Category Archives: Union Pacific Railroad

Air Quality, Bakken Crude, Benicia Planning Commission, Benicians for a Safe and Healthy Community, California Attorney General Kamala Harris, Crude By Rail, Derailment, Environmental Impacts, Explosion, Greenhouse gas emissions, Oil spill, Revised Draft EIR, Tar sands crude, Train collission, Union Pacific Railroad, Valero Benicia Refinery, Valero Crude By Rail, Wildlife

BENICIA HERALD: Long-awaited reissue cites ‘significant’ environmental impacts; public given 45 days to comment

Repost from the Benicia Herald

Revised, expanded crude-by-rail report released

Long-awaited reissue cites ‘significant’ environmental impacts; public given 45 days to comment

By Nick Sestanovich, September 1, 2015

“Because no reasonable, feasible mitigation measures are available that would, if implemented, reduce the significance below the established threshold, this secondary hazards- and hazardous materials-related impact would be significant and unavoidable.”  – The Recirculated Draft Environmental Impact Report on Valero’s Crude-by-Rail Project

The long-awaited revision of the draft Valero Crude-by-Rail Project Environmental Impact Report was released Monday, almost a full year after California’s attorney general and others publicly challenged the scope and accuracy of the document.

The new report cited additional negative environmental effects of the project pertaining to air quality, greenhouse gases, protected species and more, expanding its scope to cover impacts for more “uprail” communities — and finding “significant and unavoidable” effects that would result from approval of the project.

The “recirculated” report (RDEIR) is just the latest development in Valero’s three-year battle to bring crude oil deliveries to its Benicia refinery by train. The proposal for a use permit to extend Union Pacific Railroad lines into its property so crude oil could be delivered by rail car, initially submitted to Benicia Planning Commission in late 2012, triggered an uproar over environmental and safety concerns, which prompted the drafting of an Environmental Impact Report.

The document, released in 2014, was criticized by many, including Attorney General Kamala Harris and state Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis, who felt the report’s focus on the 69 miles of rail between Benicia and Roseville didn’t adequately convey the scope of the project’s potentially negative impacts.

The RDEIR addressed these concerns by expanding the range of its focus beyond Roseville to three new routes: the Oregon state line to Roseville; the Nevada state line to northern Roseville; and the Nevada state line to southern Roseville.

In the process, the report uncovered more significant environmental impacts.

The refinery has said it expected 50 to 100 additional rail cars to arrive up to twice a day, brought in at a time of day when there would be little impact on traffic. The trains would carry 70,000 barrels of North American crude each day, replacing shipped barrels from foreign sources, the refinery said in its use permit application.

The DEIR had initially noted that greenhouse gas emissions generated by the Crude-by-Rail Project would be “less than significant.” The RDEIR updated the risk level of direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions to “significant and unavoidable,” specifically if trains used the line from Oregon to Roseville, which would travel a round-trip distance of 594 miles per day.

Additionally, the RDEIR found that the project would conflict with Executive Order S-3-05, signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2005, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.

The revised report also found that nitrogen-oxide levels would increase in the Yolo-Solano region, among other areas, and that nitrogen emissions in Placer County “would exceed the cumulative 10-pounds-per-day significance threshold.”

Biological resources are another area of concern. According to the report, crude-by-rail trains could have “potential impacts to biological resources along any southern route,” that “could include collision-related injury and mortality to protected wildlife and migratory bird species.”

Finally, the RDEIR said, other hazards exist: If a train were to crash and result in a small oil spill, there would be a 100-percent chance of 100 gallons or more being released. Similarly, should a train crash in a high fire danger area, the risks would be inevitable.

As the report notes, “Because no reasonable, feasible mitigation measures are available that would, if implemented, reduce the significance below the established threshold, this secondary hazards- and hazardous materials-related impact would be significant and unavoidable.”

Conversely, other areas of concern such as noise pollution and earthquakes, were found to have little or no significant impact.

“Valero’s effort to rush through their dangerous project and their long record of constant violations and fines of Bay Area Air Quality Management District emissions rules give many of us pause to reflect on the many risks associated with this project,” said Andres Soto, a Benicia resident and member of Benicians for a Safe and Healthy Community, a group formed to opposed the Crude-by-Rail Project.

