Leaks and spills galore

[eridani]

Koch Pipeline Spills 400 Barrels of Crude Oil in Texas

http://www.nationofchange.org/koch-pipeline-spills-400-barrels-crude-oil-texas-1383229963

The crude oil spill is the latest in a string of pipeline incidents that have occurred in multiple U.S. states as oil companies ramp up production and find themselves scrambling to ship their product to refineries. Earlier this month, a pipeline that spewed over 20,000 barrels of crude oil into a North Dakota wheat field went unreported for 11 days until it was discovered by a farmer harvesting his wheat. A subsequent Associated Press investigation found nearly 300 oil spills and 750 “oil field incidents” have gone unreported in the state since January 2012 alone.

The unparalleled expansion of oil and gas pipelines throughout the country has exposed serious deficiencies in oversight and regulation of the industry, particularly since choosing the routes of new pipelines and overseeing safety and maintenance is predominantly left up to the individual companies. In September, Jeffrey Weise, head of the Office of Pipeline Safety at the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), asked conference attendees simply, “Do I think I can hurt a major international corporation with a $2 million civil penalty? No.”


Revealed: Never Before Seen Photos of Tesoro Fracked Oil Spill in North Dakota, Pipeline Restarted Today

http://www.nationofchange.org/revealed-never-seen-photos-tesoro-fracked-oil-spill-north-dakota-pipeline-restarted-today-1383379180

A month after over 865,200 gallons of oil spilled from Tesoro Logistics' 6-inch pipeline near Tioga, North Dakota, the cause of the leak is still largely unknown to anyone but Tesoro. The pipeline resumed operations today.

Carrying oil obtained via hydraulic fracturing ("fracking&quot , the controversial horizontal drilling method used to capture oil and gas found embedded in shale rock basins worldwide, the Bakken Shale pipeline spill on September 29 was the largest fracked oil spill in U.S. history. Oil spill experts say the spill may be even bigger than originally estimated.

Yet few details of what caused the spill - and how to prevent it from happening again - have arisen in the month since it occurred.

The U.S. Department of Transportation's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) believes a lightning strike may have created the quarter inch hole in the pipeline, leading to the spill.

PHMSA says it will carry out a rigorous investigation into the cause of the spill, but allowed the restart after Tesoro agreed to the agency's safety order mandating aerial monitoring of the pipeline over the next three days during the restart and then weekly for the next year, along with 20 other things.