Category Archives: Emergency Readiness & Response

Washington Gov. Inslee eyeing a tax on oil shipments arriving by rail

Repost from Crosscut.com, Seattle, WA

Inslee is eyeing a tax on oil shipments arriving by rail

His measure could also target pipeline shipments.
By John Stang, December 6, 2014
Tanker cars can carry oil or LPG.
Tanker cars can carry oil or LPG. Paul K. Anderson, Chuckanut Conservancy

The Inslee administration’s leaders expect to introduce a bill to extend Washington’s 5-cents-a-barrel oil tax to pipelines and railroad oil cars.

Currently, the tax on the 42-gallon barrels applies only to oil arriving in Washington by ship. Dale Jensen, director of the Washington Department of Ecology’s oil spill program, briefed the House Environment Committee on the matter Friday.

Officials are also considering the possibility of increasing the current 5-cents-a-barrel tax on oil arriving in the state. Part of the money goes to oil spill prevention and response programs across the state. The administration has not yet calculated how much money will be needed in upcoming years, meaning it has also not decided yet whether to increase the five-cents tax or keep it intact, Jensen said.

Extending the tax to oil railcars and pipelines reflects the shrinking of the amount of oil arriving in Washington by ship, while pipeline traffic and rail oil traffic are increasing, Jensen said.

In 2003, 91 percent of the oil going to Washington’s refineries came by ship, with 9 percent arriving by pipeline, and none arriving by rail. In 2013, 67.4 percent arrived in Washington by ship, 24.2 percent by pipeline and 8.4 percent by railroad.

A typical tanker railcar holds 29,200 gallons. Washington’s five refineries process roughly 24.3 million gallons of crude oil a day, and have the capacity of processing 26.5 million gallons daily. At 42 gallons per barrel, that translates to approximately $34.75 in tax per tanker car or roughly $28,900 per day for the amount of imported oil to be refined in Washington.

In the 2014 legislative sessions, Sen. Rodney Tom of Medina — who retired this year and was the leader of the Senate’s Majority Coalition Caucus at that time — introduced a bipartisan bill to extend the oil tax to railroad oil cars, but not pipelines. With support from both parties, the Senate Ways & Means Committee recommended passage on March 10. But that bill did not make it to a full floor vote by the time the 2014 session ended on March 13.

Frank Holmes, representing the Western States Petroleum Association, said the organization supported Tom’s 2014 bill, which the association membership believed accurately reflected Washington’s oil traffic shifting from ship to rail. However, the association opposes installing the tax on pipeline oil. Holmes said Washington’s pipelines have had an excellent safety record during the past 50 years.

All this unfolds as Gov. Jay Inslee is digesting a draft state report on factors to consider on designing legislation to improve oil train safety in Washington. In the Legislature’s 2014 session, Democrats and Republicans introduced somewhat similar oil train emergency prevention and response bills, including requirements that oil companies and railroads provide advance information on each oil train to emergency agencies. But the two sides could not get past one major point. The Democrats wanted to make the volumes and chemical compositions of the oil in each upcoming train available to the public. The Republicans were against that provision, arguing it would expose proprietary corporate secrets.

Jensen speculated that Inslee may push for full public disclosure of the oil train information.

 

Albany NY Area officials say crude-oil transport is getting safer

Repost from The Press Republican, Plattsburgh, NY
[Editor: the safety improvements showcased here are far from adequate, nevertheless, it’s a good update on conditions in New York.  Sen. Schumer is absolutely right – the DOT-111 tank cars should be taken out of service immediately… and not just in New York.  And Bakken crude should be stabilized before it is transported (not just conditioned) … just as it is in Texas.  – RS]

Area officials say crude-oil transport is getting safer

Lohr McKinstry, December 6, 2014

LEWIS — New state regulations on crude-oil trains should help make them safer, Emergency Services officials from Essex and Clinton counties said recently.

State agencies have implemented 66 actions designed to strengthen standards, regulations and procedures to make the transport of crude oil by rail and water in New York safer and to improve spill preparedness and response.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo received a status report outlining the progress made by multiple state agencies after they were directed to evaluate the state’s capacity to prevent and address crude-oil accidents.

Local leaders have been concerned about the 100-car-plus oil trains moving through Clinton and Essex counties as the crude oil extracted in North Dakota arrives via Canadian Pacific Railway trains.

The oil is on its way to the Port of Albany, where it is stored for transport to various refineries.

IMPROVEMENTS

Essex County Emergency Services Director Donald Jaquish said he sees the new procedures as a safety benefit to the North Country.

“It’s a step in the right direction,” he told the Press-Republican. “We’re in a better position than we were a year ago.”

