A STEP toward safer oil trains?

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and 15 of her Senate colleagues want more money for oil train safety. In a letter sent last Friday to Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), who chairs the Appropriations’ Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, the senators asked for funding to create a "Safe Transportation Energy Products Fund" (STEP). The fund would cover the cost of oil train-related rulemaking, studies, inspections, accident response planning and first responder training. It would also support efforts by DOT's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration to improve safety standards for tank cars used to transport crude oil.The request for the money comes as work begins on 2015 appropriations bills. The proposed fund would be included in the U.S. Department of Transportation's budget. There was no dollar amount in the letter, but President Barack Obama’s 2015 budget included a $40 million request for the fund. "Crude-by-rail" shipments have soared in the U.S. lately, driven largely by a boom in North Dakota's Bakken oil fields. The number of crude oil-filled tank cars originating in the U.S. rose by an estimated 1,251 percent from 2010 to 2013, according to the American Association of Railroads. The shipments have raised safety concerns. Crude oil trains crashed and burned last year in North Dakota, Alabama and — fatally — in Quebec. "The resurgence of American oil and natural gas production has created new opportunities," wrote the senators, "but also new challenges." — B.L.