Arkansas Oil Spill: Exxon Shuts Pegasus Pipeline After Rupture
NEW YORK, March 30 (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil was working to
clean up
thousands of barrels of oil in Mayflower, Arkansas,
after a pipeline
carrying heavy Canadian crude ruptured, a
major spill likely to stoke
debate over transporting Canada's
oil to the United States.
Exxon
shut the Pegasus pipeline, which can carry more than
90,000 barrels
per day (bpd) of crude oil from Pakota, Illinois,
to Nederland, Texas,
after the leak was discovered on Friday
afternoon, the company said in a
statement.
Exxon, hit with a $1.7 million fine
by regulators this week over
a 2011 spill in the Yellowstone River,
said a few thousand
barrels of oil had been observed.
A
company spokesman confirmed the line was carrying
Canadian Wabasca
Heavy crude. That grade is a heavy
bitumen crude diluted with lighter
liquids to allow it to
flow through pipelines, according to the
Canadian Energy
Pipeline Association (CEPA), which referred
to Wabasca
as "oil sands" in a report.
The spill occurred as
the U.S. State Department is considering
the fate of the 800,000 bpd
Keystone XL pipeline, which would
carry crude from Canada's oil sands
to the Gulf Coast. Environ-
mentalists, concerned about the impact of
developing the
oil sands, have sought to block its approval.
Supporters say Keystone will help bring down the cost of fuel in
the United States.
The
Arkansas spill was the second incident this week where
Canadian crude
has spilled in the United States. On Wednesday,
a train carrying
Canadian crude derailed in Minnesota, spilling
15,000 gallons of oil.
Exxon
expanded the Pegasus pipeline in 2009 to carry more
Canadian crude
from the Midwest to the Gulf Coast refining hub
and installed what it
called new "leak detection technology".
Read the rest of the article here.
"The ExxonMobil Pegasus tar sands pipeline spilled around 185,000 gallons of tar sands, undisclosed toxic chemicals and contaminated water in Mayflower, Arkansas yesterday.
Like many tar sands pipelines, Pegasus was actually an older pipeline
which had its flow reversed. This is also the case for the Seaway
pipeline in Texas and proposed tar sands pipelines East through Canada
to New England.
Forcing the evacuation of 20 homes and shutting
down sections of the interstate highway; hazardous materials team from
the Office of Emergency Management has contained the spill and is
currently attempting a cleanup.
1000s of gallons of crude oil
erupted from the breach around
3:00 p.m. on Friday, spilling through a
housing subdivision and
in to the town’s storm drainage system, fouling
drainage ditches
and shutting down Highway 365 and Interstate 40.
Residents were evacuated to avoid health hazards from crude
oil fumes
and to keep stray sparks from igniting the standing oil.
Emergency
workers contained the spill by hastily constructing
earthen dams. Read the rest at The Raw Story.
Can you imagine if this was your backyard? You're HOME?
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"I, as a responsible adult human being, will never concede the power to anyone to regulate my choice of what I put into my body, or where I go with my mind. From the skin inwards is my jurisdiction, is it not? I choose what may or may not cross that border. Here I am the Customs Agent. I am the Coast Guard. I am the sole legal and spiritual government of this territory, and only the laws I choose to enact within myself are applicable." ~ Alexander Shulgin PhD, Chemist and author
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