This page was last updated on March 11, 2015.
Ban oil trains from our towns; Alaina Gercak – PennEnvironment, Philadelphia; Beaver County Times; February 22, 2015.
You won’t be surprised to learn PennEnvironment believes in manmade global warming. Other letters from PennEnvironment activists/employees include “Vogel supported fracking on state park lands,” “Raccoon Creek needs EPA protection,” “Protect parks,” “Protect clean air standards,” “Altmire’s vote does not tell whole tale,” “Wind power beats drilling any day,” “Address mass transit needs,” and “Fund mass transit adequately.”
Below is a detailed critique of the subject letter.
“Two days after a train carrying highly volatile crude oil derailed, shooting fireballs into the sky and sending an oil-filled car into the Kanawha River, flames remained burning in West Virginia. And now, questions are burning, too: Are these trains coming through our neighborhoods?”
[RWC] Ms. Gercak spammed this letter. In one of the publications, Ms. Gercak identified herself as a “PennEnvironment Campaign Organizer.”
“Dangerous oil trains barrel down tracks through numerous communities in Pennsylvania, carrying extremely volatile crude oil from the Bakken Shale; just watch the video from West Virginia’s explosion. Hundreds of thousands live inside the evacuation zone for these trains, yet our local governments and first-responders too often do not know when these trains travel through our communities, leaving them unable to prepare for the worst. When leaks, crashes, or derailments occur, not even the walls of people’s homes are guaranteed to keep them safe from fiery explosions.”
[RWC] “Extremely volatile crude oil?” No. Bakken crude is typical for light crudes. Every day trains and trucks carry materials far more dangerous than crude oil.
“Barrel down the tracks?” Ms. Gercak wants us to believe these trains are speeding.
“Last year alone, Pittsburgh and Philadelphia saw their own oil-train accidents. Luckily, these incidents weren’t disasters on the same scale as the one last week, but a number of Pennsylvania communities could be the next West Virginia. Before a Pennsylvania neighborhood goes up in flames, our elected officials should ban oil trains until critical safety standards can ensure the end to destructive accidents like this one.”
[RWC] This letter is not really about safety concerns. It’s about the religion of manmade global warming. If Ms. Gercak had been honest about her intent, she would have omitted “until critical safety standards can ensure the end to destructive accidents like this one” from her letter’s final sentence.
Except for portions of the West, it’s almost impossible for any train to travel any significant distance without going through a population center. We should remember groups like PennEnvironment lobby against pipelines then complain about train and truck accidents. I don’t know if any proposed pipelines would eliminate the need for the train in this particular incident.
© 2004-2015 Robert W. Cox, all rights reserved.