload site in North Dakota.

Northern Plains also submitted a Bakken Crude Safety Data Sheet, created by Musket, as well. The Sheet echos CP Rail in stating that Bakken oil is a “highly flammable liquid and vapor.”

Further, the Sheet explains that Bakken oil contains Benzene, a carcinogen.

A record amount of Bakken oil spilled into waterways that are a drinking source for many as a result explosions of oil-by-rail trains in 2013. Most recently, the exploding oil-by-rail train in Lynchburg, Virginia spilled into the James River.


Photo Credit: Erin Ferrell – ABC 13 News | Twitter

Compared to CP Rail and BNSF, Northern Plains is a minor player in terms of the amount of oil it carries by rail in North Dakota. It submitted that it carries 12 trains per year and all within Walsh County, North Dakota, also including a map of its route.

“Right to Know” vs. “Need to Know”

Despite the fact dozens of oil-by-rail trains pass through North Dakota counties on a daily basis, carrying a substance that contains a known carcinogen and is “highly flammable,” Big Rail and Big Oil used its legal might to claim only a select few “need to know” where these cars travel.

“For some reason this entire rail oil industry, they just fill these rail cars and send them without really knowing what’s in them,” Scott Smith, chief scientist for Water Defense said in an article appearing in the summer edition of the Earth Island Journal. “And it’s the only industry I’m aware of that gets away with that.”

But this time around, due to the North Dakota Public Records Statute, Big Rail and Big Oil didn’t get away with it.

Photo Credit: Kyle Potter | Forum of Fargo-Moorhead

Attachment Size
BNSF ND Oil-by-Rail Filing.pdf 10.69 MB
Northern Plains ND Oil-by-Rail Filing.pdf 14.68 MB
Canadian Pacific ND Oil-by-Rail Filing.pdf 10.7 MB
Bakken Crude, California Regulation, Crude By Rail, Hazmat notification

California wants details on crude oil shipments by railroad

Repost from The Riverside Press Enterprise
[Editor: This Southern California newspaper regrets that rail routing information about its Inland Area has so far not been made available to first responders or the public.  Significant quote: “So far the Office of Emergency Services has received two letters from BNSF Railway, dated June 6 and 13, which say that one train carrying plains crude went through Sacramento County and eight other counties during the week of June 5 to 11, and none entered California during the previous week….Union Pacific submitted a letter May 29 to the state office, saying the company was ‘compiling and reviewing the data.’”    – RS]

California wants details on crude oil shipments by railroad

It’s unclear whether any oil trains have passed through the Inland area, but officials want to know so they can plan for possible accidents.
By David Danelski, June 26, 2014
A BNSF Railway train hauls crude oil near Wolf Point, Mont. Montana officials intend to release details next week on oil trains passing through the state despite efforts by railroads to keep the information from the public. FILE PHOTO: MATT BROWN , AP
A BNSF Railway train hauls crude oil near Wolf Point, Mont. Montana officials intend to release details next week on oil trains passing through the state despite efforts by railroads to keep the information from the public. FILE PHOTO: MATT BROWN , AP

Disclosures from railroad companies about volatile crude oil shipments from the Northern Plains are starting to be made public after the Obama administration last month ordered that such information be shared with states.

But so far only a trickle of details about the dangerous cargo has been shared with California’s emergency response agency. Initial information from one railroad showed that some of the oil has been shipped into Northern California.

“We are working with them to provide more information so our first responders can better prepare for accidents and derailments,” said Kelly Huston, a spokesman for the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services.

It remains unclear whether any of the shipments of crude oil have passed through the Inland area

So far the Office of Emergency Services has received two letters from BNSF Railway, dated June 6 and 13, which say that one train carrying plains crude went through Sacramento County and eight other counties during the week of June 5 to 11, and none entered California during the previous week.

Union Pacific submitted a letter May 29 to the state office, saying the company was “compiling and reviewing the data.”

BNSF Railway spokeswoman Roxanne Butler said her company is complying with the federal order, which pertains only to crude shipments since May that have come from the Bakken region of North Dakota and Montana.

Most of the crude oil coming into California by rail is from Canada, according to 2013 state data.

Butler added that the railroad industry is sponsoring emergency response training in Colorado this summer for firefighters and other professionals who may have to deal with accidents involving trains hauling crude oil. Numerous emergency responders in California have signed up to participate, she said.

Railroad officials in the past have carefully guarded information about about toxic cargo shipments, including times and routes of tank cars loaded with potentially deadly chlorine and ammonia gases, citing security concerns. Such shipments routinely pass by Inland homes, schools and businesses.

In its two letters to the state, BNSF reiterated that crude oil shipment data should kept confidential and released only to “those people with a need to know.”

