[In Canada as a whole,in 2009, there were 500 carloads of crude oil shipped by rail. In 2013, there were 160,000.]
This coal train derailed in Burnaby, BC, on January 1, 2014
The Vancouver Sun reports … The number of rail cars transporting crude oil and petroleum products through B.C. jumped almost 200 per cent last year, reinforcing the resolve of municipalities to prevent a disastrous accident similar to the derailment in Lac-Mégantic in Quebec last July.
Transport Canada figures provided at The Vancouver Sun‘s request show just under 3,400 oil and petroleum rail-car shipments in B.C. last year, compared with about 1,200 in 2012 and 50 in 2011.
The figures come a week after The Sun revealed that train derailments jumped 20 per cent to 110 incidents last year in B.C., the highest level in five years.
Railway companies on Monday provided few details on routes or destinations of these growing numbers of oil railcars.
CN Rail spokesman Mark Hallman said the company transports crude oil to New Westminster, where it is interchanged with two U.S. railroads, and also to an undisclosed company in Vancouver.
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