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August 22, 2019
EESI Policy Fellow Richard Nunno, who is now based in Portland, Oregon, learned that his new home has become a key transit point in the transportation of Canadian tar sands oil to the Pacific, for export to Asia. Tar sands are a particularly dirty source of oil: according to the Union of Concerned Scientists, “a gallon of gasoline made from tar sands produces about 15% more carbon dioxide emissions than one made from conventional oil.” Alberta, Canada, is home to the world’s largest deposits of tar sands.
Companies are investing in transportation infrastructure, such as new train terminals, to bring Canadian tar sands oil to Asia, where demand is strongest. But such investments will lock financing into fossil fuels, when we need to transition to carbon-free sources of energy to stop climate change. Moreover, transporting oil through densely populated areas is very risky.
Oil train moving through North Dakota (courtesy North Dakota Department of Transportation)
Over the past several years, pressure has been mounting to transport crude oil from the controversial tar sands extraction sites in Alberta, Canada, to the West Coast for export. In a series of revelations first uncovered by The Oregonian newspaper, the secretive activities of a company named Zenith Petroleum Corporation to export Canadian tar sands oil have been brought to light. Zenith, an oil and gas extraction company based in Houston, Texas, with facilities in Canada and other countries, purchased an asphalt and crude oil distribution facility (or terminal) in Portland, Oregon, in December 2017. The previous company (Arc Logistics Corp.) had obtained a permit from the city of Portland to store asphalt (a material used for road construction) and crude oil brought into that terminal. The facility had been mostly dormant, however, until Zenith purchased it and began its crude oil export activities. Even though asphalt is far less toxic and explosive than tar sands oil, Zenith immediately began using the existing permit to transport tar sands oil into the terminal. In early 2019, Zenith began construction at the Portland facility to quadruple its rail unloading capacity, from 12 rail cars at a time (for a total capacity of 18,000 barrels per day) to 44 at a time (72,000 barrels per day).1
Map of the Zenith oil trains from Canada to Portland, Oregon. The black line is an approximation of the initial blast zone in case of accident or derailment. Additional toxic effects can be expected depending upon the weather, the train’s location, and its contents. Courtesy of The Oregonian/OregonLive.com (Mark Graves) Sources: Oregon Department of Transportation, Department of Environmental Quality; Zenith Energy.
To get to the Zenith facility, trains travel from Alberta, Canada, through Montana, and then proceed along the Columbia River through the state of Washington and into Portland. Zenith can use several different routes, but it usually uses the Burlington Northern & Santa Fe (BNSF) route on the Washington side of the Columbia River or the Union Pacific railway line on the Oregon side of the Columbia River. Both routes pass through the Scenic Columbia River Gorge, and expose sensitive wetlands, as well as numerous communities along the route, to the dangers of a major spill. In Portland, lower income communities are the most threatened. Zenith is working with Chevron Corporation, which operates tankships to transport the oil down the Willamette River to the ocean. According to shipping records, the tankers have traveled to locations in China, South Korea, and California. Bloomberg reported that Zenith started exporting tar sands crude out of Portland in January 2018. In January 2019, observers noticed construction cranes visible at the terminal site for the expansion of Zenith’s operations.
The storage terminal is located in the heart of Portland along the Willamette River, making any potential spills or explosions a very dangerous prospect. The oil trains must travel through densely populated neighborhoods and along highly sensitive ecosystems to arrive at this location. The Portland site is Zenith’s only West Coast facility, providing access to international markets and refineries; it is considered a key component in the effort to export the oil.
Company disclosure of the movement of these and other toxic petroleum products continues to be opaque according to Oregon state regulators, largely because of successful industry lobbying efforts and the reluctance of the Oregon state legislature to pass laws similar to those enacted in California and Washington states. In the 2019 legislative session, Oregon enacted a bill (HB 2209), enabling the state to levy fees on the railroad companies (up to $20 per car entering the state, which would likely only raise about $400,000 per year, at four 100-car trains per week) to cover the cost of spills in the state, plus an operating fee on the railroads (which is expected to raise $1 million every two years). This amount is clearly not enough to cover the costs of even a small accident. Furthermore, in its final form, the bill did not include key language requiring oil train operators to notify first responders, who would be unprepared to handle a devastating spill in Portland or the Columbia Gorge. Environmentalists warn that Oregon has become the path of least resistance for the transport of tar sands oil that could devastate the region’s fisheries and waterways.