Huston said state attorneys determined that the BNSF information could be released to the public.

The letters were in response to U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx’s order last month requiring the nation’s railroads to provide states with information about crude shipments from the oil fields in the Bakken region of North Dakota and Montana.

Crude oil from shale rock formations below the plains has been involved in most of the major rail accidents as the crude-by-rail industry rapidly expanded in the past several years, The Associated Press reported.

The AP learned this week from public records requests that dozens of the trains are passing weekly through Illinois and the Midwest and up to 19 a week are reaching Washington state.

Bakken Crude, Crude By Rail, Take Action

Oil Train Week of Action July 6-13, 2014

Repost from San Francisco Bay Area Independent Media Center

Oil Train Week of Action July 6-13, 2014

by Matt Landon ( vancouveractionnetwork [at] gmail.com )
Jun 20th, 2014

Bakken crude oil trains have exploded at least 8 times since the first a year ago in Canada. Please plan an action during July 6-13, 2014 to protest the continued endangerment of our communities by the oil by rail industry.

Please repost far and wide.

Are explosive Bakken crude oil trains coming through your town? / Actions you can take now!

July 6, 2014 marks the one year anniversary of the first major oil train explosion in Canada which took the lives of 47 people. The week of July 6-13, 2014 is an international week of action to mark this anniversary and make sure these folk’s lives were not lost in vain. Your actions should not be limited to this one week as we are dealing with an entrenched oil and rail industry and don’t settle for anything less than the a complete ban on any oil shipped by DOT 111 and DOT 111a cars.

Actions are being posted on http://www.stopoiltrains.org

When you organize a protest please contact us at vancouveractionnetwork [at] gmail.com

We have come up with tactics here in Vancouver, Washington to take this from a defensive to an offensive fight against the oil by rail industry. Please consider using these tactics as they are and will be effective. If you begin using this tactics please contact us so we can help document your work. If you need tech support contact us.

Take care, matt landon with Vancouver Action Network vancouveractionnetwork.blogspot.com

Check out this map to see if oil trains are coming through– http://priceofoil.org/rail-map/

Oil trains are bad because they have blown up at least 8 times in the last year killing innocent railside residents and polluting the environment. As the US and Canada have increased their oil extraction and production–and as resistance to oil pipelines becomes more effective–the use of trains to transport oil has skyrocketed, leaving communities vulnerable to explosions, oil spills, and unmonitored oil train air emissions. We must take action now to stop this trend!

Call to Action— Nationwide protests and formation of an International Oil Train Activists movement

This is a call for activists to join in creating an International Oil Train Activists movement and to help organize mass non-violent protests across the North American continent against explosive oil trains.

We have three nationwide protest actions.

1) First contact your state Emergency Management Agency and fill out a public records request for information which the railroads have provided to the EMA’s in relation to DOT Emergency Order DOT-OST-2014-0067 and which was due by June 7, 2014.

Find your state EMA– http://www.fema.gov/state-offices-and-agencies-emergency-management

For more info about DOT Emergency Order– http://www.dot.gov/briefing-room/emergency-order

Information on public records request in WA– http://www.mil.wa.gov/about/about_public_records_disclosure.shtml

Here is the request form for Washington state– http://www.mil.wa.gov/about/documents/mil_public_records_request_form.pdf

Please print the above form and fill in the following information including your name, date, email and signature and return to the WA state EMA or your state EMA.

We have filed an information request here in Washington state and the EMA informed us that the railroad would likely seek a court injunction against our request. This is GREAT because it means that the railroad is spending between several hundred and several thousand dollars to keep one person from one group from getting this information! Let’s see how many people we can get to request this information and how much money we can cost the railroads. We plan to request this information in 49 US states.

When you request info from your state EMA please let us know vancouveractionnetwork [at] gmail.com

2) Since the railroads won’t release their oil train information we can just generate the information ourselves. You can start a 100% Oil Train Watch in your city, town, or neighborhood by using Twitter on a computer or smart phone. If you see a 100% oil train Tweet the time, location, direction of train travel, and your state’s abbreviation in the hashtag such as #waoiltrainwatch for Washington state or #tnoiltrainwatch for Tennessee. By watching and recording these trains we can be a warning siren for first responders, elected officials and the general public with real time information. We can also use this information to provide a check on the info the railroads provide to the state EMAs, and on possible total oil train volume violations of air quality permits of current export facilities.

To view our Train Watching activities go to vancouveractionnetwork.blogspot.com

Let us know you are Tweeting about 100% oil trains at vancouveractionnetwork [at] gmail.com

3) The Department of Transportation and Federal Railroad Administration are the two agencies that regulate Hazardous Materials shipping via railroads. We demand that they immediately issue an Emergency Order halting the hauling of any type of crude oil in the outdated and unsafe DOT 111 and DOT 111a railcars. By organizing a protest in your own city or state you will be joining in the growing movement to bring a halt to these explosive oil trains before the next city is vaporized, life is lost, or environment spoiled.

