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State shaping oil-by-rail safety rules

Ecology Department working on specifics for Legislature’s measure

By Lauren Dake, Columbian Political Writer
Published: November 19, 2015, 5:18pm

An effort to strengthen crude-by-rail safety transport measures is underway, the state’s Department of Ecology announced Wednesday.

In recent years, the state has seen a dramatic spike in oil-by-rail traveling through communities, from zero gallons in 2011 to more than 700 million gallons in 2013.

In the most recent legislative session, lawmakers passed a measure to increase the number of the state’s rail inspectors, require railroads hauling crude to demonstrate an ability to pay for a cleanup and to ensure that oil refineries share information about the type of oil and volume with first responders.

But legislators left specifics up to the Ecology Department.

Ecology officials are charged with identifying what type of information should be shared with first responders, tribal and local governments and the public. They also need to consider how they will disseminate the information to first responders and others.

Officials plan to host several workshops and consider feedback from the public. The dates and locations of the meetings have not been set.

“These rules will help ensure public safety and environmental protection,” Dale Jensen, Ecology’s spills program manager, said in a statement. “Emergency responders will have more information, better resources, and training to respond to incidents in a rapid, aggressive, and well-coordinated manner.”

Railroads currently do not need to have contingency plans. Ecology officials will work with railroads to develop worst-case scenarios and be on the hook to demonstrate to the state’s spill department that they know how to respond to such an event.

The measure that passed this session also taxed barrels of crude oil traveling through the state by rail and directed the money toward oil spill response programs.

When the governor signed the bill into law earlier this year, he said the measure will ensure “that at a time when the number of oil trains running through Washington is skyrocketing, oil companies will be held accountable for playing a part in preventing and responding to spills.”

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Columbian Political Writer