Derailed

More than 200 residents from southern West Virginia have filed a lawsuit against CSX Corp. seeking punitive and compensatory damages for a fiery oil train derailment in February near their homes.

Twenty-one cars of a 118-car crude-by-rail train owned by Norfolk-Southern Corp. (NS) derailed on Thursday near Vandergrift, PA, with up to 4,000 gallons of oil said to be leaking from four cars. NS officials were on the scene and responding, a spokesman said.

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) had a team of investigators on the scene Tuesday near Casselton, ND, where a BNSF train carrying crude oil smashed into another train that had derailed earlier, setting off explosions and fires in nine tanker cars.

Transwestern declared force majeure after a freight trainderailed near its mainline in northwest New Mexico. The derailmentoccurred Sunday afternoon but the pipeline did not learn about ituntil Monday morning, according to a spokeswoman. As a precaution,Transwestern immediately took the line out of service betweenStations 5 (Thoreau) and 6 (Laguna). Westbound deliveries from theEast of Thoreau area and eastbound deliveries from San Juan Basinhave been suspended until further notice, affecting about 400,000MMBtu/d, the pipeline said. The line will be inspected and returnedto service once the train cars have been removed, which wasexpected to be completed by late Tuesday afternoon.

Wait until next year. That was the message from U.S. House Democrats who derailed Senate-passed pipeline safety legislation (S. 2438) in the closing days of the 106th Congress. Opponents of the measure labeled it “soft” on safety.

Wait until next year. That was the message from U.S. HouseDemocrats who derailed Senate-passed pipeline safety legislation(S. 2438) in the closing days of the 106th Congress. Opponents ofthe measure labeled it “soft” on safety.

An attempt to slow development of merchant power plants inFlorida has been derailed, at least temporarily, but independentpower in the sunshine state still faces some governmental hurdles.

While the Gas Research Institute maintains the most likelyfuture for natural gas includes low prices and a 31 Tcf market by2015, it is hedging its bets with a new study examining the outcomeif not all the expected pieces fall into place.

While the Gas Research Institute maintains the most likelyfuture for natural gas includes low prices and a 31 Tcf market by2015, it is hedging its bets with a new study examining the outcomeif not all the expected pieces fall into place.