A Resounding Call for Tougher Rail Safety Regulations After Oil Disaster in Lac-Mégantic

More than fifty organizations have banded together to demand the federal government increase safety standards in the wake of the devastating rail accident in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec.

“Even as we mourn the dead, we must fight for the living,” Chairperson of the Council of Canadians, Maude Barlow said in the press release announcing the historic collaboration. “These measures cannot undo the damage done to Lac-Mégantic and other regions, but they can help reduce the risk of future disasters.”

In the early hours of July 6th, a failure in the braking system sent a 73-car train carrying crude oil operated by the United States-based Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway (MMA) barreling down hill toward the town of 6000 people. The train derailed and destroyed more than 30 buildings in the town’s downtown core, including a popular bar.

As of today, 42 casualties have been confirmed with five people still missing. Authorities are having trouble identifying bodies in the rubble because the high temperatures caused by ensuing explosions.

Though Lac-Mégantic is unequivocally the worst, it is not the lone incident in recent memory. Earlier this year there was a spill of about 20,000 gallons of oil on a Canadian Pacific Railway line Minnesota. Another spill of about 575 barrels took place near Jansen, Saskatchewan.

EnergyWire reports an 88 percent rise in incidents in the US this year over last. This as the Alberta Oilsands Quarterly Update predicts that rail transport could more than make up for the absence of the Keystone XL pipeline. It foresees a four-fold jump in the capacity of rail shipments of diluted bitumen by 2014. The Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific currently carry about 200,000 barrels of diluted bitumen per day.

In 2012, after a 2009 derailment near Cherry Valley, Illinois, a study by The National Transportation Safety Board in the US called for a major overhaul of all DOT 111 rail cars similar to those involved in the Lac-Mégantic disaster.   

In order to head-off future disasters, the organizations are calling for three specific actions:

• Implement an immediate ban on shipping oil in the older, type 111A tanker cars that have been identified as spill-prone by the Canadian Transportation Safety Board.
• Reinstate mandatory two-person minimum train crews.
• Launch a comprehensive, independent safety review of all hydrocarbon transportation: pipelines, rail, tanker and truck. This review should include public hearings and an examination of the role of deregulation and privatization in reducing safety standards.

As well as several environmental organizations, the group includes representatives from trade unions, including the Confédération des Syndicats Nationaux (CNS), Quebec’s second largest trade union. These groups point out that in the absence of sound regulation, workers often take the fall.

“Workers and our communities end up paying the price when the federal government chooses to look the other way as companies cut corners on safety to get oil to market,” said CSN’s Pierre Patry. “Regulations have been weakened as the amount of oil being moved has increased. It is time to take a step back and have a comprehensive, public review of safety in order to prevent future catastrophes.”

This certainly seems to have been the case with this crash. From the beginning, MMA Executive Chief Officer Edward Burckhardt tried to shift blame off the company’s shoulders. “The words corporate responsibility are used from time to time, but what I think you generally find is that when mistakes are made… then it’s people that did it,” he told the Toronto Star. “A corporation is a bank account in a lock box at the post office. It doesn’t do things. People do things.”

Since then the company has laid off a quarter of its Quebec workforce. 

The residents of Lac-Megantic have also expressed frustration with the federal government’s weak regulations and slow action as the newly appointed transport minister Lisa Raitt visited the town late last week.

Jocelyn Breault, who works at a bottle depot near the blastzone, pointed out in a press conference that this was not the first train derailment in the area. "I hope she will say that, starting now, we will not allow this to happen."

Several of the groups contend that the only way to ensure that there is not a repeat of this disaster is to wean the country from fossil fuels which are dangerous to procure and transport by any means.

“Transporting oil is always risky, but both rail and pipelines can be a lot safer than they are today,” said Keith Stewart, Greenpeace Canada Climate and Energy Coordinator. “Breaking our addiction to oil is the only real solution and something we must do to combat climate change, but as we make the transition to clean energy we must reduce the harm from transporting and using oil.”

Visit www.leadnow.ca/lac-megantic to voice your support for tougher regulations for transporting oil by rail.

Image Credit: Transportation Safety Board via flickr