The Dangers of Oil Trains
Tar sands oil is extremely viscous, and it requires the addition of a diluent called naphtha to allow it to flow from rail cars to storage tanks and then on to tankers. Naphtha vapor is a respiratory system irritant and nervous system toxin, and may be carcinogenic. Naphtha is highly flammable and explosive in air. The crude oil mixture also contains benzene, a known carcinogen, and hydrogen sulfide, a gas which, when inhaled, can cause loss of consciousness and respiratory failure.2
The risks of derailment, and the fires and explosions of crude oil trains are well documented. One notable example is the disaster at the town of Lac Megantic in Quebec in July 2013, when a 74-car freight train carrying Bakken Formation crude oil derailed, causing an explosion and the combustion of multiple tank cars, killing 42 people, with five more missing and presumed dead. More than 30 buildings in the town center were destroyed, and all but three of the remaining 39 buildings had to be demolished due to petroleum contamination. Another accident took place in June 2016 in Mosier, Oregon—70 miles east of Portland—when 11 cars derailed from a Union Pacific train hauling 96 tank cars loaded with Bakken Crude Oil from North Dakota. The derailed cars caught fire and exploded shortly afterwards. There were no deaths, because it was an unusually calm day with no wind. The nearby school was evacuated. The contamination of the Columbia River and the air pollution caused by the accident were catastrophic to the local environment. If such an incident were to occur in or near a major city such as Portland, the death and destruction would be considerable. Such incidents have helped raise public awareness over what reporters have dubbed “train bombs” and “rolling pipelines.”
In April 2019, news reports revealed that Zenith had not yet performed a spill test as required annually by state and federal laws. The existing permit is based on a test that the previous company performed using diesel fuel (which is far less toxic and explosive than tar sands oil and easier to clean up). The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, which regulates facilities that store and transfer petroleum products, for some unknown reason did not require that Zenith comply with the test requirements, and to date, neither Zenith nor Oregon state first responders have practiced for a tar sands disaster.
The entire Cascadia Subduction Zone, which runs along Oregon’s Pacific shore, is vulnerable to an earthquake. According to a 2018 Oregon state government report, a Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake could potentially cause 27,000 injuries and/or fatalities, 85,000 people needing shelter, and $37 billion in building damages. But fossil fuel-oriented industries in Portland have not made recommended safety improvements.
A particular risk associated with Zenith’s use of its oil terminal in Northwest Portland is that the site along the Willamette River is a known earthquake liquefaction zone, i.e., the land on which the terminal is built has been identified by authorities as highly susceptible to losing its stability and becoming like a liquid, or dissolving, in the event of a major earthquake. In that case, the petroleum contents within the tanks would either explode and/or empty into the Willamette River, causing a major environmental and public safety catastrophe. The areas at highest risk are those along the Willamette and Columbia rivers, which is where most of Portland’s petroleum fuel is stored.
Oils Trains Are Part of a Trend of Transporting Oil from the Interior to the West Coast
In addition to Zenith’s Tar Sands Oil operation, several other fossil fuel companies are searching for ways to move petroleum resources out of the continent’s interior. Since there is a surplus of petroleum within North America, petroleum producers are attempting to move it to the Pacific Northwest coast for export to Asia, primarily to China. For example, in 2013 a company called Global Partners LP was able to change its port lease with Oregon to allow for the shipment of heavy crude at its facility in Clatskanie, Oregon (a small town 60 miles northwest of Portland). That facility was originally built as a bio-fuel refinery in 2009 using $36 million in green energy loans and tax credits from the state. Sightline Institute, a research group based in Seattle and focusing on environmental and sustainability problems and solutions, has identified a total of eleven oil-by-rail facilities at refineries or port terminals, which could move 858,900 barrels per day, enough to emit 132 million metric tons of carbon dioxide every year.
The dangers associated with the transport of oil by means other than rail are also numerous. Accidents and disasters occur often along pipelines and at storage tanks, as well as at shipping and other transportation installations. Environmental impacts include the release of noxious air pollutants, explosions that endanger and destroy human life, out-of-control fires, petrochemical contamination of oceans, rivers and drinking water, and the killing of fish and wildlife.
Over the past several years, Sightline has been publishing a variety of reports on fossil fuel projects and proposals that have been thwarted by the governments of California, Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia. Sightline’s reporting series, “The Thin Green Line”, refers to the contiguous three U.S. states (California, Oregon and Washington) and one Canadian province (British Columbia) that are blocking private sector attempts to move fossil fuels out of the interior of the continent to the coast. Sightline estimated that if all of those proposals were built, their emissions would be five times that of the Keystone XL Pipeline, which itself is widely considered to be devastating for the climate.
While many of the attempts to build oil pipelines and facilities have been defeated, many new ones have been proposed. Advocates point out that the oil industry is transporting tar sands oil by rail now mainly because climate and environmental activists and indigenous tribes have been able to stop or delay construction of proposed pipelines. Other facilities have opened with little public awareness. In addition to oil by rail, other investigative research groups have found:
Opposition Mounting to Oil Trains
With the Trump Administration attempting to reduce safety regulations for oil trains, some state and local governments are working on protecting their jurisdictions from the risks of tar sands oil and oil train explosions. State and local opposition is arguing that the public is being forced to incur all of the risks of moving and storing oil trains in their jurisdictions, and that corporations, and not the local or state economy, receive all of the financial benefits. They further argue that the port infrastructure that the oil interests are purchasing could be better used to develop renewable energy, such as importing wind turbines and transporting them by rail to the nation’s interior. After the Mosier incident, Washington Governor Jay Inslee stated that attempts to transport oil by rail significantly increase the risk of oil pollution, and “it does not make sense to make such massive investments in fossil fuel infrastructure given that we’re going to have to wean ourselves off of fossil-based fuels in the coming years.” Washington State now requires rail companies to have oil spill response plans. In March 2018, the city of Baltimore, Maryland, in an effort to forestall oil by rail projects, voted to ban the construction of new facilities that could be used to export crude oil from its port. Similarly, in December 2017, South Portland, Maine, banned the loading of crude oil onto ships, and Albany, New York, continues to block attempts to move tar sands oil by rail through its terminals.
