Oil Spill Science and Technology, 2nd Edition

2.6. Crude-by-Rail Spills

The rapid changes in the last 5 years or so with the shift toward transportation of crude oil by unit trains of 100–120 cars were summarized in previous reports [67,68]. In 2010, about 55,000 barrels (bbl) of oil per day were being transported by unit train in the US—that is, less than one train per day carrying Canadian oil sands oil, and shale oils (e.g., Bakken crude) primarily from North Dakota to refineries in Washington on the west coast, Louisiana refineries on the Gulf of Mexico coast, and New Jersey and Pennsylvania on the mid-Atlantic coast. Crude-by-rail (CBR) transportation increased more than six-fold to 440,000 bbl/day by 2012. By 2014, CBR transport had increased to more than one million bbl/day—about 14 ...