Category Archives: Valero Crude By Rail

California Attorney General Kamala Harris, Crude By Rail, DEIR, Valero Benicia Refinery, Valero Crude By Rail

Vallejo Times-Herald: Attorney General blasts Benicia crude-by-rail project

Repost from The Vallejo Times-Herald

California Attorney General Kamala Harris blasts Benicia crude-by-rail project

By Tony Burchyns, 10/08/2014

California Attorney General Kamala Harris has blasted Benicia’s environmental review of Valero’s crude-by-rail project, claiming it underestimates safety risks and relies on an overly broad definition of trade secrets in failing to disclose the types of volatile crudes to be shipped.

In a letter to the city last week, Harris said Benicia’s safety analysis was inadequate because it only considers “a fraction” of the rail miles that would be traveled by oil trains headed to the city’s Valero refinery. Harris also faults the city for relying on Valero’s “unenforceable” promise to use newer, safer tank cars that are not currently required by federal regulations.

The letter follows similar critical comments from the state Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Office of Spill Prevention and Response and the Public Utilities Commission. Those agencies called on the city to redo its safety analysis before allowing the refinery to receive two 50-car oil trains a day that would travel through Roseville and other parts of Northern California.

Also, the Sacramento Area Council of Governments, the cities of Davis and Sacramento and the University of California at Davis have sent letters to Benicia expressing concerns about the project.

Valero is seeking city permits to build a rail terminal that would allow the refinery to receive up to 70,000 barrels of crude daily from North American sources such as the Bakken shale in North Dakota and tar sands in Canada.

According to Valero, the rail shipments would replace oil deliveries by boat and allow the refinery to remain competitive on the West Coast.

Benicia is one of at least 12 crude-by-rail related projects that are either operational or being considered in California — including in Richmond, Pittsburg, Martinez, Santa Maria, Stockton, Los Angeles, Bakersfield, Wilmington and Sacramento, according to the attorney general’s office.

Harris, whose duties include enforcing the California Environmental Quality Act, contends the city’s project analysis fails to analyze air pollution impacts from the foreseeable change in crude oils that would be processed at the refinery. It also faulted the city for limiting the scope of its rail safety analysis to 69 miles of track between Roseville and Benicia, and failing to consider cumulative impacts from other crude-by-rail projects proposed in California.

The letter also criticized the city’s finding that the risk of train spills of more than 100 gallons between Roseville and Benicia would be once in 111 years. Critics have said the analysis is flawed because it relies on rail safety data that predates the nation’s crude-by-rail boom.

“This boom in crude oil being transported by rail has corresponded with a major increase in the number of accidents involving such trains,” the letter states. “In 2013 alone, trains spilled 1.1 million gallons of crude oil, a 72 percent increase over the total amount of oil spilled by rail in the nearly four previous decades combined.”

The letter cites notorious spills such as the July 2013 derailment and explosion in Quebec that killed 47 people and destroyed a downtown. Other derailments in Aliceville, Ala., Casselton, N.D., and Lynchburg, Va. resulted in explosions and fires.

Harris also said the city’s nondisclosure of the characteristics of the crude oil to be processed at the refinery undermines states environmental laws by preventing the public to assess the nature of the project’s risks. Further, Harris said the broad grant of trade secret protection conflicts with recent decisions this year by state and federal agencies that the characteristics of crude oil traveling by rail should be publicly released.

“Benicia’s nondisclosure of this information deprives both the public and Benicia officials of the informed decision making process that is the ‘heart’ of (the California Environmental Quality Act),” the letter states.

Benicia has declined to comment on letters received during the report’s public comment phase. However, the city plans to respond to written and verbal comments before the project’s next public hearing.

California Attorney General Kamala Harris, Crude By Rail, Draft EIR, Valero Benicia Refinery, Valero Crude By Rail

Sacramento Bee: Attorney General challenges Benicia oil train analysis

Repost from The Sacramento Bee

California Attorney General Kamala Harris challenges Benicia oil train analysis

By Tony Bizjak, Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2014
Oil train
A crude oil train operated by BNSF snakes its way through James, California, just outside the Feather River Canyon in the foothills of Sacramento Valley, on June 5, 2014. The potential environmental and safety risks posed by such trains continues to elicit debate. | Jake Miille / Special to The Bee/Jake Miille

California Attorney General Kamala Harris has joined the list of state and local government officials challenging Benicia’s review of plans to bring crude oil on trains to a local refinery.

In a letter last week to Benicia, Harris said the city’s draft environmental impact report “fails to properly account for many of the project’s potentially significant impacts.”

Benicia is conducting an environmental review of a plan by Valero Refining Company to build a crude oil transfer station on its Benicia plant site, so it can transport two 50-car crude oil trains a day through Northern California to the refinery for processing.

In the report, Benicia officials conclude the project’s oil spill risk along the rail line is insignificant. The state Office of Spill Prevention and Response and state Public Utilities Commission already have challenged the report, calling it inadequate. The Sacramento Area Council of Governments has challenged Benicia’s analysis, as well. All three criticize the Benicia report for only looking at the spill risks between Roseville and Benicia, failing to study rail lines all the way to the state border.

Harris’ letter repeats most of the earlier criticisms, including the contention that the report “underestimates the probability of an accidental release from the project by considering only a fraction of the rail miles traveled when calculating the risk of a derailment.”

“These issues must be addressed and corrected before the City Council of Benicia takes action” on the project,” Harris states.

