Repost from Oil Change International [Editor: Excellent 8-page report. Interesting for folks on both coasts, and critical for those along the rails in the Midwest and Eastern states! TAKE NOTE: Does this report describe our future on the west coast? – RS]
U.S. East Coast is key crude-by-rail destination
By Lorne Stockman, July 22, 2015
An examination of crude-by-rail data shows that the U.S. east coast has become one of the busiest regional destinations for hazardous crude-by-rail traffic. Oil Change International used publicly available Department of Energy (EIA) data as well as subscription data from Genscape to examine the growth of crude-by-rail to one of the most densely populated areas of the United States.
Key Findings:
An average of 450,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude was delivered by rail to the east coast region in 2014.
Around 50% of all crude-by-rail is unloaded in the wider east coast region (PADD 1).
Around 50% of the crude oil input to six east coast refineries is supplied by rail.
Over 80% of the crude oil delivered by rail to the region comes from North Dakota (Bakken crude).
Canada is the next biggest source of crude-by- rail for the region at around 12%.
Five key terminals account for 73% of the unloading capacity and around 65% of the throughput of the region’s crude-by-rail terminals.
This briefing provides additional information on crude-by-rail to the east coast. For further information on crude-by-rail see www.priceofoil/rail
Two years and three days ago, a train carrying crude oil from the Bakken rock formation along the border between the United States and Canada in the northern Great Plains derailed in the town of Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, Canada, causing explosions of oil tank cars that destroyed dozens of buildings in the central part of Lac-Mégantic and killed 47 people.
The train that derailed in Lac-Mégantic passed through Milwaukee, the largest city in the American state of Wisconsin, where a railroad bridge responsible for carrying trains loaded with oil tank cars has deteriorated so badly, some of the beams supported the place have been rusted hollow. Earlier this week, a protest was held at the bridge, which runs right next to lofts in the Fifth Ward area of Milwaukee that would likely be destroyed in the event that an oil train derails and explodes, whether it occurs because of the bridge collapsing or for some other reason. Protesters were critical of both the deteriorating condition of the bridge and the oil trains that use it frequently, and they called for the release of bridge inspection reports and for the development of an evacuation plan in the event that either an oil train or other type of train carrying hazardous materials were to derail.
The deteriorating railroad bridge in Milwaukee is owned by Canadian Pacific Railway, a company, which is based in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, that runs freight trains through the United States and Canada. Under United States federal law, Canadian Pacific is legally responsible for inspecting the bridge and maintaining inspection reports. However, because the bridge has rusted and deteriorated so badly, a proper inspection of the bridge is impossible, according to a steel engineer that WITI-TV, a local television station in Milwaukee, brought to the bridge with them. Despite requests from WITI, Canadian Pacific has repeatedly refused to make the bridge inspection reports available to them. Additionally, the United States Federal Railroad Administration, the only government entity in the United States that can demand the release of bridge audits from Canadian Pacific, has claimed to have never asked for the Milwaukee bridge inspection reports from Canadian Pacific.
Because of deteriorating railroad infrastructure and more trains carrying tank cars full of highly-explosive oil across America, places like Milwaukee could become the next Lac-Mégantic if action isn’t taken to fix our crumbling infrastructure and increase the amount of energy being generated from renewable sources like solar and wind.
Firefighters letting flames burn toxic chemical after Blount County train derailment
News Sentinel staff, Jul 2, 2015 5:54 AM, updated later…
A CSX train burns on Thursday, July 2, 2015, after it derailed near Old Mount Tabor Road in Blount County overnight. (MICHAEL PATRICK/NEWS SENTINEL)
Firefighters haven’t tried to douse flames burning a derailed train car containing a toxic substance that already has sent 10 law enforcement officers to a hospital.
“I think they’re just letting it burn itself out because they don’t want to get too close to it,” Blount County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Marian O’Briant said Thursday morning.
“It’s very toxic.”
The flammable chemical is Acrylonitrile, a substance used in manufacturing plastics. The chemical is considered carcinogenic. Exposure can burn the skin, inflame the lining of the lungs and nose and cause headaches, nausea and dizziness.
O’Briant said five officers with the Sheriff’s Office and five from the Alcoa Police Department were exposed to the substance during efforts to evacuate 5,000 people from a 2-mile radius from the derailment.
