US oil trains and safety

[oldman]

Extracted from a longer piece on Yahoo/Reuters:

Billionaire investor Warren Buffett is set to be a chief beneficiary of a bid by Senate Republicans to weaken new regulations to improve train safety in the $2.8 billion crude-by-rail industry, a key cog in the development of the vast North American shale oil fields.

A series of oil train accidents, including the July 2013 explosion of a train carrying crude in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, that killed 47 people, led U.S. and Canadian regulators to announce sweeping safety rules in May. Among other things, U.S. oil trains are required to install new electronically controlled pneumatic (ECP) brakes.

But in late June, the Republican-controlled Senate Commerce Committee approved a measure to drop that requirement, and order years of new research to confirm the safety benefits of ECP brakes.

...

The series of oil train explosions in recent years follows a boom in U.S. shale oil production, notably in the Bakken region of North Dakota. Bakken crude has helped reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil but is also considered more volatile and flammable than heavier crudes.

Because the landlocked Bakken region is not easily accessed by oil pipelines, rail provides the main transportation route. The result has been a bonanza in the crude by rail business. Shipments surged to more than 350 million barrels in 2014 from less than 680,000 barrels in 2008, according to industry data.

BNSF has been the biggest beneficiary. In 2013, the railroad hauled 324,206 carloads of crude oil, about three quarters of the industry's total volume of 435,560 carloads, according to data provided by the company and AAR.

But BNSF also has been involved in six of the 18 U.S. oil train derailments since the Lac-Megantic disaster, second only to CSX, which has had seven. The latest BNSF derailment was in Heimdal, North Dakota, on May 6. Ten cars left the rails. The crude caught fire, forcing the town of 40 to evacuate.

 

[ac6000cw]

I generally agree with Fred Frailey's blog post re. the ECP brake debate - http://cs.trains.com/trn/b/fred-frailey/archive/2015/05/06/the-war-over-electric-brakes.aspx (some quotes from it below)

So I’ll make the case for ECP. (By the way, the standards were developed two decades ago by the same AAR that now vigorously opposes their implementation.) A train equipped with electronic braking is hard-wired, allowing instant communication from airbrake handle in the locomotive to every brake valve on the cars. The principal advantages are that all brakes instantly apply and release at the same time, the air supply is continually charged, engineers can gradually release and reapply brakes, and undesired emergency braking (dynamiters, they’re called) virtually disappear. In-train forces, such as slack roll-in and roll-out, are greatly reduced, and that lessens the risk of derailment. Moreover, stopping distance is reduced 40 to 60 percent, permitting higher train speeds and higher speeds approaching restricting signals. Longer trains are possible. Longer trains run at higher speeds increase the capacity of the railroad network. Because air is always charging, braking power is inexhaustible; plus, a train can stop and instantly restart. Brakes, draft gear, wheels, and bearings require less maintenance. Existing federal regulations would allow train inspections every 5,000 miles instead of the present 1,500 or 1,000 miles.

Let’s just say I don’t understand this whole display of foot-dragging. In a presentation the AAR made earlier this year, the trade group appeared to be saying that because accident rates have decreased substantially in recent years, ECP really isn’t necessary. As I write this, news comes in of yet another crude oil train jumping the tracks, this time before it could even get out of North Dakota. Oil train derailments are devastating the reputation of the railroad industry. My point is that yes, accident rates are way down and that’s good, and yes, one hell of a lot more needs doing. And reducing accidents is just one benefit of ECP braking.

Personally I think the railroads should just commit to installing ECP brakes on all new oil tank cars at least - they normally run in unit (block) trains, so the operational benefits would build up quite quickly as new cars are put into service.