Megaload Tar Sands Boondoggle

Megaload Tar Sands Boondoggle 

by Jim Fetter

(Printed here with cartoonist's permission.)

Otter's blast at Judge Winmill: He's not one of us 

 Dan Popkey, Idaho Statesman, 2/13/14

Idaho Gov. Butch Otter says U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill is out of touch with Idaho values, including freedom and the marketplace...  Otter “urged people to understand their votes matter in coming elections because public officials are responsible for appointing judges like Idaho U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill, who he said might not share Idaho’s values”...  It’s not every day a governor questions the values of an Idaho federal judge...  Among Winmill’s notable cases:...  delaying megaload transports over U.S. Highway 12 and ordering the U.S. Forest Service to assess environmental impacts...  Read more.

Nez Perce Tribe Protests Illegal Megaload Shipments

Night 1: 

Approximately 150+ blockaders participated on the first night of the Omega Morgan transport.  The megaload transport had launched about 45 minutes late, at 10:45.  As it approached the reservation boundary at about 12:40, the blockaders walked out onto the pavement to block the highway.  The blockaders held back the megaload convoy for almost 2 hours.  The megaload, whose target for the night was Hwy.12 Milepost 38.8, only managed to travel 3 more miles west of the blockade.  It's total miles, 11 miles, was 27.8 miles short of its target.

Every member of the Nez Perce Tribe Executive Committee and several other people were arrested.  Others were forcefully removed by police from the blockade and taken to the sidelines.  Some were threatened with mace.

Night 2:

More than 100 Nez Perces and others had created a 2 1/2-hour human road block that, for a second night, halted the Omega Morgan megaload.  As the megaload eventually became able to inch forward, the blockaders became a moving roadblock tightly bottlenecking the transport, moving with it, and preventing it from gaining even modest speed.  The number of police officers at the scene was estimated to be double that of last night, perhaps as many as 40, and about a half dozen people were arrested.

The Nez Perces staged tonight's blockade at Hwy.12 Milepost 11, below the legendary Ant & Yellowjacket rock archway perched above the highway about 2 miles upriver from the transport's launch point. The site is 1 of 38 Nez Perce National Historical Park sites strung along a 4-state route.  One concern of the Nez Perces and other anti-megaload activists has been the effect of ground vibrations created by transports as immensely heavy as the Omega Morgan megaload.  Complete with load, trailer, trucks, etc., the transport weighs 644,000 pounds, and ground vibrations theoretically over time could loosen rock and cliff structures alongside and above Hwy.12.

Ant & Yellow Jacket

picture from Nez Perce Historical Park

Night 3:

As the megaload left Mile 38.8 below Orofino, for the third night, the Nez Perces blockaded it.  More police officers preceded the megaload than the previous 2 nights, and they aggressively drove their vehicles towards the blockade in an attempt to force the blockaders into retreating.  When the Nez Perces held their ground, officers approached on foot, shouted "get off the road," and physically pushed some of the protesters toward the roadside.  Yet the Nez Perces remained in a group and gradually began to move backwards, intentionally slowly, as the police vehicles and megaload convoy were relegated to following at a snail's pace for a mile or two through the Riverside area of Orofino.

 

The Omega Morgan megaload reached Hwy. 12 Milepost 90, Syringa, last night, within the Clearwater National Forest and the Wild & Scenic Middlefork corridor.  They did that by breaking the stipulations of their permit & filed travel plan.  Instead of stopping regularly to let traffic pass, as required, they held all cars traveling east hostage behind 2 Idaho State Police vehicles, who led what was at one point 40+ personal vehicles and forced them to travel at 0-17 mph speeds for 51.2 miles.  In other words, corporate Canada 'owned' and controlled your highway last night, aided by state police.

According to their plan, Omega Morgan's target destination had been the Kooskia kiosk station.  However, apparently they felt they would be beyond more Nez Perce blockades if they could get farther up the highway.  They are parked in a large private lot owned by Terry & Becky Jackson.  Terry is the person who -- for pay -- lifts the tram cable that crosses the highway at Milepost 83 so megaloads can pass under it.

