Fraser Institute: pipelines 2.5x safer than rail for oil transportation; tankers have safest record
27 July 2017
Transporting oil by pipelines is more than twice as safe as using rail, and marine tankers are safer still with a markedly improved safety record over the past 40 years, according to a new study released by the Fraser Institute, a Canadian policy think-tank.
The study updates previous research that finds pipelines are 2.5 times less likely to experience a spill than rail, with an occurrence rate of 0.03 accidents per million barrels of oil shipped by pipeline between 2004 and 2015, compared to 0.08 accidents per million barrels of oil shipped by rail over the same period. Marine tankers, by comparison, have a spill rate of less than 0.001 per million barrels of oil shipped.
While oil shipped by tanker has increased from 1.4 billion tonnes in 1970 to 2.9 billion tonnes in 2015, the amount of spillage has plummeted by 98%. Specifically, in 1970, there was 383,000 tonnes of oil released in spills globally compared to just 6,000 tonnes in 2016.
Well designed, installed, re-enforced, well monitored and maintained pipelines should be the safest. Unfortunately, most pipelines do not meet basic safety features.
Trains and trucks are inherently not the safest. Too many interactions with other ground transport vehicles. Rails and trains maintenance leaves to be desired.
Large tankers are and should be the safest over long periods.
Posted by: HarveyD | 27 July 2017 at 01:52 PM
This is a report from a well known advocate of right wing libertarian ideas and aendas this time to discredit activist concerns over oil pipelines and their environmental affects including Global warming concerns.
Typically this is the form of which would you prefer, 1:
An oil spill at the rail side possibly taking out ta town?
2:
An oil spill on more remote farmlands or reservations - maybe adjacent to natioal parks?
3: ((It's always good to offer the punters three ( but not more than) choices as it tends to confuse them,))
How about the best possible choice of a tanker disaster at a place so far away, you will never even know?
4: Or just go for low impact distributed renewable energy that is cheaper?
Oh shit - that's right you only get the first three options. Just forget I mentioned option 4.
Canadian media outlets aren't fact-checking Fraser Institute's misleading tax study (again)
some people allege that Michael Walker helped set up the Institute after he received financial backing from forestry giant MacMillan Bloedel, largely to counter British Columbia's NDP government
In late 1997, the Institute set up a research program emulating the UK's Social Affairs Unit, called the Social Affairs Centre. Its founding Director was Patrick Basham. The program's funding came from Rothmans International and Philip Morris.[51] When Rothmans was bought by British American Tobacco (BAT) in 1999, its funding ended,[52] and in 2000 the Institute wrote to BAT asking for $50,000 per year, to be split between the Social Affairs Centre and the Centre for Risk and Regulation.[51] The letter highlighted the Institute's 1999ve Smoke: The EPA's Betrayal of Science and Policy,
In 1999, the Fraser Institute was criticized by health professionals and scientists for sponsoring two conferences on the tobacco industry entitled Junk Science, Junk Policy? Managing Risk and Regulation and Should Government Butt Out? The Pros and Cons of Tobacco Regulation. Critics charged the Institute was associating itself with the tobacco industry's many attempts to discredit authentic scientific work.[50][dead link]
In 2004, the Fraser Institute issued a statement of support for the legalization of cannabis and its sale on the market
The Institute is headquartered in Vancouver, with offices also located in Calgary, Toronto, and Montreal, and ties to a global network of 80 think-tanks through the Economic Freedom Network
The Fraser Institute issued a number of articles and statements opposing Canadian gun control laws,[32][33] including firearms registry
Posted by: Arnold | 27 July 2017 at 08:48 PM
The strategy is to assure the public that the currently controversial oil pipelines are safe by showing they are safer than oil trains. The reader is then left with conclusion that the best solution would be to ship by sea.
Except there will be no let up for rail shipments - or any pipelines in any state of repair or otherwise and with global warming opening up new opportunities for shipping to Europe or Asia as well as proposed new port infrastructure, there will be more shipping as well.
I guess when they can't see past their own financial interests in promoting climate suicide it would be pointless to expect fair and balanced suggestions for the implementation of carbon free options.
Welcome to the real world of interest group think tanks.
From Wiki.
"According to an article published in CBC News Online, some people allege that Michael Walker helped set up the Institute after he received financial backing from forestry giant MacMillan Bloedel, largely to counter British Columbia's NDP government[50] then led by premier Dave Barrett. The CEO of MacMillan Bloedel at the time supported wage and price controls.
In late 1997, the Institute set up a research program emulating the UK's Social Affairs Unit, called the Social Affairs Centre. Its founding Director was Patrick Basham. The program's funding came from Rothmans International and Philip Morris.[51] When Rothmans was bought by British American Tobacco (BAT) in 1999, its funding ended,[52] and in 2000 the Institute wrote to BAT asking for $50,000 per year, to be split between the Social Affairs Centre and the Centre for Risk and Regulation.[51] The letter highlighted the Institute's 1999 publication Passive Smoke: The EPA's Betrayal of Science and Policy,[53] "which highlighted the absence of any scientific evidence for linking cancer with second-hand smoke [and] received widespread media coverage both in Canada and the United States".[51] At this time the CEO of BAT's Canadian subsidiary, Imasco, was also on the Fraser Institute's Board of Trustees.[52] The Fraser Institute ceased disclosing its sources of corporate funding in the 1980s.[52]
In 1999, the Fraser Institute was criticized by health professionals and scientists for sponsoring two conferences on the tobacco industry entitled Junk Science, Junk Policy? Managing Risk and Regulation and Should Government Butt Out? The Pros and Cons of Tobacco Regulation. Critics charged the Institute was associating itself with the tobacco industry's many attempts to discredit authentic scientific work."
Posted by: Arnold | 28 July 2017 at 01:02 AM
Notwithstanding its pious mission statement -- "to measure, study, and communicate the impact of competitive markets and government interventions on the welfare of individuals" -- essentially 100 per cent of the Fraser Institute's activities are 100-per-cent political.
As such, the far-right, market fundamentalist "think tank" plays a key role in what author Donald Gutstein terms the "corporate propaganda system" that purports to churn out unbiased research but in fact works tirelessly to hijack our democracy for the benefit of Big Business and the ultra-wealthy families that control it
Posted by: Arnold | 28 July 2017 at 01:12 AM
From Wiki.
According to an article published in CBC News Online, some people allege that Michael Walker helped set up the Institute after he received financial backing from forestry giant MacMillan Bloedel, largely to counter British Columbia's NDP government[50] then led by premier Dave Barrett. The CEO of MacMillan Bloedel at the time supported wage and price controls.
In late 1997, the Institute set up a research program emulating the UK's Social Affairs Unit, called the Social Affairs Centre. Its founding Director was Patrick Basham. The program's funding came from Rothmans International and Philip Morris.[51] When Rothmans was bought by British American Tobacco (BAT) in 1999, its funding ended,[52] and in 2000 the Institute wrote to BAT asking for $50,000 per year, to be split between the Social Affairs Centre and the Centre for Risk and Regulation.[51] The letter highlighted the Institute's 1999 publication Passive Smoke: The EPA's Betrayal of Science and Policy,[53] "which highlighted the absence of any scientific evidence for linking cancer with second-hand smoke [and] received widespread media coverage both in Canada and the United States".[51] At this time the CEO of BAT's Canadian subsidiary, Imasco, was also on the Fraser Institute's Board of Trustees.[52] The Fraser Institute ceased disclosing its sources of corporate funding in the 1980s.[52]
In 1999, the Fraser Institute was criticized by health professionals and scientists for sponsoring two conferences on the tobacco industry entitled Junk Science, Junk Policy? Managing Risk and Regulation and Should Government Butt Out? The Pros and Cons of Tobacco Regulation. Critics charged the Institute was associating itself with the tobacco industry's many attempts to discredit authentic scientific work.[50][dead link]
Posted by: Arnold | 28 July 2017 at 01:13 AM
So we are supposed to take away the message that oil pipelines are good but not as good as shipping.
In fact all three methods are being ramped up and shipping is entering a new phase as the arctic ice melts creating new opportunity to ship more oil.
"According to an article published in CBC News Online, some people allege that Michael Walker helped set up the Institute after he received financial backing from forestry giant MacMillan Bloedel, largely to counter British Columbia's NDP government[50] then led by premier Dave Barrett. The CEO of MacMillan Bloedel at the time supported wage and price controls.
In late 1997, the Institute set up a research program emulating the UK's Social Affairs Unit, called the Social Affairs Centre. Its founding Director was Patrick Basham. The program's funding came from Rothmans International and Philip Morris.[51] When Rothmans was bought by British American Tobacco (BAT) in 1999, its funding ended,[52] and in 2000 the Institute wrote to BAT asking for $50,000 per year, to be split between the Social Affairs Centre and the Centre for Risk and Regulation.[51] The letter highlighted the Institute's 1999 publication Passive Smoke: The EPA's Betrayal of Science and Policy,[53] "which highlighted the absence of any scientific evidence for linking cancer with second-hand smoke [and] received widespread media coverage both in Canada and the United States".[51] At this time the CEO of BAT's Canadian subsidiary, Imasco, was also on the Fraser Institute's Board of Trustees.[52] The Fraser Institute ceased disclosing its sources of corporate funding in the 1980s.[52]
In 1999, the Fraser Institute was criticized by health professionals and scientists for sponsoring two conferences on the tobacco industry entitled Junk Science, Junk Policy? Managing Risk and Regulation and Should Government Butt Out? The Pros and Cons of Tobacco Regulation. Critics charged the Institute was associating itself with the tobacco industry's many attempts to discredit authentic scientific work."
Posted by: Arnold | 28 July 2017 at 01:19 AM
http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/djclimenhaga/2012/02/fraser-institute-100-political-and-still-registered-charity-expl
The Fraser Institute is serious all right, although its research is not serious in the normal sense of transparency and lack of bias, no matter what it claims. But it surely is political. Indeed, the Fraser Institute is all politics, all the time.
As it turns out, this is important, because the Fraser Institute is also a registered charity, meaning that those Canadians who do pay taxes are in effect subsidizing its purely political operations. Indeed, to go a step further, we are also subsidizing those wealthy individuals, organizations and corporations that bankroll the Fraser Institute's propaganda efforts to work directly against the interests of ordinary Canadians.
Alert readers will be aware that charitable status for organizations that take controversial positions on the issues of that day is currently a highly contentious issue -- at least when the registered charities in question do not support the Harper government on such issues as bitumen pipelines to the West Coast, climate science and uncontrolled oilsands development.
Posted by: Arnold | 28 July 2017 at 01:35 AM
And the trains are safer than the trucks. The marine tankers may have only spilled 6000 gallons last year but one collision or grounding would change that. I am still waiting for a major LNG tanker accident. They have the equivalent of 1mega-ton TNT in energy on board or more than 20 times the Hiroshima weapon.
Posted by: sd | 28 July 2017 at 06:33 AM