PORT ARTHUR, Texas — Port Arthur environmentalists took a tour through the city Monday, visiting areas they say are heavily polluted by oil refineries.
These areas in Southeast Texas could soon be impacted even more by a possible merger between two railroad companies.
In 2022, two of the country's largest railways, Canadian Pacific (CP) and Kansas City Southern (KCS), lobbied the federal government to approve their multibillion-dollar megamerger, according to a news release from Seeker Strategies.
The recent Norfolk Southern (NS) train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio has environmentalists concerned about the possible railroad merger.
Two thousand residents were forced to evacuate East Palestine so emergency teams could conduct a controlled release and burn of materials that "could potentially explode, causing deadly disbursement of shrapnel and toxic fumes," said Ohio Governor Mike DeWine.
A similar accident in Port Arthur or a major urban area would be "catastrophic", according to the release.
Southeast Texas advocates say they are afraid if this merger happens, it will increase the number of trains carrying hazardous materials.
These tracks run right through communities of Southeast Texas families.
The "Toxic Train Tour" was organized by environmentalist John Beard, who lived in Port Arthur his entire life and has worked in the oil industry.
Beard now dedicates his time to tackling environmental issues with his non-profit organization "Port Arthur Community Action Network".
During the tour Monday, Beard and about 10 others stopped across the gates of Valero Refinery in Port Arthur, the train sorting station in Nederland and some neighborhoods in the north end of Port Arthur.
At each stop, Beard demonstrated what products were made and the negative impacts they could have on the environment and families.
For this reason, Beard stands firm against the merger between Canadian Pacific and Kansas City Southern.
"What they're wanting to do is grow those exports, so they can make more money at a time when their already achieving record profits," Beard said. "That's insane. That's also sacrificing communities like mine unnecessarily and we say it needs to stop and it shouldn't even happen."
Beard says if the merger happens, it can bring 120 car trains passing through Southeast Texas communities at least five times a day.
Some residents on the tour say they don't agree with the merger.
"My main concern is when he mentioned it earlier was that we don't have a plan of action in place and so if a train would derail I wouldn't know the first thing that I need to do to protect my family from any hazardous chemicals on the train," resident Terry Hadley said.
Canadian Pacific released a statement to 12News regarding the potential railroad merger:
Railways, including CP, are legally required to transport hazardous materials as part of their common carrier obligations, on reasonable terms and conditions, and to do so in accordance with all applicable laws, including safety and environmental protection regulations.
We continually strive to make the transportation of hazardous materials and other goods as safe as possible, meeting or exceeding applicable regulations and industry standards, investing in our network infrastructure, implementing advanced technologies to drive safety and working with our customers to continually improve the safety of their tank cars. CP has led the industry with the lowest train accident frequency rate in North America for 17 straight years, illustrating the effectiveness of our efforts to enhance public safety and protect the environment.
As part of its environmental impact statement on the proposed combination of CP and Kansas City Southern, the Surface Transportation Board evaluated the risk of hazardous material incidents that could result from the CP-KCS merger. The agency’s Office of Environmental Analysis said it “expects that the number of hazardous material releases would remain low along rail lines and at rail yards.” The report stated: “OEA expects that any potential increase in the number of releases along rail line segments on the combined CPKC network would be partially offset by a reduction in the number of releases along other rail lines owned and operated by other railroad companies. In addition, to the extent that the transportation of hazardous materials could be diverted from truck to rail as a result of the Proposed Acquisition, the total number of releases could decrease because rail transportation is generally safer than truck transportation.” The EIS goes to describe that “both CP and KCS have established hazardous materials protocols, training, and emergency response practices that address emergency preparedness, prevention, and response. These plans identify available resources and procedures for responding to a potential incident involving hazardous materials.”
12News did not receive a statement from Kansas City Southern in time for this publication.
Data from The Association of American Railroads says 99.9% of all hazmat shipments reach their destination without incident.
Since 2012, the hazmat accident rate has declined by 55% and over the last 10 years, less than 1% of all train accidents have resulted in a hazmat release, according to data.