The Colorado House last week approved legislation that would limit the length of trains as a way to reduce chances of a hazardous spill in watersheds. The proposal is in response to increased derailments involving hazardous materials and the Uinta Basin Railway plan, which, while derailed, is not dead.
House Bill 1030 has collected support from conservation groups eager to prevent projects like the Uinta Basin Railway, which proposed routing as much as 5 billion gallons of crude on trains two miles long along the Colorado River through Colorado.
The Uinta Basin Railway project faces fierce opposition and was stalled last year when the U.S. Court of Appeals sided with environmental groups and overturned the railway project’s approval by the Surface Transportation Board. But the proposal is not dead.
The group behind that Uinta Basin Railway — the Seven County Infrastructure Coalition, which hopes to ramp up production of the basin’s crude with a railroad that connects the oil fields to the national rail network — last month asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review the appellate court’s decision. The railway’s backers also are hoping to overturn the appeals court decision with legislation from two Utah lawmakers. U.S. Rep. John Curtis and U.S. Sen. Mike Lee have crafted amendments to federal spending bills — Curtis for a transportation appropriations bill and Lee for a military construction spending bill — that would bypass the Supreme Court ruling and give congressional approval to the Uinta Basin Railway project as “required in the national interest.”
The oil is already delivered via Colorado
Uinta Basin crude is still delivered on trains through Colorado, and the Utah oil industry is seeking federal approval to expand railroad loading facilities in Carbon County, southeast of Provo, that could export much more of the basin’s crude — carried by trucks through Colorado from the oil fields to the loadout depots.
The Colorado railroad legislation requires railroads to better train workers and community firefighters to handle hazardous spills. It also requires railroad companies to install wayside detectors on every 10 to 15 miles of track that monitor passing trains and can swiftly identify defects that could cause an accident. Railroad companies also must maintain insurance policies to cover the cost of spills and accidents.
“Colorado’s fragile ecosystems, weather extremes, extensive number of hard-to-maintain railroad track miles and number of communities through which railroads operate necessitate that the state take decisive action to prevent and mitigate potential harm to the environment and Colorado residents from derailments and other accidents,” the legislation reads.
The legislation also limits the length of trains in Colorado to 8,500 feet. The $2.5 billion Uinta Basin Railway plan could send as many as 10 trains a day — each longer than 10,000 feet with more than 100 heated tanker cars — through Colorado. The legislation also creates a Colorado fine structure for railroads that violate the new rules and gives railroad union representatives a way to investigate safety issues.
Colorado lawmakers in 2019 approved legislation that required at least two crew members on all freight trains in the state. The Biden administration this month announced a new rule that required two crew members aboard all freight trains. Ohio passed a two-person crew law and rules requiring railside defect detectors in 2023 following the fiery derailment in East Palestine. The railroad industry sued the state to overturn the law.
Similar proposals have been floated at the federal level — including defect detectors on the side of tracks — but Congress has passed no law.
Railroads are the safest way to move goods across land and the railroad industry works “every day to further reduce incidents,” said Ted Greener with the Association of American Railroads.
“We support data-driven policies that can bolster safety, however, we oppose arbitrary measures such as train length limitations or one-size-fits-all detector spacing provisions,” Greener said in an email. “Undue intervention could yield unintended consequences, such as moving freight off private railroads to public highways and in turn increasing emissions and road damage.”
A spokesman for Union Pacific said the railroad operator, which runs on more than 1,500 miles of track in Colorado, said “safety is always our first priority” and the company is working with the Association of American Railroads to review the legislation.
“It’s hard to get anything done at the federal level so sometimes we feel the need to address these safety issues at the state level,” said Paul Pearson with the Colorado legislative branch of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen.
That union has been lobbying Colorado lawmakers to pass House Bill 1030 before the state moves forward with plans for increased passenger rail traffic along the Interstate 25 corridor and west from Denver to Craig.
“Before we consider Uinta Basin or passenger rail traffic in Colorado, it’s important the issues in House Bill 1030 be addressed,” Pearson said. “It’s an important step on our path to passenger rail along the Front Range and west into the mountains.”
The Colorado Senate Transportation and Energy Committee is scheduled to hear testimony on House Bill 1030 on April 17.