“Going door to door, they just breathed in some of the fumes,” she said.
The Sheriff’s Office called in extra officers to deal with the situation, O’Briant said.
“Just about every emergency agency in Blount County is involved,” she said.
The Tennessee Emergency Management Agency also has joined the effort.
Authorities have closed a section of U.S. Highway 321 between the bypass to West Blount Drive, O’Briant said. She was unsure if a detour route had been established.
Residents who use wells from south of Robert C. Jackson Drive off US. 321 to Friendsville should not drink the water, she said.
“They recommend you don’t drink the well water until further notice,” O’Briant said. “It’s just a precaution for now.”
Officers initially established a shelter for displaced residents at the Foothills Mall, but later moved people to Heritage High School. The American Red Cross chapter is staffing the high school to help those evacuated.
“Streaming in and out it’s about 100 people,” O’Briant said of the number of people at the high school.
“There’s fewer people now than there was earlier because they’re calling friends and relatives and finding places to stay,” she said.
Dayanny Hernandez, 18, and the rest of her extended family headed to the emergency room shortly after 10 a.m.
Hernandez and her mother complained of a headache, stomach pains and sore throat hours after a train carrying poisonous liquids derailed in Blount County.
“It’s hard to explain,” Hernandez said of the feeling in her throat and stomach.
Ana Castro, a family member who is 14 weeks pregnant and lives nearby, said she too wanted to get checked out. She woke at 3 this morning when a tired-looking firefighter banged on apartment door.
Clutching her 1-year-old daughter, she stood and ate breakfast with her extended family at Heritage High School before leaving for the hospital. CSX has said they would reimburse the family for the doctor’s visit.
Sandra Kelley left her yorkie and maltipoo at home this morning when authorities knocked on her door at 1 a.m., telling her to evacuate.
“I feel so bad because I only thought we would be gone for a couple of hours,” Kelley said.
One dog is in a cage; the other in the bathroom. Neither has food or water and authorities have since said it could be 48 hours before residents are allowed back into their homes.
A Red Cross assured Kelley the dogs would be OK. But O’Briant said it’s been a common problem.
A number of people have asked about returning home to get their dogs, but authorities will not let anyone through, she said.
Authorities said the evacuation could remain in force for 24-48 hours.
The Blount Partnership said in a statement that it is working with the businesses and residents affected by the train derailment.
“We will assist all businesses and individuals affected by this accident any way we can to get them operating as soon as possible,” said Bryan Daniels, Blount Partnership president/CEO.
Displaced residents with pets are being told to take the critters to the Blount County Animal Shelter on Curry Avenue, O’Briant said. Pets are not allowed at the high school shelter.
— Don Jacobs and Megan Boehnke
—
UPDATE: Pellissippi campus used as command center
It’s highly unlikely that anyone was on campus in the hours after a train derailed and displaced residents near the Blount County campus of Pellissippi State Community College.
Anthony Wise, the community college’s president, closed the campus about 6 this morning, and emergency workers are using the campus as a command center, said Julia Wood, a Pellissippi spokeswoman.
Wood said it was highly unlikely anyone was on campus before 6 a.m. since it was so early and the roads to the campus would have been blocked by emergency workers.
There are 145 students registered for summer classes on the Blount County campus, and there are 20 faculty and staff who work there as well.
But Wood said only those with classes today would have been on campus.
The campus was already scheduled to be closed Friday for Independence Day.
— MJ Slaby
UPDATE: Federal investigators on the scene
A statement from the Federal Railroad Administration said the agency had investigators and hazmat inspectors at the scene of a train derailment in Blount County.
“Once it is safe, FRA will begin a thorough investigation to determine the cause of the derailment,” the statement said.
— The Associated Press
—
UPDATE: Emergency workers decontaminated
Authorities have decontaminated 10 emergency workers exposed Thursday to a toxic substance released during a train derailment and the resulting fire, and another dozen first responders are expected to undergo the cleansing operation.
Blount Memorial Hospital spokesman Josh West said three of the first responders had been decontaminated by 4:15 a.m. in a special tent set up behind the hospital. The other seven first responders had been cleansed as of 7 a.m.
“We expect 12 more at this time, but they haven’t come through yet,” West said.
He identified the toxic substance as acrylonitrile, a colorless liquid used in the manufacture of plastics. Exposure can burn the skin, cause nausea, headaches and dizziness, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. At least one death has been recorded from inhalation of the substance.