“It is only due to the volume and detail of scope of all of the public comments received on the original Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) that Benicia chose to recirculate a seriously flawed DEIR. California Attorney General Kamala Harris and many uprail communities, as well as many Benicians, including BSHC, identified many critical shortcomings with the original DEIR.

“Valero has shown nothing but intransigence and misinformation in the face of this opposition to its flawed proposal, thus we do not expect much to have changed in the RDEIR from the DEIR that would convince us that Valero and Union Pacific Railroad can make this project safe enough for Benicia. The risk of catastrophic explosions along the rail line and in Benicia, and the plan to process dirtier extreme crude oils strip-mined from Canadian tar sands and fracked in the Bakken shale formation is just too dangerous for our safety and our environment.

“We hope that after thoroughly reviewing the RDEIR, our Planning Commission and City Council will have the wisdom to deny this project for the good of Benicia, our neighboring communities and the good of our planet.”

A Valero representative was asked to comment on the newly released report but did not respond by press time Monday.

Copies of the RDEIR are available at Benicia Public Library, 150 East L St.; at the Community Development Department at Benicia City Hall, 250 East L St.; and as a PDF download on the city’s website, www.ci.benicia.ca.us.

Public comments on the RDEIR will be accepted by the city until Oct. 15 at 5 p.m. Comments may be submitted in writing to Amy Million, principal planner of the Community Development Department, 250 East L St., Benicia, CA 94510; or they may be given at formal public hearings on the project by Benicia Planning Commission, the first of which will be at 6:30 p.m. Sept. 29 at City Hall.

Additional Planning Commission meetings to receive comments on the RDEIR are scheduled for Sept. 30, Oct. 1 and Oct. 8.

Crude By Rail, Derailment, Electronically controlled pneumatic braking (ECP), Massive increase in crude-by-rail, Oil prices, Rail industry, Rail Safety, Train braking systems, Union Pacific Railroad

Union Pacific chief threatens action on oil train brake rules

Repost from Financial Times

Union Pacific chief threatens action on oil train brake rules

Robert Wright in New York, May 31, 2015 4:55 pm
In this photo from Aug. 8, 2012, a Union Pacific train travels in Council Bluffs, Iowa. Union Pacific said Thursday, Oct. 18, 2012, that its third-quarter profit climbed 15 percent because price increases and more automotive and chemical shipments helped the railroad offset a 12 percent drop in coal shipments. The railroad reported $1 billion in net income, or $2.19 per share. That's up from $904 million, or $1.85 per share, a year ago. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik)
In this photo from Aug. 8, 2012, a Union Pacific train travels in Council Bluffs, Iowa. Union Pacific said Thursday, Oct. 18, 2012, that its third-quarter profit climbed 15 percent because price increases and more automotive and chemical shipments helped the railroad offset a 12 percent drop in coal shipments. The railroad reported $1 billion in net income, or $2.19 per share. That’s up from $904 million, or $1.85 per share, a year ago. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik)

The chief executive of Union Pacific, the US’s largest rail network, has vowed legal action over a provision of new rules for oil trains that he says would cost billions of dollars and provide little benefit.

The pledge from Lance Fritz threatens further delay to rules that have already been years in preparation.

The Federal Railroad Administration and Canadian regulators jointly announced the rules less than a month ago to improve the safety of oil movements by rail, which have risen sharply following the surge in US oil and gas production in recent years.

The surge — from only about 1m tonnes of traffic in 2007 to roughly 40m in 2013, the last year for which full data are available — has exposed the shortcomings of existing safety rules for tank cars, with several trains exploding following derailments.

While Mr Fritz said that most of the new provisions were “great regulation”, he criticised provisions demanding that railways start controlling tank cars’ brakes via an electric signal either transmitted wirelessly from the lead locomotive or via electrical wires running along the train.

The new arrangement, known as electronically controlled pneumatic (ECP) braking, is intended to speed up the transmission of the braking command compared with current methods, which rely on pressure changes in a pipe running along the train. That should reduce the number of cars that derail in a crash.

