While the primary purpose of the American Petroleum Institute is to advocate for its member oil companies, it is disappointing that the institute's narrow focus all but dismisses matters of public safety. So when the oil lobby this week asked a U.S. Court of Appeals to block rules designed to enhance safety of oil trains, it came as no surprise. The rule the oil lobby doesn't like is the timeline that would require shippers to retrofit old tank cars with new safety features, or replace the old cars with new ones.
The push for tank car improvements comes after several tank car train derailments that resulted in fires and explosions (two in North Dakota). One accident in Canada caused 47 deaths. Since then, industries involved in shipping volatile Bakken crude oil from North Dakota have been scrambling to improve safety standards in the hope of preventing more fiery derailments. Those interests include railroads, tank car builders and, kicking and screaming, the oil-producing folks.
State and federal regulators have been moving with atypical speed to put in place new safety regulations. North Dakota, for example, imposed in April a tougher oil conditioning standard that is supposed to reduce the volatility of Bakken crude. There's vigorous debate whether the volatility standard is tough enough, and a derailment and fire a few days ago near Heimdal, N.D., suggests critics of the standard might be right.
Nonetheless, the API's stance is troubling. Rather than urge its member companies to crank up their operations to adjust to new regulatory demands, the institute marches off to a federal court in order to block safety standards for retrofitting older tank cars. And why? Because the rule would result in a car shortage, API says, which, of course, would mean additional difficulty for oil companies in getting their product to market. The industry needs more time, says API. The calculation might make sense for the API, but it does not for advancing oil train safety.
The institute also crows about a statistic that oil shipment by rail has a 99.997 safety record - the same stat railroads like to underline. Fair enough. But oil train traffic has increased more in the past few years than ever before in railroading history. Therefore, that 0.003 percent of oil trains that derail and explode represents, in real numbers, more trains, more oil train accidents, and more potential for disasters.
ADVERTISEMENT
Ideally, all the players involved in the transport of oil by rail would welcome a comprehensive collaborative effort to enhance rail safety. But when one of the major players opts for a lawsuit, the at-risk public has to wonder if any of them are serious.
This editorial originally ran in the The Forum of Fargo Moorhead.
