Recent Events Make Shipping Crude By Rail A Tough Sell
Thursday, July 11, 2013 @ 3:45 AM
The tragedy in Lac Megantic Quebec has not yet been fully realized as friends and family wait for word on their missing loved ones. No matter what the final figure of deaths may turn out to be, this catastrophe will also cast a pall over the idea of moving crude oil or finished product to market by rail. We are now painfully aware of what can happen when something goes terribly wrong.
The train’s Engineer has now been suspended , but that will be of little comfort to the families who are searching for 50 people who are reported as missing. Ed Burkhardt, chairman of the Monteal, Main and Atlantic railway, the company that owned the train, says his company is not accepting responsibility until the investigation is complete.
The fact that the engineer from the train went to a room to have some sleep and left the train unattended might enter into the picture.
You can fully expect to see red flags flying if there is any attempt to increase, by major proportion, the shipping of petroleum products along the east- west line that runs through Prince George . While we already have product passing through the center of many communities in BC. any major traffic increase will be met head on by a public that has become very jittery over the movement of crude oil and its associated products to market.
Railways have helped build towns, Prince George is no exception, but we have also learned over the years their cargo can pose a major threat to the very communities which have grown alongside those ribbons of steel. The Mississauga, Ontario derailment of November 1979 was a prime example. More than a hundred cars, carrying deadly, explosive chemicals went off the tracks, forcing the evacuation of 200 thousand people. It was the largest peace time evacuation in North America, and would not be surpassed in scope until Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in 2005. Mississauga was lucky, no one died.
We have recently seen increased rail activity as the Port of Prince Rupert responds to the growing Asian marketplace’s appetite for our natural resources. Adding petroleum cars to that long line of west bound train traffic may need a re-think. The price paid by the community of Lac Megantic should be a chilling reminder that some things can never be offset by economic gains.
I’m Meisner and that’s one man’s opinion.
Comments
This is a complex issue with a myriad of variables involved. Some of them:
– How are the tanker cars designed? Are there safer options out there for how such product is to be transported?
– What role did negligence play?
– What role did inspection (or lack thereof) play?
– What role did regulation (or lack thereof) play?
– Could the track and/or routes have been designed in a better way?
My father was a career railway man and he said the environment they operated in when he started to what it is now, is FAR different. Everything from maintenance and employee training to the amount of red tape that the operators have to deal with.
Let’s not forget that most governments of the day tend to believe that industry self regulation is the best model out there and that there is an inherent willingness for industry to want to do what is best for the public.
I don’t know about you, but after listening to the way that Ed Burkhardt has responded to this, I have a hard time accepting that his heart is anywhere but the front office. Maybe it’s just his approach, or perhaps he’s in shock, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more detached response to such a terrible tragedy. “I hope I don’t get shot” was one of his responses when he was talking about visiting Lac Megantic to see the destruction. If you were in control of that company and your trains just destroyed half of the city and killed 50+ people, one would think that most people may wish to get shot in order to resolve them of the guilt that they must surely be feeling about the incident.
This whole thing makes me sick. At what point do we get back to putting people and communities ahead of balance sheets, stock markets and economic development at any cost?
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2013/07/09/f-runaway-trains.html?cmp=rss
The correlation is we had government implementing self regulation at the same time as we had railways introducing huge increases in shipments of oil via rail.
The railways treated this deadly new cargo as business as usual and allowed it to be shipped in canola oil rail cars and not cars made to safely transport the goods… they allowed the hundred car trains to be operated by one individual on rail lines with no monitoring… and trains with dangerous cargo to be parked on mainlines, on hills with no hand brake on, and left abandoned with no security… of course we will have a tragedy like the one in Lac Magnatic.
The lesson is that sometimes government regulation and the enforcement of those regulations has its place. Obviously that is the elephant in the room here. Self regulation of any industry is riff with human error and greed.
This could just as easily happen to a self regulated pipeline… oh wait it already did in Kamalzoo. Human error in not turning the pumps off despite the warnings.
At least with a railway one can limit the risk… limit the placement of cars in a train, limit the amount of cars allowed per train, limit the use of cars to double hauled cars able to withstand a derailment, mandate two engineers on any train with dangerous goods and only designated locations for stop overs with clear procedures to be followed. A lot can be done to limit the scope of the danger with rail and make it doable… the same can not be said of a pipeline rupture.
I think with proper regulation and oversight rail is safer for the environment. The problem with rail is it runs through our cities and as it is today the system is not designed for the level of public safety that it should be.
The anti pipeline crowd going ya-but, ya-but.
So why can’t the scope of danger be reduced with a pipeline?
Kalamazoo is the reason Enbridge should not build the pipeline. Less we forget they are still cleaning it up!
As I’ve said many times, pipelines are statistically far safer than rail.
Interesting point seamutt… a pipeline spills a drop and everybody is up in arms. This tragedy happens and the apologists come out.
You’re absolutely correct that risk can be reduced on a pipeline and safety measures put in place. Just try telling that to some people though.
If Lac Megantic was a pipeline and not a rail disaster, this story would have had 70 comments on it by now.
Betcha things where learned from Kalamazoo and improvements made.
The pipeline that burst which caused the leak into the Kalamazoo was in dire need of maintenance and Enbridge did nothing to fix it. It came out in court that Enbridge knew the pipe was in need of repair for 5 years. It also came out in court that junior employees were intimidated by senior employees and were instructed to keep the oil flowing ever though instruments were telling them there was a problem. The oil was kept flowing until someone from another company that seen the oil spewing out all over contacted someone to tell them to shut it off. No safety measures in the world can protect you from incompetence. No one was fired for that spill, Enbridge has learned nothing and they continue to break the rules.
The sheer volume of a pipeline spill and the fact they can happen in a remote area out of sight and continue unabated make the scope of a pipeline spill many magnitudes greater than anything a controlled and regulated rail operation could ever happen.
I think we can all agree Lac Magnatic is the absolute worst case scenario for a rail disaster brought on manly due to substandard regulations and moronic human error.
Sheer magnitude of oil spill from a pipeline. Are you sure, technology keeps improving.
Does anyone remember the details on the train explosions out at Salmon Valley back in the 70s? (I am guessing at the tune, I was little) I recall seeing the smoke from the Hart Highway. What happened, what was it carrying etc? Or is my memory completely playing tricks…
There is no doubt that rail is not the way to ship pipelinable material. The argument about Kalamzoo is irrelevant. Comparing a 50 year old line to a state of the art project makes zero sense. We need to move oil, rail is not the best way.
You lost me Eagleone – you are saying a rail car that holds 25,000 imp gallons could never have the magnitude spill of a pipeline?
Last report on the news has 100,000 liters of oil floating down the river in Quebec never mind what is in the ground in the area.
March 2013 Minn – CP derailed 14 railcars spilling 750 barrels (120,000 liters) April 2013 Ont – CP lost 22 cars off the tracks spilling 400 barrels (64,000 liters). May 2013 Sask – CP derailed 5 cars leaking 575 barrels of crude (91,500 liters). June 2013 Alta – CP 4 cars derailed on a bridge. July 2013 Que – MMA derails entire train in downtown Lac Megantic, spill size unknown – up to 72 railcars 38,880 barrels (6,181,920 liters) never mind the lives that were lost. Compare this to Kalamazoo? At 877,000 US gallons (3,331,980 liters)
This year Kinder Morgan trans mountain pipeline spill (in a 50+ year old line we won’t let them replace) spilled 6 barrels (950 liters) in Merrit, 20 barrels (3,200 liters) spill found during maintenance in Hope
It’s not the line dow7500 it’s the company!
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