[Vision2020] 300-ton engine for PGE power plant strikes crude-oil train car near Clatskanie

[Tom Hansen]

Courtesy of Oregon Live at:

http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2014/01/300-ton_engine_for_pge_power_p.html

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300-ton engine for PGE power plant strikes crude-oil train car near Clatskanie, no oil spilled

A massive 300-ton engine being delivered to a Portland General Electric power plant near Clatskanie fell off a truck and struck a loaded crude oil rail car Tuesday morning, causing only minor damage.

No injuries were reported. The steel tank car didn't rupture or explode. No oil spilled.

The accident, which happened 160 feet from the Columbia River, underscored the risks posed by oil trains in Oregon. Regulators were caught flatfooted by the arrival of trains carrying dozens of cars filled with potentially explosive North Dakota crude oil in 2013. Last year, 110 oil trains traveled through Portland en route to the Columbia Pacific Bio-Refinery, which exports up to 600,000 barrels to West Coast refineries each month.

The engine, which is 20 feet tall, 50 feet long and 13 feet wide, was inching along on a specialized heavy-load trailer when it "literally tipped off the truck and went plop," said Steve Corson, a PGE spokesman. The engine landed on empty train tracks, but left a dent in a tanker of crude oil sitting stationary on adjacent tracks.

The accident happened as the crude tanker was waiting to be unloaded. The railroad that serves the area, Portland & Western, had already delivered the train, a company spokesman said.

Corson said PGE doesn't know what caused the engine to fall or what impact the accident would have on construction of the company's estimated $300 million power plant at Port Westward, which is supposed to be ready in 2015. The engine's manufacturer, the Finnish company Wärtsilä, hadn't completed delivery and installation, he said. The engine's condition isn't known.

The incident involved the same type of oil that's been involved in three high-profile explosions on trains in Canada and the United States in the last seven months. The worst, a July 6 derailment in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, killed 47 people and leveled part of the town.

Russ Quimby, a retired National Transportation Safety Board inspector and rail consultant, said he didn't believe Tuesday's incident had the potential to be as catastrophic as the three major accidents in Quebec, North Dakota and Alabama where rail cars have exploded.

"At the worst you would've punctured it and had a leak from one tank car," Quimby said. "It's generally pretty hard to ignite crude oil – even sweet, light crude. It's more likely to knock it over than puncture it."

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Engines like those involved in a minor accident with an oil train on Tuesday, Jan. 21, are staged for placement at Portland General Electric's new Port Westward power plant. 



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Seeya 'round town, Moscow, because . . .

"Moscow Cares" (the most fun you can have with your pants on)
http://www.MoscowCares.com
  
Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"There's room at the top they are telling you still.
But first you must learn to smile as you kill,
If you want to be like the folks on the hill."

- John Lennon
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