Mr Fritz said, however, that virtually the same improvements could be gained by spacing locomotives out along a train, as Union Pacific frequently does, and the extra benefits of ECP did not justify the costs. The new equipment would cost about $75,000 for each of UP’s 6,500 locomotives, while there would also be substantial costs for fitting out tank cars, nearly all owned by oil shippers or leasing companies.

“The juice isn’t worth the press,” Mr Fritz said. “We think that’s very ill-considered. We provided that feedback and we will continue to provide that feedback.”

The industry could appeal against the rule both through administrative channels and in the courts, Mr Fritz said. “We as an industry are taking that path,” he added.

Railways have been pressing for improvements in tank car design to avoid a repetition of disasters like the Lac-Mégantic explosion in Canada in 2013, in which 47 people died when a poorly secured oil train broke lose, derailed and exploded in the centre of a small town.

Operators are barred from refusing to carry cargo that meets the minimum regulatory requirements but have been concerned that under existing regulations cars were excessively vulnerable in an explosion.

Mr Fritz also criticised the new rules’ standards for thermal protection for cars, meant to prevent their exploding in a fire, saying they were not strict enough.

The Federal Railroad Administration declined to comment publicly on Mr Fritz’s criticisms but looks determined to press ahead with the mandate for ECP brakes.

UP, which has a larger track network than any other US railway, has been a significant beneficiary of the surge in oil movements. Mr Fritz said he expected a strong continuing role for rail in transporting US-produced crude oil.

The sharp fall in the oil price in recent months has shifted traffic away from the routes that UP serves, however, pushing down crude oil movements on its network by 38 per cent in the first quarter compared with last year.

Rail crossings, Rail routing, Rail Safety, Union Pacific Railroad

Union Pacific decision imperils sports events in Sacramento CA

Repost from The Sacramento Bee

Texas train tragedy imperils sports events in California’s capital

By Curtis Tate, McClatchy Washington Bureau, 04/17/2015 1:39 PM
Runners wait for the race to begin during the 32nd annual California International Marathon on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2014. Organizers of sports events in California’s capital are concerned that the nation’s largest railroad may not allow participants to cross tracks, forcing them to reroute or cancel more races.
Runners wait for the race to begin during the 32nd annual California International Marathon on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2014. Organizers of sports events in California’s capital are concerned that the nation’s largest railroad may not allow participants to cross tracks, forcing them to reroute or cancel more races. Andrew Seng / Aseng@sacbee.com

WASHINGTON — Every year for a decade, organizers of the Kaiser Permanente Women’s Fitness Festival took care of an important detail without much difficulty: asking Union Pacific Railroad permission for runners to cross its track that bisects the city of Sacramento.

Kim Parrino, the event’s race director, put in the request to the railroad for safe passage for about 4,000 participants in a June 5K and half-marathon back in September.

She got the return call two weeks ago. And for the first time ever, the answer was no.

“It was a very short conversation,” she said.

Parrino was forced to cancel the Women’s Festival half-marathon and reroute the 5K so it doesn’t cross the Union Pacific track.

“We have a beautiful downtown area, and we can’t run through it,” she said. “We’re cut off.”

Organizers of other sports events in California’s capital are concerned that the nation’s largest railroad may give them the same answer, forcing them to reroute or cancel more races. It could threaten the California International Marathon, which brings 14,000 runners and millions of dollars to the Sacramento-area economy, and could affect the ability of the city to host future events.

“The policy shift is something that presents significant challenges,” said Mike Sophia, director of the Sacramento Sports Commission.

Though the railroad won’t elaborate on what prompted its change in policy, Sophia said the difficulties began two years ago, a few months after the fatal collision of a Union Pacific train and a veterans parade float in Midland, Texas, in November 2012.

“I do believe it’s a safety issue,” Sophia said. “That’s understandable.”

That parade’s organizers never told the railroad that their route would cross its track, and a train slammed into a parade float at 60 mph. Four veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars were killed, having pushed their spouses out of harm’s way seconds before impact.

Though the National Transportation Safety Board faulted the parade’s organizers and found Union Pacific to be in compliance with federal law, 43 survivors and family members of crash victims sued the railroad. Union Pacific reached a confidential settlement with 26 of them in January. In February, a Texas judge dismissed a lawsuit by the remaining 17.

