Remember over the last few years when the enemies of oil development were hyping oil train derailments? To be fair those derailments – some of them hugely explosive and damaging, some even costing people their lives – were a legitimate thing to be concerned about. But when some, including this observer, argued that the solution…
Time To Institute Conditioning Regulations For Ethanol?
Recently left-wing environmental activists have been focusing on the safety of oil by rail shipments. And by focusing, I mean they’ve been trying to stoke fear among the public as a way of generating political opposition to transporting oil by rail. The thinking of these activists, who also oppose pipelines, is that if they can…
Oil Pipelines Help Resolve Lack Of Rail Capacity For Farmers
Here’s some good news. After a couple of years of problems with farmers unable to put their crops on overcrowded rail lines it seems problems have eased, just in time for harvest: Just in time for what the U.S. Agriculture Department expects to be near-record corn and soybean harvests, grain train cars are in abundance.…
Firefighters Dispel "Voodoo" Myths Around Bakken "Bomb Train" Crude
“We’ve got people running around saying that it’s like a bomb on wheels,” Chauncey Naylor, director of training and fire and emergency response for Tyco Williams Fire & Hazard Control, is quoted as saying in the Summer 2015 issue of Industrial Fire World magazine (scanned version below). “It got us thinking that we ought to check…
Environmentalists Protesting Oil Trains Should Answer Questions About Alternatives
Environmental activists are planning a week of protests against oil by rail shipments in remembrance of the Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, derailment and explosion which killed 47 people. That train was hauling oil from North Dakota’s oil fields. In fact, most of the oil produced in North Dakota is shipped by rail these days thanks to a lack of…
Heimdal Derailment Shows That Oil Train Problem Is Improving
Earlier this week another oil train derailed, this time near Heimdal in central North Dakota. Anti-oil activists could almost be heard panting in their excitement, rushing to the media with talking points about “bomb trains” and lax regulation of oil shipped on America’s rail lines. Rep. Ron Guggisberg, a North Dakota Democrat from Fargo, went…
Bakken Crude Involved In Heimdal Derailment Was Well Below Conditioning Threshold
Forum reporter Amy Dalrymple is reporting that the oil involved in the Heimdal derailment was below the conditioning threshold set by state regulators which went into law on April 1st. “Oil from the Tioga rail facility has tested at 12.44 psi, 11.08 psi and 11.18 psi, according to April tests submitted by Hess to the…
Blame Heimdal Derailment On The Anti-Pipeline Activists
At some point, we’re going to have to acknowledge that all the oil conditioning rules and track inspectors in the world aren’t going to change the fact that we’re producing more oil than the rails can handle. This morning came news of another oil train derailment, this time near Heimdal, North Dakota. Every time one…
Five BNSF Tanker Cars Derail And Catch Fire Near Harvey, ND
Another firey train derailment, this time near the tiny town of Heimdal, North Dakota. Also close to Harvey. Here’s a photo. No word yet on what was in the tanker cars. UPDATE: It was oil. My good friend Rick Jensen at KHND in Harvey is telling me the area around the derailment is being evacuated.…
House Shoots Down State Rail Inspectors: "Every Derailment Threatens Our Entire Oil Industry"
Normally you wouldn’t think the budget for North Dakota’s Public Service Commission would be a likely candidate for heated and protracted debate in the Legislature, but that was the case this morning. A House committee removed language in the PSC budget – SB2008 – which would have funded two state rail inspectors and one supervisor…