There’s been concern the trains could derail, and the oil burn or explode, as it has in other regions, and Jaquish praised Canadian Pacific for trying to make the tracks and tank cars safer.

“Upgrading the DOT-111 tank cars, rail replacement and maintenance, and specialized training are all beneficial to safety.

“Canadian Pacific has been helping us with training, hands-on-experience, that first responders need for these situations.”

EVACUATION PRACTICE

The tank cars are not owned by Canadian Pacific but by oil companies and vendors, and as a federal common carrier, the railroad is required to transport them.

Both the railroad and federal regulators have pushed for upgrades to the DOT-111 single-shell cars or a switch to the stronger DOT-109 or 112 cars.

“In almost any situation we get, we will be doing evacuations,” Jaquish said. “We’ve been working with Clinton County on planning and implementation.”

Clinton County Emergency Services Director Eric Day said any improvements to the transport of oil cars are welcome.

“At the end of the day, what they’ve done is good, no question,” Day told the Press-Republican. “Any regulatory move to make the DOT-111 cars safer is a plus. It’s a long time coming.”

One problem is that there are thousands of DOT-111 tank cars still in service, he said.

“There are so many of them (DOT-111 cars) out there on the tracks. They’re not going to stop moving the oil before they fix the cars. The oil is not going to stop coming any time soon.”

STATE GUIDANCE

Day said enhanced state regulations on oil shipments will be helpful.

“If there are changes that are pushed upon them (shippers), it can only make it safer. We’ve seen some of the benefits of the state’s work with regard to planning,” he said.

“We have guidance now on firefighting potential on dealing with these things. There are so many variables. Multiple cars of this crude oil on fire are a different animal.”

He said that, thanks to a donation, they now have the foam needed for such fires. The expensive product costs $30,000 for 1,000 gallons of foam but puts out crude-oil-based fires.

VOLATILE GAS

The North Dakota Industrial Commission has proposed draft regulations to remove the volatile gases from the oil before it is shipped, and Day said that provision is a good one.

“One of the things that makes the Bakken crude so volatile are the gases in the oil. The gas works its way out and is stuck in the head space of the car. If they breech, there’s flammable gas; cars that aren’t breeched and heat up, the gas could expand and be a problem.

“Removing that gas is a possibility before they put in the cars and ship it. If they could do that, it’s a big win.”

FEDERAL ROLE

Cuomo called for the federal government to mandate tank-car upgrades or replacement.

“The federal government plays a vital role in regulating this industry, and Washington must step up in order to expedite the implementation of safer policies and rules for crude-oil transport,” he said in the release.

The governor said the oil-production industry has resisted stronger tank-car standards and regulations requiring companies to reduce the volatility of crude before shipment.

A new report from the Brattle Group for the Railroad Supply Institute, a trade group, showed that a proposed federal rule to upgrade rail-tank cars could cost $60 billion.

According to the report, the high price tag is largely due to the costs associated with potential modifications to tank cars, early retirement of existing tank cars, temporarily using trucks instead of rails for transport and lost service time for tank cars under modification or awaiting modification.

‘TIME BOMBS’

U.S. Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-NY) has also come out against use of DOT-111 cars.

“These outmoded DOT-111 tank cars … are ticking time bombs that need to be upgraded ASAP,” the senator said in a news release.

“That is why for two years, since the tragedy at Lac-Megantic, I have pushed federal regulators to phase out and retrofit these cars.

“As a result of our efforts, the federal Department of Transportation has put a proposal on the table that could start taking these cars off the tracks within two years, as well as restrict the speeds at which these trains operate.”

On July 6, 2013, a 74-tank-car train carrying Bakken light crude derailed in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, and the tank cars exploded, killing 47 people, destroying 30 buildings and spilling 1.5 million gallons of heavy crude oil.

That disaster was followed by oil-train-explosion derailments in Alabama, North Dakota, Illinois and New Brunswick, Canada.

Canada Bans Thousands of Old Crude Rail Tank Cars

Repost from Natural Gas Intel’s Shale Daily

Canada Bans Thousands of Old Crude Rail Tank Cars

Richard Nemec, December 5, 2014

While it has a phase-out process running into 2017 for old (DOT-111) rail tank cars that carry crude oil, Canada’s Transport Department (CTD) has accelerated the process by banning nearly 3,000 of the older model cars from carrying “dangerous goods” throughout the nation.

The transportation agency, the equivalent to the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT), has ruled that 2,879 of the tank cars are not safe enough to continue carrying shipments of oil, chemicals or other explosive materials.