Aaron Hunt, a spokesman for Union Pacific, said the railroad made decisions about whether to grant safe passage on a case-by-case basis. He offered no specific reasons for the company’s change in policy on safe passage for Sacramento events or who changed it.

“We asked officials to reroute their race due to safety concerns for event participants,” he said.

Rail transportation is federally regulated, giving state and local officials little say over how railroads operate. Railroad rights-of-way are privately owned property, and organizers of events that intersect with railroad tracks are obligated to seek permission to cross.

In addition to safety issues, there are business costs. Idling trains for hours at a time can delay freight shipments. Hunt said that Union Pacific, which has a parallel route that avoids the middle of Sacramento, does not reroute trains for special events.

Last year, the railroad didn’t grant safe passage for the California International Marathon until November, a month before the race.

Rep. Doris Matsui, a Sacramento Democrat, helped resolve last year’s impasse and encouraged the railroad to work with Sacramento to find a safe way to hold events.

“Events such as the Women’s Fitness Festival and the International Marathon are important to our community and our economy,” she said in a statement this week.

The California International Marathon has been run every year for 32 years. The 26-mile race starts in Folsom and proceeds west to the state capitol. But the Union Pacific track presents a barrier. Major east-west streets in Sacramento cross the railroad at ground level, and there are no overpasses or underpasses.

“It’s very hard to do much in the downtown corridor without coming in contact with those tracks,” said Scott Abbott, executive director of the Sacramento Running Association, which founded the International Marathon in 1983.

The race had a close call in 2003, when a train crossed the marathon route during the previously arranged safety window.

“We weren’t prepared for that,” Abbott said.

Last fall, even though organizers of the Mill Race Marathon in Columbus, Ind., made arrangements with a local railroad in advance, a train made an unexpected appearance.

Video footage shows runners scrambling to beat the slow-moving train. When it stopped, some climbed between the cars. The few police officers on hand could do little to stop it.

Just last week, a similar problem beset the Paris-Roubaix bicycle race in France. When the gates came down at a railroad crossing, many competitors darted around them in front of a high-speed passenger train.

No one was injured in these incidents, but the combination of focused athletes and trains that need as much as a mile to stop can lead to tragic consequences.

“A lot can go wrong, even with the proper precautions,” said Steven Schmader, president and CEO of the International Festivals & Events Association, whose group participated in the NTSB investigation of the Texas accident.

According to Operation Lifesaver, a nonprofit rail safety education group, California led the nation last year in railroad crossing fatalities involving trains and cars, with 33. More people were killed while walking across or on railroad tracks in California than any other state with 101 deaths and 53 injuries, according to federal statistics.

Abbott said the Sacramento Running Association has rerouted every other event it holds to avoid crossing the railroad tracks, but moving the International Marathon course has too many downsides. Rerouting the race would require adjusting the mileage and could potentially disrupt local traffic and inconvenience participants who are staying in downtown hotels.

“With the numbers of people that we have and the amount of time we impact at the finish area,” he said, “the capitol grounds are really the only acceptable place to finish on a Sunday morning in Sacramento.”

Schmader, whose office, coincidentally, is in the old Union Pacific station in Boise, Idaho, said Sacramento leaders should come together to stress the importance of the marathon.

“Everybody would hate to see a good event go away or changed to its detriment,” he said.

Derailment, Feather River Canyon, Massive increase in crude-by-rail, Rail infrastructure, Rail inspection, Union Pacific Railroad

November train derailment in Feather River Canyon caused by broken rail

Repost from The Chico Enterprise-Record

November train derailment in Feather River Canyon caused by broken rail

By Ashley Gebb, 04/13/15, 5:11 PM PDT
Twelve rail cars full of corn derailed Nov. 25 in the Feather River Canyon. The accident was caused by a broken rail. Courtesy of Jake Miille
No railroad cars reached the Feather River after the Nov. 25 derailment, but corn did. Courtesy of Jake Miille

Belden >> A November train derailment in the Feather River Canyon was caused by a broken rail, the Enterprise-Record has learned.