The Department of Transportation has the authority to deem the DOT 111 and DOT 111a railcar fleet unsafe for hauling explosive crude oil yet they have been dragging their feet on taking real action. We demand they take immediate action. Each state has multiple regional DOT offices and we need protests at each one.

Department of Transportation state/ regional offices and headquarters in Washington DC– https://fhwaapps.fhwa.dot.gov/foisp/staffnetStateDOT.do
and

Federal Railroad Administration regional offices — http://www.fra.dot.gov/Page/P0244
Headquarters Washington DC Region 1 Cambridge, MA Region 2 Crum Lynne, PA Region 3 Atlanta, GA Region 4 Chicago, IL Region 5 Fort Worth, TX Region 6 Kansas City, MO Region 7 Sacramento, CA Region 8 Vancouver, WA

4) Consider attending the Washington Oil Train Summit August 22-23, 2014 at Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA. More info at http://washingtonoiltrainsummit.blogspot.com This summit will mainly be focused on solidifying the WA Oil Train Activists actions but we are inviting representatives from other groups to attend as well so that we can grow the International movement.

Thanks Matt Landon with Vancouver Action Network vancouveractionnetwork.blogspot.com

http://vancouveractionnetwork.blogspot.com
Bakken Crude, Crude By Rail, Hazmat notification

CSX’s oil shipping information made public in Virginia

Repost from The Roanoke Times

[Editor: Significant quote: “In addition to describing oil train movements, the CSX notice to Virginia officials named contacts within the Jacksonville, Fla., company who oversee hazardous materials shipments; published a number for its emergency call center; and furnished nine pages of general and technical information about crude oil’s makeup, chemical properties, handling, dangers and mitigation measures in the event of a spill…. A red placard bearing the number 1267 is plastered on the side of every oil tanker car for easy identification.”  – RS]

CSX’s oil shipping information publicized by government

The disclosure of routes and frequency of oil trains through Virginia was first mandated by the Department of Trasnsportation
By Jeff Sturgeon | The Roanoke Times  |  June 20, 2014 

Between two and five CSX tanker trains loaded with 1 million gallons or more of flammable crude oil cross Virginia’s midsection weekly, taking a west-to-east route to a Yorktown refinery, state records show.

No railroad has previously revealed its oil shipping volumes and routes in the state. But the U.S. Department of Transportation last month told the nation’s railroads that ship flammable Bakken crude oil to notify states of oil-filled trains moving within their borders as a safety precaution, effective this month.

The first notice, received by the Virginia Department of Emergency Management about June 4, was made public Friday in response to a public records request.

The information is supposed to empower local emergency responders to better respond to a future train crash like the derailment that caught fire in Lynchburg almost eight weeks ago.

In disclosing its oil-hauling practices, CSX mapped the route along which it carries oil. The trains, which contain domestically pumped crude oil, appear to enter the state from West Virginia in Alleghany County, pass through or near Covington, and roll east to the Yorktown area, the site of an oil distribution terminal.

The trains traverse 20 counties.

Virginia officials are passing the information to local emergency responders in counties where oil trains pass. Quarterly updates will be shared as well, VDEM said.

The state’s emergency response agency plans to ask CSX to help develop a procedure by which a community holding a special event could ask CSX to modify its train schedules and not ship crude through that community during the event.

A high number of Bakken crude-filled trains in North America have crashed in recent years, leading to enactment of enhanced safety measures. The federal transportation agency issued an emergency order May 7 that directed the nation’s railroads to notify states about all oil trains carrying 1 million gallons or more of crude oil.

A train carrying 1 million gallons of oil would typically be comprised of about 35 tanker cars.

Norfolk Southern Corp. has notified the state it does operate such trains in Virginia.

Just a week before the new rule, a CSX oil train derailed, released oil and caught fire on the bank of the James River in Lynchburg. That train, which came from Chicago, was carrying 3 million gallons of crude oil on its way to Yorktown, VDEM said.

CSX continues to use the route through Lynchburg.

CSX officials asked Virginia officials to not make public the notification. But VDEM released it, saying the same information was available from other public sources.

In addition to describing oil train movements, the CSX notice to Virginia officials named contacts within the Jacksonville, Fla., company who oversee hazardous materials shipments; published a number for its emergency call center; and furnished nine pages of general and technical information about crude oil’s makeup, chemical properties, handling, dangers and mitigation measures in the event of a spill.

A red placard bearing the number 1267 is plastered on the side of every oil tanker car for easy identification.