Idaho Officials Disregard Nez Perce Tribe and U.S Forest Service in Attempts to Please Multi-National Corporations

Links to this video and more from the Nez Perce Tribal Council

ITD’s recently issued permits to megaload transporter Omega Morgan come after the recent court ruling, requiring Forest Service oversight of megaload traffic.  The USFS District Manager, Rick Brazell warned the heavy-haul company that the agency does not authorize the shipment through the Nez Perce Clearwater National Forests.

Brazell also accused the company of ignoring language in the state permit outlining Forest Service and Federal Highway Administration jurisdiction.

The Nez Perce Tribe also opposes this megaload shipment through their reservation and ancestral homelands.  

 “The tribe is shocked by Omega Morgan’s audacity," Nez Perce Tribal Chairman Silas Whitman said in a news release Monday. “The company has apparently decided it does not need to wait for Forest Service review or tribal consultation to move General Electric’s loads."  Read More

Idaho Rivers United Press Release 8-8-13

Release - Megaload enters Wild & Scenic corridor.pdf

BOISE — An unauthorized megaload traveling Highway 12 in north Idaho barreled through the Nez Perce Reservation last night and entered U.S. Forest Service land and the Wild and Scenic River corridor. It finally stopped at Syringa near Milepost 90, 16 miles into the Wild and Scenic River corridor. “This is a sad day for Idaho. The Idaho Transportation Department, Omega Morgan and their Canadian clients have blatantly disregarded the wishes and regulations of the Forest Service and the wishes and requests of the Nez Perce Tribe,” said IRU Executive Director Bill Sedivy. IRU Conservation Director Kevin Lewis said IRU is pursuing legal options. “The Nez Perce Tribe has done an excellent job protesting this load’s shipment across the reservation, and now the load has entered public land and the Wild and Scenic River corridor,” he said. “This is a clear violation of the U.S. Forest Service’s order denying shipment across public land. We are consulting with our attorneys this morning and plan to proceed to protect the tribe’s homeland and our Wild and Scenic Rivers.”

 

 

Highway 12: A Timeline

After the recent victory for Highway 12's Wild and Scenic corridor in a Boise courtroom, we thought it would be a good time to present a timeline of Highway 12 from it's creation to the present:

1961-1962: U.S. Highway 12 was built and paved through Idaho and into Montana.

1968: With passage of the Wild & Scenic Rivers Act, eight of the nation's most pristine rivers were designated Wild & Scenic. Among them were three Idaho rivers: the Selway & Lochsa, which join to form the third, the Middlefork Clearwater. For about 90 miles, the latter two -- Lochsa and MF Clearwater -- flow immediately alongside Hwy.12, and at Milepost 97, the Selway flows in from the southeast.

1995: The USFS, which has jurisdiction over these three rivers and the wild corridors through which they run granted a highway management easement to the Idaho Department of Transportation. Many residents, fearful that ITD would ignore Wild & Scenic protection mandates, spoke against the easement. In 1997, some revisions were written into the easement. Five small stretches of the highway were inadvertently, or otherwise, left out and remain left out today.

2008-2010: "Improvements" were madeon Highway 12, including the widening and rock filling of some turnouts, projects partially paid for by Exxon Mobil/Imperial Oil.

2010, spring: ITD and Exxon/Imperial made public a proposal to ship 200+ tarsands modules on U.S.12. Following consultations with Idaho Rivers United and Friends of the Clearwater, The Rural People of Highway 12 Fighting Goliath was launched, and in Montana, NoShipmentsNetwork and All Against the Haul, among others, had entered the fray. Numerous organizations and hundreds of individuals joined the anti-megaload fight, and Advocates for the West lawyer Natalie Havlina and director Laird Lucas began documenting developments.   An Idaho District Court win involving ConocoPhillips' shipments, followed by a Supreme Court appeal, two unsuccessful contested cases (but that caused significant and costly time delays for the corporations), a court case win in Montana that stopped Exxon/Imperial in its tracks, protests, monitorings, comments and letters, and so much more. And then ...

 

2011, March: IRU filed its lawsuit against the USFS & FHWA.

 

2012, December: The Nez Perce Tribe filed a motion for amicus status in the case.

 

2013, Feb. 6th: Advocates for the West's Laird Lucas presented final arguments before U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill, and Tribal lawyer Michael Lopez argued for amicus status.

 

2013, Feb. 7th: Judge Winmill ruled in IRU's favor. 

 

Now: With the IRU win secured, all of us must remain engaged in order to ensure that the USFS does step up to protect the Wild & Scenic Lochsa--Middlefork Clearwater corridor from the kind of industrialization megaload transports would bring.

 
 Recent Articles about case:

   The Mega-Myth About Mega-Loads

  equities.com: If not industrial corridor's demise, something close

  Judge Sides with Conservationists in Mega-Load Case

Current Events

A lot has happened in the past month related to Megaloads and Highway 12. Imperial/Exxon will not, for the time being, pursue any more permits for megaloads to travel on U.S.12.
Read the storyand watch the video "Toxic Alberta" on Huff Post. Read the story at the Oregonian.

While this is good news for residents & travelers, the fact that Imperial still speaks of wanting in the future to use U.S.12 and that other companies, too, want to turn this route into a permanent high and wide corridor is unsettling. Especially in the face of the numerous risks these types of loads pose to the residents of the local communities they pass through.

Here are a few stories about recent problems with megaloads:
1.) A woman being rushed to the emergency room is delayed by megaloads--Megaloads; The long night, by Alex Sakariassen, Missoula Independent. Augusta residents Lorna and Pete Scott took to Highway 287 shortly after midnight on Oct. 6. Lorna's mother was suffering an apparent heart attack. The family decided to drive her to the Teton Medical Center, in Choteau. But the normally 25-minute drive lasted nearly an hour—due to an oversized industrial shipment..."There was nothing we could do," Lorna says. "We couldn't see a patrol car. We could see nothing but flashing lights, and many of them, in front of us."
... the Scotts discovered it was an oversized load. It belonged to Nickel Bros., a Washington-based company transporting machinery through Montana along the same route proposed for industrial shipment by Exxon Mobil subsidiary Imperial Oil.... Scott says she saw no flaggers...

Her incident was an isolated one, but it does underscore the public safety concerns voiced by megaload detractors over a year ago, when Imperial Oil first announced its Kearl Module Transportation Project. MDT has repeatedly stated that turnouts would be constructed to allow the megaloads to comply with state law, which forbids traffic delays of more than 10 minutes. However, the turnouts were proposed as part of Imperial Oil's beleaguered KMTP and have yet to be constructed between Augusta and Choteau.... Read more.

2.) Injury accident results from confusion over megaload transportation--Two injured in U.S.95 collision, Moscow-Pullman Daily News, 11/10/11Two Idaho men were released from the hospital following a rear-end collision Tuesday night near Viola on U.S. Highway 95 that law enforcement claims occurred when one driver stopped to talk with a flagger awaiting Imperial Oil shipments bound for the Idaho/Montana border.
.... Shawn Dewitt, 36, of Princeton, stopped his vehicle on the highway to investigate flashing lights belonging to a flagger awaiting three shipments of refinery equipment and ask how he should proceed.
Idaho State Police Capt. Lonnie Richardson said Dewitt voluntarily stopped to talk to the flagger around 11 p.m., and had not been requested to do so. Dewitt's vehicle was then struck from behind by a vehicle driven by Frank Bybee, 33, of Desmet...
Subcribers, read more.

If you'd like to see for yourself how confusing these megaload shipments are please watch this video.

One of the major concerns local residents have about megaloads is accidents. Highway 12 is a notoriously dangerous highway with a long history of semi-truck accidents, many causing major spills into the Wild & Scenic Lochsa River. The most recent one took place on Saturday.

Fuel tanker crashes on Highway 12, by Eric Barker, Lewiston Tribune, 11/13/11LOWELL - A multi-agency response team worked to mop up a fuel spill along U.S. Highway 12 and the Lochsa Wild and Scenic River Corridor following a one- vehicle traffic accident Saturday.... about 10 miles east of Wilderness Gateway Campground... No fuel was detected in the river....
... driver Marco D. Williamson of Florence, Mont., failed to negotiate a curve.... drifted left, over corrected and the pup trailer whipped across the snow covered road and hit the guard rail ... before coming to rest on its side in the ... ditch.... [carrying] 2,000 gallons of diesel fuel and 1,700 gallons of gasoline. HazMat workers pumped some... gasoline out of the wrecked trailer .... "We don't know how much diesel is out" ... "We are offloading gasoline so all 1,700 gallons are not on the ground."...
Officials from the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Clearwater National Forest, Idaho Transportation Department, Nez Perce Tribe and a private HazMat company were on hand...
The Lochsa River is a blue-ribbon cutthroat trout stream and home to protected bull trout, wild steelhead and chinook salmon...
The highway along Lochsa-Middle Fork Clearwater...has been the location of several large fuel spills. Last year, ...a fuel tanker spilled 7,500 gallons of diesel.... In 2005, a three-vehicle accident spilled 1,600 gallons of diesel... Crashes in 2002 and 2003 each spilled thousands of gallons. In 2003, a tanker crashed and spilled 6,300 gallons.... A year earlier, a tanker crash spilled an estimated 6,000 gallons of diesel directly into the Clearwater River near Syringa. Several downriver communities temporarily halted pumping drinking water from the river until the escaped fuel had dissipated. Subscribers, read more photo taken by Vickie Garcia & Walt Bailey

Paul Edwards Video

After months of research on the issue of megaloads and the Alberta tar sands, Montana resident Paul Edwards created an engaging youtube video to share his point of view. Here's the link to the video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoKW771tG_Q

A Tale of Two Press Releases

A truck driver, traveler, or local citizen trying to make plans around the megaloads has their work cut out for them. Trying to figure out whether or not a megaload is actually going to be on the road on any given night is a struggle. Exxon’s Highway 12 website has a professional look but it lacks any real information on the status of the loads. The last information updated on the site is from April 12th. There have been numerous news stories since the 12th stating nights the Exxon Test Module planned to move but never any mention of them on Exxon's Highway 12 website. The most consistent way to find out if Exxon is moving it’s test module has been through ITD press releases.

Yet, ITD doesn’t seem that sure of what’s going on either. In a press release from earlier today ITD stated that Exxon was moving the test module tonight and that Mammoet had submitted a plan of recommendations to reduce the risk of further issues. Mr. Hoff is quoted as saying that the changes made by Mammoet will “help avoid any further . . . delays.” Yet late tonight ITD released a second shorter statement contradicting their first one. The Exxon Test Module was not going to move tonight due to concerns over power lines in Kamiah. Mammoet must have missed the power lines in Kamiah when they were making their recommendations to ITD. What else has Mammoet missed?

Here are the two press releases with a few significant lines highlighted:

#1: ExxonMobil test shipment resumes travel Tuesday night

BOISE - An ExxonMobil test shipment will resume travel on U.S. 12 tonight at 10 PDT after the Idaho Transportation Department accepted the company's corrective action plan, the Idaho Transportation Department announced.
The over-sized test load has been parked at milepost 61 about 12 miles west of Kooskia since April 12 after striking a guy wire above the highway during the first night of a scheduled three-night transport to the Montana state line.
The transportation department required ExxonMobil and its contract hauler, Mammoet, to submit an incident report and make recommendations on how to reduce the risk of further issues.
Changes made include:
Additional verifications of all overhead utilities from milepost 61 to the Montana state line to ensure adequate clearance;
Raising a power distribution line crossing the highway at milepost 75;
Additional verifications of all overhead utilities from the Port of Lewiston to milepost 61
Lead escort vehicles will watch for overhanging tree branches in addition to other overhead obstructions.
"The additional precautions will improve safety and help avoid any further problems or delays," said Doral Hoff, the transportation department maintenance engineer in Lewiston.
The test shipment will travel:
Tuesday night/Wednesday morning from milepost 61 to milepost 139.
Wednesday night/Thursday morning from milepost 139 to the Montana state line at milepost 174, then 7.5 miles into Montana. It will stop at a restaurant parking lot.

#2: Tonight's planned U.S. 12 ExxonMobil test shipment postponed

BOISE - An ExxonMobil test shipment scheduled to resume travel tonight on U.S. 12 was postponed, the Idaho Transportation Department announced.
Concerns about the load clearing two power lines in the Kamiah area prompted representatives of ITD, ExxonMobil and power provider Avista to agree to postpone the move.
"We want to be 100 percent certain there is adequate clearance and that the load moves safely," said Doral Hoff, the ITD maintenance engineer in Lewiston.

Exxon Fails First Test

Local citizens who rely on Highway 12 were told not to worry when they brought up their concerns to Exxon representatives at last summers open house. They were assured by the Kearl Oil Project spokesmen that Mammoet was the best shipper in the business. When asked about the specifics of the road and how these megaloads would handle things like rock faces, ice, landslides, soft shoulders, etc. the representatives seemed unfamiliar with the nature of Highway 12 and unable to give adequate answers. Instead of taking the concerns of local citizens seriously Exxon spent time and money on a PR campaign to make it look like this project would benefit the local economy while ignoring the many ways this transportation project could hurt the area.

Now, almost a year later, on the first night of the Exxon's Test Validation Module there were problems. The Exxon megaload hit a guy wire that knocked the power out to 1,300 homes and shut the highway down for over an hour.

ITD has asked the shipper, Mammoet, to address the problems from last night before they continue their journey. I would like to ask ITD to consider this transportation plan from the point of view of local residents who rely on Highway 12. Knocking out power and shutting down the highway are minor issues compared with what could happen with these loads. But even these types of minor problems could result in a life or death delay for someone racing to the hospital.

We've learned over the past year that there are other routes available to these megaload modules. We've learned they can be broken down into smaller units and shipped on alternate routes. We've also learned that these megaloads can be made on site in Alberta. So why does ITD and Exxon continue to push for an unsafe use of Highway 12?

Here's more info on Exxon's trouble Monday night:

Big rig test module hits wire, cuts power to 1,300 homes, businesses off Highway 12 by Kim Briggeman, Missoulian, 4/12/11
The big blue megaload that a Canadian oil company says will validate its plan to send many more up U.S. Highway 12 in Idaho and Montana got off to a rough start.

The 30-foot-high load hit a guy wire near Orofino, Idaho, early Tuesday, setting off a sequence of events that led to power outages in some 1,300 area homes and businesses for almost five hours, and causing the highway to be closed for an hour.

It happened around 1:45 a.m., a few hours after the big rig struck and broke off a giant tree branch near the Lewiston Rose Garden as it left town. The branch was 10 inches in diameter and 20 feet long. No traffic delays resulted.

Imperial Oil/ExxonMobil's practice load finished the night parked 13 miles short of its designated stopover near Kooskia. It appeared the plan to make the 182-mile trip to Lolo Hot Springs in Montana by Thursday morning was off....ITD ... said Mammoet would not be allowed to proceed with the move until [an investigative] report had been received and approved.

"When we're working with haulers and shippers, our approach is to have an exchange of information with them and to improve transportation plans moving forward," Rush said. "We don't like to levy fines right from the get-go or flat out deny people permits, but we do ask them to make changes.".... Read more:

http://missoulian.com/news/local/article_4ba1f8a4-654c-11e0-82d1-001cc4c002e0.html

Imperial to 'revisit' foreign input in oilsands

Remember when ...
Imperial Oil spokespeople said...
1. the modules are nonreducible;
2. they have no alternative routes;
3. South Korea is the best and pretty much only place the modules can be built;
4. they had no 'assurances' from Idaho & Montana transportation departments for transport permits.
Now read this... (especially note lines in bold... and you may also spot some lines to 'suspect' in italics...)

Imperial to 'revisit' foreign input in oilsands; Kearl project hit by logistical problems and protests over shipments of upgrader modules by road to Fort McMurray by Dave of the Edmonton Journal, published in the Calgary Herald, 3/30/11
EDMONTON - Imperial Oil will “revisit” its decision to buy massive modules from South Korea ... for the future expansion of its Kearl oilsands, its chief executive
... Bruce March said “we will revisit this for the expansion,” but added that his firm’s focus right now is getting the modules — stalled at the inland port of Lewiston, Idaho, amid protests from residents — on the road to Fort McMurray as soon as possible.

Currently, the $8-billion Kearl mine and bitumen production project is on time, scheduled to open late next year. Some of the modules made in Edmonton — which represents 80 per cent of the fabrication work — are ready to be shipped.
“We made the decision to order [the units from Korea] in the 2007-08 period ...
The Korean firm building the 207 mega-sized units — 33 of which are now being broken apart in Idaho ... so they can move as 60 smaller shipments on the Interstate highway — has supplied specialized ore-processing equipment to all oilsands plants in the past.

But in those cases the equipment has always been shipped in pieces and assembled in Edmonton.
March said Imperial could have done that with the modules, “but we opted to have it built in Korea. We could have gone either way.”
March said Imperial did its homework with the module transportation....
and got pretty good assurance from the state governments that they would allow it.”

But then came the protests, much of it from people opposed to the oilsands in general and rather than residents worried about the rural scenery. National advocacy groups have been sending out news releases for months denouncing the mega-loads....
...We are now seeing (protests) in the supply chain for the oilsands, in the pipeline projects like Keystone,” he said...

On Wednesday, commissioners in Missoula County, Montana, voted to file a lawsuit ... to stop oversized loads....
Read More:
http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/Imperial+revisit+foreign+input+oilsands/4531382/story.html?cid=megadrop_story

Kooskia, Idaho ~ Gateway to the Wilderness or Pit Stop along Big Oil's Tar Sands Alley?

Kooskia Crossing is a lovely and informative tourist area at the entrance to Kooskia, Idaho. Volunteers have spent years developing this area, which now boasts a handsome, illustrated "Welcome" sign, multi-paneled information kiosk, and landscaped green space that volunteers spruce up and groom each year. One feature of the area is a beautiful metal sculpture celebrating the salmon and their native home, the Clearwater River. But now one's view of the salmon includes the giant megaload you see in the background. If the hundreds of proposed megaloads of Exxon/Imperial, Harvest, Shell and other tar sands oil companies are permitted for shipment along U.S.12, these giant loads will sit here almost daily for decades to come.

Speaking of salmon, one environmental concern of a megaload accident on U.S. 12 is damage to critical salmon spawning grounds. A load the scale of the megaloads could create an immediate dam if it fell into the Lochsa. Since Exxon's shipping company Mammoet had two accidents in the past year while driving on dry flat wide roads, it's no stretch of imagination to envision their having a slip-off or tip-over on curvy, narrow U.S. 12. A decline in salmon and other fish populations will be felt throughout north central Idaho's economy. Right now, today, in just a 2-mile stretch of the Middle Fork, 18 fishermen are fishing. They buy groceries, cafe meals, fishing gear, gas and rooms.

The question for local residents is what does the future hold for our children. We live next to the largest wilderness area in the lower 48 and enjoy 3 pristine wild and scenic rivers in our backyard. These are our greatest, most valuable natural resource assets. They are worth protecting - not just for their physical beauty, abundant hunting and fishing and many other recreation opportunities - but because they have value to visitors from around the nation and world and offer a substantial base for a healthy long-term tourism industry. Our area becomes more valuable to tourists and Idahoans alike only for as long as we protect the natural, remarkable wild and scenic qualities of North Central Idaho and ensure access to our wildlands and rivers. If instead we choose to take a few quick bucks now from oil companies wanting to turn our the highway into an industrial megaload truck route, we stand to loose normal access in the present and our only growing industry in the future. What may look like easy money to some comes with a price tag for our children and grandchildren - deteriorating roads, lower tax base, loss of access to public lands/rivers, and loss of value of our greatest asset.

Photo by Gail Renshaw

Crossroads

ITD ignored the concerns of local residents when it issued permits to ConocoPhillips earlier this week to transport 4 super-sized loads along Highway 12. The earliest the loads could roll is Feb. 1st, but the 13 intervenors, who for the past 5 1/2 months have been challenging the permitting of the shipments, are currently considering their next legal step.


The Missoula Independent recently published a comprehensive article on the mega-load issue titled 'Crossroads'. The story covers local opposition in both Idaho and Montana and addresses the issue of creating a permanent high and wide corridor between Pacific Rim nations and the Alberta Tar Sands.

Please read the full story here:
http://missoulanews.bigskypress.com/gyrobase/crossroads/Content?oid=1371483&showFullText=true