Category Archives: Rail Safety

Bay Area Refineries, California Regulation, Climate Change, DEIR, Environmental Impacts, Rail Safety, Valero Crude By Rail

KCBS Radio report on Valero meeting

Repost from KCBS Radio 740AM, 106.9FM

Valero Confirms Plans For Crude Oil By Rail At Benicia Community Meeting

March 25, 2014 1:14 PM
Refinery at Sunrise

The Valero refinery in Benicia. (James Irwin/CBS)

BENICIA (KCBS) – On the day a Bay Area state senator was voicing concerns over the transport of crude oil by rail, the Valero refinery in Benicia has announced at a community meeting it wants to do just that.

There was standing room only where about 200 people showed up for the meeting on Monday night at the Ironworkers Union Local 378 hall to hear Valero outline its crude-by-rail project.

[Audio with interview of Jan Cox-Golovich and others.]

Many who attended were skeptical of the plan which critics claim will result with two trains a day made up of 50 tanker cars each.

“It’s been proven that Bakken crude is a lot lighter and it’s very volatile and there’s been explosions and derailments and spills,” Jan Cox Golovich, a member of Benicians for a Safe and Healthy Community.

But another attendee, Frank Sykes, said that using railcars would avoid a Cosco Busan or Exxon Valdez accident and that it would bring hundreds of jobs.

“I believe in Murphy’s Law—if it can happen, it will happen—but can’t live your life like that because nothing will ever get done,” he said. “If something was to happen out in the water ways, there’s a lot more damage that could be done.”

Environmentalists, however, point out that many rails lines traverse along the state’s rivers.

The meeting was peaceful but it was clear Valero has a long way to go to placate community members. Valero spokesman Chris Howe said the company understands there is opposition but said everyone will get a chance to weigh in.

“The environmental impact report is due out in the early part of next month, we’re expecting; the city will have a comment period,” he said

“It’s clear that the opponents of our project have a view; we scheduled this meeting tonight to bring some credentials experts.”

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, California Regulation, Rail Safety, Risk Assessment, Roseville California

Roseville Firefighter: increased risk. Senator Wolk: no unified response

Repost from KCRA Sacramento

State lawmakers worried about oil trains

More crude arriving by rail from fracking fields

Mar 20, 2014

KCRA report 2014-03-20

ROSEVILLE, Calif. (KCRA) —California lawmakers have expressed concern about a growing influx of freight trains loaded with oil and the state’s ability to handle a major rail disaster.

“Right now we’re seeing approximately 30 to 40 (cars) a day,” said Peter Hnat, of the Roseville Fire Department.

Hnat said the tanker cars are passing through Roseville’s busy Union Pacific railyard on their way from North Dakota to oil refineries in the Bay Area.

He said railroad companies have told the city that the number of cars is eventually expected to reach 120 a day.

“The increased volume coming through town obviously increases the risk,” Hnat said.

Hnat said the risk also comes from the fact that these tankers are not carrying typical crude, but rather oil produced from the drilling process known as fracking.

Fracking, also known as hydraulic fracturing, is the fracturing of rock by a pressurized liquid to extract oil and natural gas.

Hnat said the oil produced by fracking is more volatile than typical crude.

Last summer, a train loaded with fracked oil derailed and exploded in Lac-Mégantic, Québec, and killed 47 people.

A similar accident happened last December in Casselton, N.D.

Kim Zagaris, fire chief for the state emergency management department, said he is most concerned about specific rural areas where derailments have been more frequent.

Zagaris pointed to a map that included such areas near the foothills town of Colfax, east of Chico and through a stretch of Plumas County.

He said these areas were also more likely to be hours away from specially trained hazardous materials crews.

“We have gaps in our system,” Zagaris said. “And like I said, the more rural the area, the longer the response will take.”

Zagaris said Gov. Jerry Brown’s budget proposal includes a plan to charge a tax on oil transported by rail, similar to a tax that already applies to maritime shipments.

He said the money would be dedicated to purchasing equipment and providing training for vulnerable areas.

According to the California Energy Commission, the amount of oil imported to the state by rail increased from more than 155,000 barrels in January 2013 to nearly 1.2 million barrels in December 2013 — a more than sevenfold increase.

State lawmakers held a hearing Thursday to discuss the issue of oil train safety.

“I’m not at all convinced that there’s a unified response by the state to this new challenge,” said Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis.