February 9, 2015
Local firm unaffected by plan for rail cars
CORTLANDVILLE — A local paving company that uses thousands of rail cars to haul asphalt to its facilities will be unaffected by proposed federal regulations dealing with certain rail cars, a spokesman said Thursday afternoon.
Suit-Kote, which uses over 4,000 rail cars a year, will be unaffected by the regulations if they are passed, spokesman Brian Renna said. Renna said the company uses different cars than the state Department of Transportation rail cars in question.
A federal agency is reviewing new regulations dealing with the DOT-111 tank car, the final step before the regulations are implemented, U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) said in a statement Thursday afternoon.
The DOT-111 tank car is commonly used to haul flammable liquids, including most crude oil from the Bakken region of North Dakota, according to the federal Department of Transportation’s website. That area tends to produce more “volatile and flammable” oil than do other areas of the country, according to the DOT.
The DOT-111 cars carrying this oil could “rupture upon derailment, creating a potentially disastrous explosion,” Schumer’s office said.
Federal authorities ordered railroad companies to give them details about their shipments of the Bakken oil following multiple “fiery accidents” involving rail cars transporting the oil, the Associated Press reported.
“The safety risk presented by transporting Bakken crude oil by rail is magnified both by an increasing volume of Bakken being shipped by (rail) throughout the United States and the large distances over which the product is shipped,” the organization said on its website.
The proposed regulations would phase out the use of such cars carrying certain chemicals, starting with crude oil over the next two years, according to Schumer’s office.
Suit-Kote uses cars encased with coils that run steam through them to liquefy the asphalt once it reaches Suit-Kote, Renna said. He added the asphalt usually solidifies as it is carried across the country to Suit-Kote’s facilities. The asphalt is then placed into storage tanks at the business and mixed with other materials before being laid on roads.
“They look the same, but they’re not the same (as the DOT cars),” Renna said. The company rents some of the cars it uses, while others are rented by the supplier, he said.
Asphalt also is nonflammable as it has a very high flashpoint, meaning it is safer to transport than crude oil or propane, he said.
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