Refueling depot looks to future

Ten trillion gallons or four tablespoons.

Depending on whom you ask, that’s how much of the region’s drinking water has been threatened by fuel leaks at BNSF Railway’s refueling depot near Hauser, Idaho.

From crushed pipes to cracked concrete and faulty pipe seals, the supposedly state-of-the-art depot had a rough beginning. The first fuel leak was spotted in December 2004, three months after the facility opened.

Company officials apologized and assured residents that the problem was a fluke and would be fixed. Another fuel leak was detected on Valentine’s Day. A closer investigation by state and railroad experts revealed extensive problems with how the facility was constructed, prompting the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality to seek an emergency shut-down until the problems could be fixed.

A Kootenai County judge ordered the depot closed Feb. 23. It remained closed 10 weeks.

“It was a black eye for us,” said Terry Gay, a BNSF foreman who supervises the depot as well as other BNSF maintenance facilities in the Northwest. But Gay insisted the depot’s troubles are in the past. If anything, the new and improved facility should be held up as an example of how heavy industry can safely exist atop the Rathdrum-Spokane aquifer, Gay said.

Fifty-six monitoring wells ring the site. Four hundred electronic sensors continually monitor below the depot for any fumes of spilled fuel. And each month the railroad produces a report for state and county watchdogs that shows groundwater test results, plus it gives an account of any problems at the depot. Nothing else on the aquifer is held to such a high standard, Gay said. “There’s absolutely nothing out here that I lose any sleep about,” he said.

Gay also insisted the fuel leaks ended up sending a total of four tablespoons of diesel into the groundwater. About 1,800 gallons reached the aquifer 160 feet below the tracks, but that fuel is floating on the water. Nearly 800 gallons has been sucked out of the ground and the rest should be removed within two years, Gay said.

In the end, the total impact came down to less than a teacup of fuel mixed into the water, Gay said.

Jules Gindraux and Jim Rowe don’t believe a word about the depot being safe for the aquifer. They’re among 7,600 people who signed a recent petition demanding the depot be permanently shut down and relocated off the aquifer. Gindraux and Rowe did more than sign the petition, however. The two Coeur d’Alene area retirees’ active opposition to the depot included sitting through every minute of long hearings in February and April when the state of Idaho battled the railroad in court over the emergency closure.

Putting a refueling depot atop the region’s only source of drinking water was incredibly stupid and short-sighted, Gindraux said. The aquifer holds an estimated 10 trillion gallons and it flows slowly each year from Hauser and North Idaho toward Spokane.

“We’re living with the sword of Damocles hanging over our head,” Gindraux said.

The recent leaks were blamed on shoddy construction practices – BNSF has sued its contractors and engineers for $18 million in damages and the case is expected to go to mediation early next year – but Gindraux thinks the biggest concern is the prospect of an earthquake. Idaho, like the rest of the Pacific Northwest, is prone to quakes. At any given time, 500,000 gallons of diesel is stored at the depot.

“The question of earthquake was ignored,” Gindraux said. “That’s a crime.”

Hurricane Katrina’s devastation to the Gulf Coast should serve as a warning for the region to remove as many risks as possible, Rowe said. But Rowe admitted he doesn’t have much faith in politicians to take preventive action – the failing levee system around New Orleans was well-documented in recent years, yet nothing was done.

“Either people aren’t paying attention or they don’t give a damn,” Rowe said, adding that his worries about earthquakes are “not some pipe dream. … I’m not anti-railroad. What I am is anti-stupidity.”

Kootenai Environmental Alliance Director Barry Rosenberg admitted the depot will not likely be moved anytime soon.

“They’re obviously not going to go anywhere now. But the next time,” Rosenberg said. “We’re setting the stage if there’s another spill. We’d have a lot better chance about getting this thing moved off the aquifer.”

BNSF officials say they have done everything possible to protect the aquifer. Spokesman Gus Melonas expressed frustration over the depot continuing to be placed in the crosshairs of aquifer advocates. Melonas pointed out that millions of gallons of fuel is stored in single-walled tanks at other sites over the aquifer – in August, an estimated 30,000 gallons of diesel spilled from an Avista facility. There have also been two major sewage spills in Post Falls and Hayden since the depot leaks were first reported a year ago.

“Why doesn’t that get the play this gets? Is it fair?” Melonas asked.

“It’s easy to pick on somebody like BNSF,” suggested Gay.

Behind the desk at Gay’s trackside office is a section of double-walled pipe, the same pipe used to replace thinner PVC pipe that cracked and spilled fuel-tainted wastewater into the aquifer. “You can tell by the heft it’s serious pipe,” Gay said, hoisting a section of the material.

Not only was the pipe replaced, but five layers of specialized sealant now cover the concrete refueling platform. The bathtub-like fuel protection barriers below the depot were also overhauled. Upwards of 80 contractors worked around the clock to repair the depot, at a price tag of $19 million in rail shipping delays and repair costs, according to BNSF.

The depot was built to relieve congestion at the railroad’s yards near Portland and Seattle. Locomotives passing through the depot can get their tanks topped off and cabs serviced in 30 minutes, compared with up to five hours at the crowded coastal yards. The railroad has been carrying record volumes of freight this year – much of it Chinese goods – and the depot is more important than ever, Melonas said.

In November, the depot opened a third set of tracks through its refueling bay to handle the heavier traffic. That same month, it set a record for the amount of diesel dispensed in a single day: 209,862 gallons.

Gay said the company is committed to setting an example for how business should be conducted over the aquifer. In recent months, he has spoken to groups about how the depot has implemented changes to protect the environment. Gay thinks there ought to be more of an aquifer-wide effort to adopt the safest practices possible. “My question is are we going to take that knowledge and push it across the prairie?”

Less than 50 feet from the refueling tracks is a cluster of equipment that sounds like a large shop vacuum. The machinery is being used to suck the fuel out of the ground below the depot, Gay explained. Occasionally, a solventlike smell blows through the air coming from one of the exhaust tubes – it’s the smell of locomotive diesel being vented from the drinking water aquifer. Within a year or two, all the fuel should be sucked out of the aquifer, Gay said.

There’s no evidence any diesel fuel has flowed beyond the boundaries of the depot, said Gary Stevens, hydrogeologist with the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality. The railroad is now required by law to test for groundwater pollutants every three months. As part of a court settlement, BNSF has also been required to fund a project aimed at improving the environment.

The railroad recently agreed to pay $100,000 to the Panhandle Health District, Stevens said. The money will be used to fund matching grants for 15 gas stations over the aquifer that need to improve the handling of storm water runoff.

“We wish it didn’t happen,” Stevens said of the leaks at the depot, “but there are some good things that could come out of this.”