[audio:http://wamcradio.org/EarthWise/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/EW-03-11-14-Trains-and-Oil-Spills.mp3|titles=EW 03-11-14 Trains and Oil Spills]
During the past five years, U.S. domestic oil production has risen 50 percent. This surge has outpaced the pipeline infrastructure needed to move oil to consumers.
Oil companies have turned to railroads as a means of transporting their product – but this is creating a dangerous situation, for both the environment and the people and businesses that reside near the tracks.
Forty-seven people were killed in an oil train accident in Quebec last July. In December, a crash between a soybean train and an oil train prompted an evacuation of Casselton, North Dakota.
Now that more than 10 percent of the nation’s oil is shipped by train, environmentally disastrous oil spills are becoming commonplace. To put it in perspective, trains spilled 800,000 gallons of oil between 1975 and 2012. In 2013 alone, more than 1.5 million gallons were spilled – nearly twice as much.
This figure can be attributed in large part to shipping methods. Trains regularly transport other hazardous materials, like chlorine, but they are kept in special pressurized vessels equipped to withstand a crash. Oil is transported in a type of tank car that has been known for two decades to be unsafe for flammable cargo because it easily punctures and tears.
In 2011, railroads and rail car owners agreed to equip new cars with thicker steel. But the older tank cars remain on the rails, rolling past farms, homes, and waterways.
Meanwhile, stakeholders worry over costs and continue to disagree on how to deal with them. With the environment and human lives at risk, we need to make oil transport safe.
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Accidents Surge as Oil Industry Takes the Train
Photo, taken on May 10, 2012, courtesy of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection via Flickr.
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Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio. Support for Earth Wise comes from the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, NY.