As Union Pacific Railroad prepares to replace more than 36 miles of track between Keddie and Lake Oroville, spokesman Francisco Castillo has confirmed a detail fracture caused by cracks led to the derailment of 12 train cars that tumbled into the canyon Nov. 25. The repairs are unrelated and were planned before the accident, Castillo said, part of a greater effort to improve rail safety as transport of crude oil continues to rise.

“Though serious accidents are rare, we recognize that there are still risks associated with rail transportation, just as there are risks with any other mode of transportation. That’s why we follow strict safety practices and work tirelessly to achieve our goal of zero derailments,” he said in an email.

In the early morning of Nov. 25, a westbound train derailed near Virgilia, upstream of Belden, causing 12 loaded hoppers to slide down an embankment toward the North Fork Feather River below, stopping just before the water. No one was injured but the carloads of corn were spread across the hillside and into the river, causing $640,049 in equipment damage and $85,786 in damage to the track.

At the time, emergency officials said the incident underscored the risks associated with train transport in the canyon.

“It’s a concern for us because it shows there is still a history of derailments in the county, especially in the canyon,” Butte County Emergency Services Officer John Gulserian said Monday of the November derailment.

Though the incident occurred in Plumas County, the same railroad lines continue into Butte County, along with whatever the trains are hauling — be it corn or crude oil. The derailment of any such materials can have devastating implications for the water, the environment and wildlife, as well as create a fire danger, Gulserian said.

Because of the remote area and the nature of the spills, the county is not always equipped to deal with the accident and has to wait for other resources, he said.

The canyon area as a whole tends to see a derailment every three to five years, with most similar to the November incident, where only a few cars go off the tracks, he said. The last derailment Gulserian could remember spilled a load of neutralized alcohol near Storrie.

Track failures are linked to 31 percent of all train accidents, and even though such incidents are becoming less common, prevention remains critical, said Federal Railroad Administration spokesman Mike Booth. It’s especially important with a 400 percent increase in more volatile Bakken crude oil being shipped out of the North Dakota region.

“It travels to nearly every state and it travels long distances,” he said. “To prevent accidents due to increased traffic going longer distances, we have increased inspection on crude oil routes. … Since the Lac-Mégantic accident two years ago in Canada, it was a bit of a wake-up call for everyone.”

The 2013 incident occurred when a 74-car freight train carrying crude oil derailed, resulting in a fire and explosion of multiple tank cars. Forty-seven people were killed, and dozens of buildings were destroyed or critically contaminated.

Railroads are required by law to inspect and maintain their equipment in good repair, and the Federal Railroad Administration ensures that by auditing records and doing spot inspections, Booth said. It also works with the Department of Transportation and the Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration, which has taken more than two dozen actions to increase the safety of crude oil transport.

“And we are looking for more ways to make it even safer,” Booth said. “We don’t want to have a single derailment …”

In the past 10 years, Castillo said derailments have decreased 38 percent, largely in part to a derailment and risk reduction process, which includes using lasers and ultrasound to identify rail imperfections, tracking acoustic vibration on wheels to anticipate failures before they happen, and performing real-time analysis of every rail car via trackside sensors. Employees also participate in rigorous, regular safety training programs that include the identification and prevention of derailments, and Union Pacific trains first responders on ways to minimize the impact of derailment in their communities.

Track maintenance projects are part of Union Pacific’s annual maintenance work and scheduled three to five years in advance, Castillo said. From 2005-14, the railroad invested more than $31 billion in its network and operations to support the transportation infrastructure, and it is in the middle of $26.1 million in improvements in the Feather River Canyon area.

The first project is complete and included replacement of 15.2 miles of rail just east of Oroville. The second project, scheduled to begin next month and be complete in August, will replace 36.3 miles of rail at various locations between Keddie and Lake Oroville.

“The Feather River Canyon upgrades will enhance the safe transport of commodities we transport through the canyon,” Castillo said.

Union Pacific and other entities have been working with Butte County recently to improve safety, Gulserian said. That effort included an exercise March 11 with a simulated train derailment near Chico that provided the opportunity to practice alert notifications, areas of authority, staging materials and alerting the public. Another simulation has been scheduled.

Gulserian said it’s encouraging to hear news of rail replacement, as safety and security of hazardous materials is as much a priority for the county as it is for the railroad.