By Natasha Bulowski, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter CANADA’S NATIONAL OBSERVER
The City of Burnaby is preparing for a series of unlikely but potentially disastrous accidents stemming from the Trans Mountain pipeline system.
An animated video, released Sept. 5, depicts three hypothetical, fiery scenarios that could arise at the Burnaby Mountain tank farm and Westridge Marine Terminal. The city plans to carry out a full emergency exercise in 2027 to prepare for these worst-case scenarios.
“While the probability of a potential major event happening at these facilities is low, the City has sought to strike a balance that acknowledges that such an event could still occur,” reads a Sept. 5 press release from the city.
The computer animation was created by ONEC in 2021 based on the terminal’s operations at that time. It does not reflect the recently completed Trans Mountain expansion which tripled the capacity of the original pipeline system and increased oil tanker traffic tenfold.
The first animated scenario depicts how a seismic event could cause crude oil to spill from holding tanks at the Burnaby Mountain Tank Farm and ignite, resulting in the whole tank catching fire and blowing its top. This could potentially escalate to a dangerous phenomenon called a boilover. This is when the temperature of fuel rises until it hits water (usually at the bottom of the tank), turning the water to steam and causing a massive eruption that forcefully ejects the burning oil into the air. Either a full surface fire or a boilover puts other tanks at risk and could potentially start a wildfire beyond the fenceline, the animation shows.
If a boilover occurs, everyone within nearly 250 metres of the tank would be expected to be killed, according to the city’s 2021 risk assessment report.
The second scenario predicts what would happen in the event of a spill from the jet fuel tanks at Westridge Marine Terminal by the Burrard Inlet. It also involves lots of fire and the tank roof blowing off, but with no risk of a boilover. There are, however, propane tanks that could blow up into a “massive fireball” due to the heat from the burning jet fuel. The fatality zone encompasses everything within 158 metres of the explosion.
In the last scenario, one of the loading arms at the marine terminal leaks and causes a fire between the tanker and the berth. These loading arm failures can cause fires or oil spills on the water that can affect shipping and the environment, the risk report noted.
Many municipalities opposed the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, including Burnaby, New Westminster, and the city of Vancouver. The Squamish Nation, Coldwater Indian Band and Tsleil-Waututh Nation also opposed the pipeline expansion.
“Regardless of our past opposition, the Trans Mountain expansion is complete and fully operational,” Mayor Mike Hurley said in the press release. “With increased oil transport, comes increased risk. We want to fully understand the risks, increase our capacity to respond and ensure we have the right partners at the table to support a safe, reliable and timely emergency response.”
Burnaby is currently creating a strategy to carry out the emergency exercise and will provide updates as the planning progresses.
To prepare for the completion of the pipeline expansion, the city said it allocated more resources to improve emergency response capabilities including the redevelopment of an existing fire hall and the construction of a new fire station at the top of Burnaby Mountain, the latter of which is nearing completion. It is also equipping both these fire stations with “specialized wildfire firefighting equipment and personnel, such as ATVs and large-scale deployable sprinkler systems,” according to the city.