West said after being scrubbed down, the workers underwent oxygen breathing treatments to “sort of flush the lungs to make sure there’s no problem.” West was unsure for which agencies the first responders worked. None of the treated workers have been released from the hospital. West was unsure how long the workers will be kept at the facility.
“That’s kind of fluid,” he said. “We’re holding them for observation.”
West said no residents were treated for exposure to the substance. The hospital was assisting two residents who were evacuated so quickly they were unable to get all their medical supplies and medications together.
— Don Jacobs
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UPDATE: Statement from CSX
CSX is working with first responders and relief agencies in Maryville following the derailment of a tank car that is on fire. CSX personnel are on hand at an Outreach Center that has been established at Heritage High School. Displaced residents are being offered assistance, including lodging.
Around midnight, a train en route from Cincinnati, Ohio, to Waycross, Ga., derailed the single tank car loaded with acrylonitrile, a hazardous material used in a variety of industrial processes including the manufacture of plastics. The substance is flammable and presents an inhalation risk. First responders have ordered an evacuation of residences and businesses in a two-mile radius.
The train consists of two locomotives and 57 cars, including 45 loaded cars and 12 empty cars. Cars of acrylonitrile are located on either side of the burning rail car. No crude oil is among the rail cars. A total of 27 cars in the train are carrying hazardous materials.
—
UPDATE: Second Harvest food deliveries delayed
Second Harvest Food Bank of East Tennessee will not be able to make deliveries Thursday due to the derailment.
The food bank’s 80,000-square-foot warehouse off Middlesettlements Road is in the evacuation area, according to executive director Elaine Streno.
Closings due to train derailment
Pellissippi State’s Blount County campus
Second Harvest Food Bank warehouse (no food delivery of pickups today)
Denso Manufacturing plant
The food bank’s six programs provide 1.1 million meals a month in an 18-county area.
It will resume deliveries when the area is no longer sealed off.
— News Sentinel staff
—
ORIGINAL REPORT: Train derailment forces 5,000 from their homes
A CSX train carrying a “highly flammable and toxic” gas derailed in Blount County on Wednesday night, forcing the evacuation of 5,000 people from their homes.
The derailment was reported about 11:50 p.m. Wednesday at the crossing at Old Mount Tabor Road, according to an emergency dispatcher. Flames erupted from the scene.
The Blount County Fire Department and the Maryville Fire Department responded.
Authorities have not released details about the number of train cars involved in the crash or the specific substances involved.
Officers with the Blount County Sheriff’s Office have been evacuating a two-mile radius around the derailment. Displaced residents without another place to go were initially housed at the Foothills Mall. Later the American Red Cross established a shelter at Heritage High School. All those in need of a place to stay are being directed to the high school, authorities said.
The Blount County Sheriff’s Office posted on its Facebook page Thursday morning that the evacuation could last 24 to 48 hours.
Authorities have established a command center at Pellissippi State Community College off U.S. Highway 321.
More details as they develop online and in Friday’s News Sentinel.
Railroads use new oil shipment rule to fight transparency
By Curtis Tate, McClatchy Washington Bureau, 6/25/15
A CSX oil train moves east through Selkirk Yard near Albany, N.Y., on May 26, 2015. The Albany area has become a hub for crude by rail shipments as East Coast refineries have replaced imported oil with mid-continent sources. CSX and other railroads continue their push to keep routing and volume information about the shipments from the public. CURTIS TATE — McClatchy
WASHINGTON — Railroads may have found a new weapon in their fight to keep information about oil train shipments from the public: a federal rule that was supposed to increase transparency.
The U.S. Department of Transportation insists that its May 1 final rule on oil trains, which mostly addresses an outdated tank car design, does not support the railroads’ position, nor was it intended to leave anyone in the dark.
But in recent court filings in Maryland, two major oil haulers have cited the department’s new rule to justify their argument that no one except emergency responders should know what routes the trains use or how many travel through each state during a given week.
Those details have been publicly available in most states for a year, though some sided with the railroads and refused to release them. The periodic reports have helped state and local officials with risk assessments, emergency planning and firefighter training.
The department’s rule was expected to expand the existing disclosure requirements. In its 395-page rule, the department acknowledged an overwhelming volume of public comments supporting more transparency. But ultimately, it offered the opposite.