CTD issued a 30-day deadline to rail operators last April to stop using certain types of DOT-111 tank cars that were deemed to be least resistant to crashes, saying the cars needed to be refitted with thicker steel and stronger reinforcement over the next three years or face being decommissioned for crude shipments.

DOT-111 railcars were carrying crude in July 2013 when a train derailed causing an explosion that killed 47 people in the small Quebec town of Lac-Megantic (see Shale Daily, July 9, 2013). It was subsequently determined that more than 5,000 of the rail tank cars without reinforced bottoms were still operating in North America, nearly 3,000 of them in Canada.

Since then, CTD has taken further measures, including

  • Removing the least crash-resistant DOT-111 tank cars from dangerous goods service;
  • Introducing new safety standards for DOT-111 tank cars, and requiring those that do not meet the new standards to be phased out by May 1, 2017;
  • Requiring railway companies to slow trains transporting dangerous goods and introduce other key operating procedures;
  • Requiring emergency response plans for even a single tank car carrying crude oil, gasoline, diesel, aviation fuel, and ethanol; and
  • Creating a task force that brings municipalities, first responders, railways, and shippers together to strengthen emergency response capacity across the country.

“The department has moved to enhance inspections, documentation, and follow-up for rail safety and transport of dangerous goods,” the agency said on its website. “This includes more frequent inspections at sites where petroleum products are transferred from one mode of transport to another, for example from truck to rail.”

Early this year, the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) issued a series of recommendations calling for tougher standards for rail shipments of crude oil on both sides of the U.S.-Canada border (see Shale Daily, Jan. 23). NTSB and the Transportation Safety Board of Canada issued the recommendations jointly in recognition that the same companies operate crude rail trains in both nations, frequently crossing the U.S.-Canada border.

NTSB called the joint move unprecedented and said it came in response to growing concerns about “major loss of life, property damage and environmental consequences” from the increasingly large volumes of crude oil being carried by railroads in North America.

DOT’s Pipeline Hazardous Materials and Safety Administration earlier this year issued new rules dealing with the design of new rail tank cars, maintenance of the rail infrastructure, content of the crude supplies being shipped and notification and training of local emergency response organizations (see Shale Daily, July 24).

Washington State report on oil train safety: new risks, more to do

Repost from BismarckTribune.com, Bakken Breakout

Study: more to do as oil trains pose new risks

December 02, 2014, PHUONG LE, Associated Press

SEATTLE — The spike in crude oil shipments by rail in Washington is creating new potential risks and will require increased safety measures and improved oil spill response and prevention, according to a state study delivered to lawmakers.

Even as more trains carry volatile shipments of crude oil into the state, nearly 60 percent of first responders said they don’t have sufficient training or resources to handle a train derailment accompanied by a fire.

The draft report delivered on Monday makes a dozen key recommendations to the Legislature for the upcoming two-year budget, including more training for first responders, more railroad inspectors and ensuring that those who transport oil can pay for cleanup.

Some actions don’t require money, but the others could total more than $14 million.

The report also outlines the environmental and safety risks from oil transport, many of which could be mitigated with additional federal and state resources.

Derailments of oil trains have caused explosions in several states and Quebec, where 47 people were killed when a runaway train exploded in the city of Lac-Megantic in July 2013.

In Washington, crude oil shipments went from zero in 2011 to 714 million gallons in 2013, and could reach nearly 3 billion gallons by the end of this year or in 2015, the report said.

As many as 19 mile-long trains carrying Bakken crude oil from North Dakota and Montana pass through the state weekly. Nearly 3 million people live in 93 cities and towns on or near these routes, posing potential public safety, health and environmental risks, the report said.

One train typically has about 100 rail cars and carries about 3 million gallons of oil. Some trains head south to Oregon and California without stopping to transfer oil in Washington. Others deliver oil to Washington facilities.

By 2020, the number of trains could grow to 137 a week if all proposed crude-by-rail terminals, including projects in Longview and Grays Harbor are built out and oil continues to be exported through the state, the report said.

Those proposed terminals could also bring more tanker and tug and barge traffic in the Columbia River and Grays Harbor area, as well as along the coast.

BP Cherry Point Refinery in Puget Sound is currently receiving Bakken crude oil deliveries from tug-barges from the Columbia River.

The report also raises concerns about diluted bitumen, which comes mostly from Alberta oil sands and has been shipped into the state for years. But shipments are increasing. Bitumen raises spill response challenges because it may sink or submerge in water if spilled, making recovery of the oil difficult, the report said.

The Department of Ecology, the Utilities and Transportation Commission and the Washington Military Department’s Emergency Management Division worked on the report.