Kinder Morgan looks to twin pipeline into Burnaby
Posted April 12, 2012 10:11 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
BURNABY (NEWS1130) – Another pipeline company is looking at getting more oil sands crude to our coast.
Kinder Morgan has officially announced its plans to twin its pipeline from Alberta to Burnaby.
The plan is to almost triple the amount of crude oil funneled through the province and shipped out of the Westridge Terminal in Burnaby by 2017.
Ben West with the Wilderness Committee is worried about more tankers going through Burrard Inlet.
“If this proposal that they’ve announced goes through, we’re going to see somewhere in the neighbourhood of 360 tankers a year in the inlet, up from 80. So it is a drastic increase in tanker traffic and with it a drastic increase in risk,” he says.
“Tanker traffic goes through Second Narrows Channel, which is very shallow and narrow for the existing tankers. It means a 30-second course correction error could result in a pretty serious incident right in the inlet.”
Those tankers, he says, will be destined for Asian markets. Currently, the ships head to California, where the crude is refined then brought back up for domestic use.
Kinder Morgan says it will be seeking input about its plans. Local cities have already called for public hearings to take place.
The company’s announcement comes as many British Columbians protest Enbridge’s proposal to run a pipeline from Alberta to Kitimat, where tankers will take bitumen to Asian markets.