Local environmental and human rights organizations in the Portland area have formed a collaborative to raise public awareness of oil train activities and to oppose them before the city, county and state governments. The group, called Stoptarsandspdx, includes local chapters of 350.org, Audubon Society, Columbia Riverkeeper, Friends of the Columbia Gorge, Neighbors for Clean Air, OPAL Environmental Justice Oregon (an advocacy group for people of color and low-income communities), the Sierra Club, and Physicians for Social Responsibility, among others. They have held a series of public fora in Portland, and have been pressuring the mayor and city council to take action to stop Zenith’s oil trains.
In 2016, Portland, Oregon, adopted a resolution to prohibit new fossil fuel storage facilities from being built within the city, but it seems that Zenith has been able to use a permit that was granted prior to 2016 to expand its operations. Many are questioning the legality of the permit since the new use is significantly different from the purpose intended in the original permit.
Potential Measures to Reduce Oil Train Risks
In the absence of any federal action to prevent the transport of petroleum by rail, states are beginning to enact laws or regulations to forestall these dangerous transactions. Since 2005, Global Partners has been fined $877,500 for violating environmental and railroad safety laws in Massachusetts, Maine, North Dakota, and Oregon. Since its creation in 2014, Zenith Energy has been fined at least $245,000 for violating environmental and pipeline safety laws in Pennsylvania and South Carolina (likely written off as the cost of doing business). More fines may be forthcoming.
Some local communities are also mobilizing to fight the threat of new or larger fossil fuel terminals within their jurisdictions. On June 25, 2019, the Port of Vancouver (Washington) Commission passed a policy statement affirming that the Port will not pursue new bulk fossil fuel terminals. A spokesperson for the Columbia Riverkeeper (a non-profit organization focused on the preservation and clean-up of that river) stated that this decision “is setting an example that other communities can follow by declining dangerous, polluting fossil fuel mega-terminals…”
In other communities, however—such as Portland, Oregon—concerned citizens have thus far not been able to convince the city to take any action against the oil companies despite repeated meetings and public fora with city officials. Possible strategies that have been suggested for the Portland Council to pursue include:
On July 15, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler and the Portland City Council held a public “listening session” on the issue of Zenith Energy. While the Mayor said that his staff is working on trying to find a legal way to stop Zenith, he claimed that “the city is limited in its ability to regulate trains, which are generally overseen by federal agencies.” Activists argued that if the city council does not have the authority to stop Zenith from continuing to move petroleum through Portland, then it needs to “change the law to enable them to stop this dirty destructive project.”3 Three days after the public meeting, the city government approved yet another permit to Zenith to expand its capacity for transferring the oil.
At the regional and national level, an organization called Stand.earth is working to protect local communities and the environment against degradation caused by corporations and governments. One of their campaigns, Stop Oil Trains, is working to defeat oil train terminals across North America, mostly through local community organization and opposition. Their website provides information and recommendations for how to fight oil companies that are attempting to transport crude by rail through a community, or to store it in a community.
The concept of Fossil Fuel Risk Bonds has been promoted by the Center for Sustainable Economy for several years, and no state or federal preemption has been identified that would prevent a city from requiring such a financial assurance to guarantee coverage in the event of an accident or natural disaster. It is not clear, however, how much these risk bonds would cost and whether the oil company would decide not to continue operations rather than pay the premiums. While this outcome would be welcomed by environmental activists, the corporate executives may try to sue the city for their losses. If nothing else, such a scenario would at least raise the level of public awareness of the environmental and public safety and health issues surrounding oil transport.
On August 1, Senator Wyden of Oregon introduced legislation that would require railroads to share information regarding oil shipments with state emergency responders so they know what risks they face, and would also allocate funding for financial assistance towards emergency preparedness and risk reduction in local communities. That funding would not be nearly enough to cover losses, however, and it would not appease the local communities, which want the oil trains out of their cities and towns altogether.
Author: Richard Nunno
ENDNOTES
1| Briefing by Sustainable Energy and Economy Network at Community Forum on Zenith’s Tar Sands Oil Expansion, sponsored by Stop Zenith Collaborative, April 17, 2019.
2| Statement by Oregon Physicians for Social Responsibility at Community Forum on Zenith’s Tar Sands Oil Expansion, sponsored by Stop Zenith Collaborative, April 17, 2019.
3| Mia Reback of Sustainable Energy and Economy Network, statement to Portland City Council, July 15, 2019.
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