By: James MacPherson
Published: October 16,2013
AP Photo/North Dakota Health Department
In this Oct. 8, 2013 photo provided by the North Dakota Health
Department, a vacuum trucks cleans up oil near Tioga, N.D. The North
Dakota Health Department says more than 20,000 barrels of crude oil have
spewed out of a Tesoro Corp. oil pipeline in a wheat field in
northwestern North Dakota. Officials say the 20,600-barrel spill, among
the largest recorded in the state, was discovered on Sept. 29 by a
farmer harvesting wheat about nine miles south of Tioga.
BISMARCK, N.D. -- North Dakota officials are
trying to determine if Tesoro Corp. knew about potential problems -
including one deemed "serious" in documents obtained by The Associated
Press - with a pipeline that leaked more than 20,000 barrels of crude
oil in a wheat field in the northwestern part of the state.
Dave
Glatt, chief of the state Department of Health's environmental health
section, said Wednesday that regulators want to know more about
inspections conducted before the spill reported by a farmer harvesting
wheat on his farm near Tioga on Sept. 29.
"We
have heard they may have found some anomalies in the metal but not
necessarily holes," Glatt said. "We have heard there were some potential
problems identified."
Tesoro had not shared
results of recent pipeline tests with health officials, Glatt said.
Cleanup of the 7.3-acre spill area is priority with the state at
present, he said.
"We want to know the
integrity of the pipeline, what kind of monitoring was in place - and we
will send a formalized letter asking that when we get a breather here,"
Glatt said.
Farmer Steve Jensen discovered the
North Dakota oil spill the size of seven football fields while
harvesting wheat Sept. 29. Tesoro Corp. first estimated the spill at its
underground pipeline near Tioga at 750 barrels. About a week later, the
San Antonio, Texas-based company increased the estimate to 20,600
barrels, making it one of the largest spills in North Dakota history.
In
a statement to The Associated Press, Tesoro said it inspected the
pipeline about two weeks before the spill was reported, using a robotic
device called a "smart pig" that travels through a pipeline to search
for corrosion and other problems.
"We were awaiting results of the analysis of that inspection when the leak was reported," Tesoro said.
Tesoro
has said that the hole in the 20-year-old pipeline was a quarter-inch
in diameter. Tesoro officials have not speculated on what caused the
hole in the 6-inch-diameter steel pipeline that runs underground about
35 miles from Tioga to a rail facility outside of Columbus, near the
Canadian border. State officials have said it may have been caused by
corrosion.
Tesoro said it acquired the pipeline
when it bought an oil refinery in Mandan in 2001. The company said it
inspected the pipeline in 2005 and on Sept. 10-11 of this year. The
company said the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety
Administration inspected the pipeline in late 2010.
The agency remains closed because of the ongoing federal government shutdown.
The
company on Wednesday did not answer immediately answer questions about
its inspection results and why it sent crude through the pipeline
without knowing them.
According to documents
obtained by the AP, the state's top oil regulator said in an email that
Tesoro's "results show a serious problem where the leak occurred."
Department
of Mineral Resources Director Lynn Helms has previously refused to
comment on the spill, saying it wasn't part of his agency's
jurisdiction. In an email to his daughter, a Penn State University
student, Helms said the pipeline was not required to have "real time
pressure monitoring and shut-down devices." He said the company was in
the process of "installing them anyway but started the pipeline without
them because they weren't required."
Helms was out of the office and could not be reached on Wednesday, his staff said.
Other
documents obtained by the AP say one state inspector, in an email to
top health officials, said that one Tesoro official had told him the
company "had the results of the pipeline inspection for several months."
Scott Stockdill told his bosses in an email that his questions are "something that should be followed up on."
Scientists
who helped calculate oil spilled from a broken BP well into the Gulf of
Mexico are questioning the methodology used by Tesoro to estimate the
amount of crude that spilled in North Dakota.
Tesoro
said it came up with its spill estimate using ground analysis. But oil
spill experts say a more accurate assessment likely would come from
calculating how much crude went into the pipeline versus what was
supposed to come out at its terminus.
Tesoro
said its "investigation included a thorough examination of the site
spill characteristics including factors such as surface area and depth
of soil impacted, and soil porosity." The company would not elaborate.
Purdue
University engineering professor Steve Wereley said Tesoro's
calculation of how much oil it released likely is "at best, a guess."
Wereley,
who along with other scientists helped estimate the amount of oil
spilling into the Gulf in 2010, said he was unaware of any scientific
studies that could back Tesoro's estimates. Wereley and Ian MacDonald, a
Florida State University oceanographer who also worked on spill
estimates in the Gulf, said detailed oil flow data from the pipeline
would provide regulators with a better estimate of the amount of crude
spilled.
MacDonald said properly estimating the size of an oil spill "is not trivial."
"Both
the environmental impact and the liability of the company are directly
related to the precise amount of the release," MacDonald said. "That is
why it is critical to know."
MORE: Remembering the BP Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill
Getty Images
Pete Duchock holds his daughter, Maddie
Duchock, as they stand near oil residue that has stained the beach after
washing ashore from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of
Mexico on June 27, 2010 in Orange Beach, Alabama. (Photo by Joe
Raedle/Getty Images)
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