The letter is one of hundreds Benicia officials said they received in the past few months in response to their initial environmental study. Benicia interim Community Development Director Dan Marks said the city and its consultants would review the comments and prepare responses to all of them, then bring those responses to the city Planning Commission for discussion at an as-yet undetermined date.

Under the Valero proposal, trains would carry about 1.4 million gallons of crude oil daily to the Benicia refinery from U.S. and possibly Canadian oil fields, where it would be turned into gasoline and diesel fuel. Valero officials have said they hope to win approval from the city of Benicia to build a crude oil transfer station at the refinery by early next year, allowing them to replace more costly marine oil shipments with cheaper oil.

Crude oil rail shipments have come under national scrutiny in the last year. Several spectacular explosions of crude oil trains, including one that killed 47 residents of a Canadian town last year, have prompted a push by federal officials and cities along rail lines for safety improvements.

A representative for the attorney general declined comment when asked if Harris would consider suing Benicia to force more study of the project.

“We believe the letter speaks for itself,” spokesman Nicholas Pacilio said. “We expect it will be taken seriously.”

California Attorney General Kamala Harris, Draft EIR, Valero Benicia Refinery, Valero Crude By Rail

California Attorney General letter critical of Valero DEIR

See a searchable version of the letter here: 2014-10-02 AGO Valero CBR Project DEIR Comment Letter OCR.   (Here is the original pdf.)

Summary, from p. 2:

Unfortunately, the DEIR for this Project fails to properly account for many of the Project’s potentially significant impacts pursuant to the California Environmental Quality Act(CEQA). Specifically, the DEIR:

1. Underestimates the probability of an accidental release from the Project by considering only a fraction of the rail miles travelled when calculating the risk of derailment, by relying on a currently unenforceable assumption that newer, safer tank cars will be used, by failing to adequately describe the potential consequences of an accident resulting in a release of crude oil, and by improperly minimizing the risk to public safety from increased rail-use;

2. Improperly asserts that the proper baseline for the Project’s impact on air emissions is determined by the Refinery’s maximum permitted emissions;

3. Fails to analyze the impacts on air quality from the foreseeable change in the mix of crude oils processed at the Refinery;

4. Ignores reasonably foreseeable Project impacts by impermissibly limiting the scope of the affected environment analyzed to only the 69-milestretch from Benicia to Roseville;

5. Fails to consider the cumulative impacts on public safety and the environment from the proliferation of crude-by-railprojects proposed in California; and

6. Employs an overly broad determination of trade secrets, which results in the nondisclosure of the types of crude oil to be shipped by rail and refined onsite. As a result, the DEIR fails to provide sufficient information for an adequate analysis of the safety risks from transportation or the air quality impacts from refining the new crude.

These issues must be addressed and corrected before the City Council of Benicia takes action  pursuant to CEQA on the DEIR or the Project.

County regulation, Crude By Rail, Derailment, Emergency Readiness & Response, Risk Assessment, Solano County CA, Union Pacific Railroad, Valero Benicia Refinery, Valero Crude By Rail

Solano County hosts community meeting on oil train safety issues [Mon. 9/29. 6pm, Fairfield]

Repost from The Vallejo Times-Herald
[Editor:  Regrettably, Solano County invited Valero Benicia Refinery and Union Pacific Railroad to make panel presentations at this “Community Conversation,” but did not invite Benicia’s officially recognized grassroots opposition organization,  Benicians For a Safe and Healthy Community (BSHC) to present.  Benicia is one of seven cities in Solano County.  Language used by the County in its original announcement of this “discussion” presumed an inevitable permitting of crude by rail in our area, even as permitting is being hotly debated here.  The updated announcement is clearer, but still used the verb will rather than would: “Proposals to process crude oil delivered by rail will change the mix of materials coming into and passing through Solano County.”  Under pressure to invite an environmentalist, the County invited oil and energy analyst, author, journalist and activist Antonia Juhasz to join the panel.  Juhasz has written three books: The Bush Agenda, The Tyranny of Oil, and Black Tide.  Oddly, the County’s recently updated publicity does not mention Juhasz.  BSHC and The Benicia Independent encourage everyone to attend.
…See also the news release on the Solano County website, and a similar article in The Benicia Herald and a better one in The Vacaville Reporter.  – RS]

Solano County to host community meeting on oil train safety issues

Times-Herald staff report, 09/26/2014 

FAIRFIELD >> Solano County will host a public meeting Monday to discuss risks posed by plans to increase oil train shipments through the region.

The meeting follows concerns raised by state, regional and local government officials about plans to ship two 50-car oil trains daily from Roseville to Benicia’s Valero refinery.

The information session will be from 6 to 8:30 p.m. in the Board of Supervisors Chambers at the County Administration Center, 675 Texas St. in Fairfield.

Last week, county officials sent a letter to Benicia asking for added measures to prevent train derailments in rural areas and protected wetlands. Also, state and Sacramento regional officials have called on the city to redo its safety analysis, saying the city has overlooked the risks of increased oil train traffic through other parts Northern California and beyond.

“The evening is about having a community conversation about our preparedness and the potential impacts from an incident along our railways,” Supervisor Linda Seifert said in a press release.

Seifert said the event format — a series of brief presentations and breakout groups — will be a facilitated discussion designed to raise awareness of the existing safety measures and identify potential gaps.

Invited speakers include representatives from the Solano County Office of Emergency Services, the Solano County Fire Chiefs Association, the Valero Benicia refinery, Union Pacific Railroad, local air quality management districts and the offices of U.S. Rep. John Garamendi and state Sen. Lois Wolk. A community perspective also will be incorporated into the lineup of speakers, county officials said.

For safe and healthy communities…