The final rule ends the existing disclosure requirements next March. Railroads no longer would be required to provide information to the states, leaving emergency responders to request details about oil train shipments on their own, and the public would be shut out entirely.
The switch floored those who submitted comments in favor of increased transparency.
“The justification was not consistent with the comments given,” said Denise Rucker Krepp, a former senior counsel for the House Homeland Security Committee and chief counsel for the U.S. Maritime administration. “They’re supposed to be the same.”
Facing push-back from Capitol Hill, Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx assured lawmakers in a May 28 letter that “we fully support the public disclosure of this information to the extent allowed by applicable state, local and tribal laws.”
Foxx added that the department was not attempting to undermine transparency.
“That was certainly not the intent of the rule,” he wrote eight Senate Democrats.
But Foxx’s assurances differ sharply from the assertions of Norfolk Southern and CSX in court documents filed last month in Maryland. The documents are related to a case last summer when the railroads sued the state to block the release of oil train reports to McClatchy.
The final rule provides “clear and unequivocal guidance” that information about oil train routes and volumes are security- and commercially-sensitive, attorneys for the railroads wrote on May 5 to Judge Lawrence Fletcher-Hill of the Circuit Court for Baltimore City.
That classification would trigger an exemption from the state’s Public Information Act.
A trial is scheduled for August, though Fletcher-Hill could decide before then whether to dismiss the case in favor of the railroads or the state.
Both companies declined to comment on the case.
Last May, the Transportation Department issued an emergency order requiring railroads to notify states of large shipments of Bakken crude oil after a series of fiery derailments involving the light crude from shale formations in North Dakota. The worst of those derailments killed 47 people in Quebec in July 2013.
Railroads have insisted that the oil train details are sensitive from a security and business perspective and should be exempt from state open records laws. They attempted to shield the data from public view last year by asking states to sign nondisclosure agreements.
Some states initially agreed, but most declined. McClatchy sought oil train reports from 30 states through open records laws. All but half a dozen states released at least part of what McClatchy requested.
Last fall, two rail industry trade groups lobbied the Transportation Department to end the reporting requirement. In a notice published in the Federal Register in October, the department rebuffed the request.
“DOT finds no basis to conclude that the public disclosure of the information is detrimental to transportation safety,” the Federal Railroad Administration wrote, adding that the trade associations “do not document any actual harm that has occurred by the public release of the information.”
But when the department unveiled its final rule in May, the requirements more closely aligned with what the railroads sought.
“Under this approach,” the regulation states, “the transportation of crude oil by rail can . . . avoid the negative security and business implications of widespread public disclosure of routing and volume data.”
The Maryland Attorney General’s Office has cited the department’s October Federal Register notice to support its position that the state can release the oil train information.
But the final rule is the last word, attorneys for the railroads say. They wrote Fletcher-Hill on May 29 that the state “relies on non-final comments published by the Federal Railroad Administration” and “fails to acknowledge the highly persuasive guidance articulated in the final rule.”
Unlike other arguments put forth by the railroads and their trade groups that have swayed few state or federal officials – including speculative claims of terrorism, competitive harm and even insider trading – the final rule may prove more persuasive to a judge.
The eight Senate Democrats wrote to Foxx on May 6, the same day another oil train derailed and caught fire in North Dakota. It was the fifth such incident in North America this year. They asked the department to reconsider the rule.
“The onus for obtaining detailed crude-by-rail information should not be on the local jurisdiction,” they wrote, and they called on the department “to clarify that broader crude-by-rail information will remain accessible to the public.”
Apparently backing away from the final rule’s expiration date for the emergency order, Foxx replied that it would remain “in full force and effect until further notice” and that the department would be looking for ways to codify the disclosure requirement.
But Krepp said that’s exactly what everyone was expecting in the rule.
“If they wanted that,” she said, “they would have put that in the rule-making.”
Krepp said the department made its intentions clear in the final rule.
“They have the final rule now,” she said. “They have to live with it.”
An examination of crude-by-rail data shows that the U.S. east coast has become one of the busiest regional destinations for hazardous crude-by-rail traffic. Oil Change International used publicly available Department of Energy (EIA) data as well as subscription data from Genscape to examine the growth of crude-by-rail to one of the most densely populated areas of the United States.
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