Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered a state of emergency in the Siberian city of Norilsk, after 20,000 tons of fuel spilled into a nearby river from a power station.

An environmental group has described the damage as "catastrophic," and the concentration of contaminants in nearby waters has already exceeded permissible levels tens of thousands of times over, according to Russian environmental agency Rosprirodnadzor. The power station's employees originally tried to contain the spill on their own and did not report the incident to emergency services for two days, head of the Ministry of Emergency Situations Evgeny Zinichev said during a Wednesday meeting chaired by Putin and shown on national television.

"So what, we are going to learn about emergencies from social media now? Are you okay over there?" Putin said, chiding Krasnoyarsk governor, Alexander Uss and managers of the Norilsk-Taimyr Energy Company, which operates the station, for a delayed response after local authorities learned about the spill from social media.

The Investigative Committee, Russia's top law enforcement body, said Tuesday a criminal probe had been launched into 20,000 tons of diesel fuel spilling into a Norilsk river following "unexplained decompression" of a storage tank.

Nornickel, the energy company's parent, said the foundation of the storage tank possibly sank due to thawing permafrost, highlighting the dangers increasingly warming temperatures pose to Arctic infrastructure and ecosystems, according to Russian state news agency TASS.

"Right now we can assume... that due to abnormally mild summer temperatures recorded in the past years, permafrost could have melted and the pillars under the platform could have sank," said Nornickel chief operating officer, Sergey Dyachenko, according to the TASS news agency. Northern Asia, especially above the Arctic Circle in Siberia, has seen the most above-normal temperatures on the planet so far in 2020. Through the first four months of the year, the region has seen temperatures more than 4 degrees Celsius above normal on average.


The Arctic region is warming, on average, twice as fast as the rest of the planet, as a consequence of global warming, scientists say.

The local authorities said the spill might take weeks to start a clean up as the region lacks expertise in utilizing such amounts of fuel, the river is not navigable and there are no roads surrounding it. Additional groups of experts are being deployed from other regions following the state of emergency.


"The incident led to catastrophic consequences and we will be seeing the repercussions for years to come," Sergey Verkhovets, coordinator of Arctic projects of Russia's WWF branch, said in a statement. "We are talking about dead fish, polluted plumage of birds, and poisoned animals."


Norilsk has been historically among one of the world's most polluted cities. According to a 2018 NASA study based on satellite data, Norilsk tops the list for worst sulphur dioxide pollution, spewing 1.9 million tons of the gas over the Arctic tundra.
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A satellite view at what rivers Ambarnaya and Daldykan outside Norilsk look now after the spill of more than 20,000 tonnes of diesel fuel pic.twitter.com/Wwpx2UqsLp

— The Siberian Times (@siberian_times) June 4, 2020

Jan 30, 2017: The pipeline ruptured around 4 pm Monday afternoon on Highway 121, about a mile away south of Highway 160 in Blue Ridge.

 Billy Brummett lives in Desert, just down the road. He tells us when he first heard the sirens, he thought it was another wreck at the intersection.

“A neighbor came by showed me a picture she’d taken of the geyser of the oil shooting," Brummett said.

We're told a contractor for TxDOT accidentally cut a 30-inch high pressure oil line, spraying crude oil all over the highway.

“Construction’s going on and that’s a deep ditch and things they’re cutting over there for the new highway so it’s not a big surprise to me," Brummett said.

The line was shut off within minutes of being cut, but continued to spill oil from what was left inside. The area was immediately placed under quarantine while crews began the cleanup process.


“The roadway’s shut down be patient with us and they’re going to get it opened up as soon as they can,” Blue Ridge Fire Captain Bonnie Bowers said.

Traffic was diverted on highway 160 due to the closure.

Multiple fire departments were at the scene. No injuries were reported.


It's unclear how much crude oil was spilled or if it poses an environmental risk.

News12 put in calls to Enterprise Products, the company that operates the pipeline, and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality but have yet to hear back from either.
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Jan 24, 2017: About 200,000 litres of oil spilled near Stoughton, Sask., last week. The pipeline breach occurred on First Nations land about 140 kilometres southeast of Regina. The spill covered an approximately 20-metre radius.

The provincial government was notified of the spill on Friday evening "as soon as the leak was detected," a government email said. Media were notified Monday afternoon.

The pipeline was shut down when the breach was discovered, and the spill is fully contained. The source of the leak is not yet known.

The oil did not enter any water sources but covered agricultural land, the email said. The site was described as a low-lying area with a frozen slough.

The spill has not affected air quality or wildlife as of yet, the government said.

Cleanup, led by Calgary-based Tundra Energy Marketing Inc., began on Saturday. As of Monday, 170,000 litres of oil had been recovered, the email said.


Doug MacKnight, assistant deputy minister with the Economy Ministry's petroleum and natural gas division, said there are multiple pipelines in the area of the leak. Until the site is excavated Wednesday, it will not be known which one is responsible. However, the Tundra-operated pipeline is thought to be the source.

Chief Connie Big Eagle of the Ocean Man First Nation visited the site last weekend. Representatives from Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada have taken the federal lead in the response.

"The first phase of getting the oil out of there should happen fairly quickly, but how long it'll take to bring it back, that's some reclamation work that's going to have to get done," MacKnight said.


Typically the company operating the pipeline is required to remediate and reclaim the land back to its original state, MacKnight said. Any compensation would have to be discussed between the federal government, the company operating the pipeline and the band.

The spill comes seven months after a 225,000-litre Husky oil spill, in which some entered the North Saskatchewan River.

It is unclear if there has been an inspection done on the pipeline in recent months, MacKnight said. If there had been any inspection, responsibility would be company's, he added.
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For nearly two weeks, Exxon has maintained that oil has not reached Lake Conway, despite clear evidence both from aerial video and on-the-ground guerrilla reporting that showed oil had spread throughout a cove and wetlands, which are connected through ground water and drainage culverts to the main body of the lake. Images captured Wednesday night should put any doubt to rest that the main body of Lake Conway is now contaminated with oil.

Citizen journalists, Jak and Lauren, reporting for Tar Sands Blockade, braved the severe weather Wednesday, which included hail, lighting and chance of tornados, to report on what was happening to the site of the oil spill.

Using the live video streaming service, UStream, Jak and Lauren broadcast from multiple locations, including the contaminated cove, Highway 89 that separates the cove and Lake Conway and the wetlands that were first documented in the now viral Tar Sands Blockade video.

A couple pieces of important news were reported by the duo Wednesday night. Their footage is not currently available to embed, but I took screenshots of their live broadcast to show what they were witnessing. I'll embed the video when it becomes available.

Here is a shot of the cove during heavy rains, taken from the yard of a resident that granted them permission to report from their property.
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Video streaming by Ustream


Video streaming by Ustream

OGDEN, Utah – A pair of young beavers credited for helping keep an oil spill out of Willard Bay are now recovering in the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center in Ogden.

A Chevron fuel spill was discovered near Willard Bay on Monday afternoon and crews spent the better part of Monday and Tuesday working to repair the broken 8-inch pipeline that caused the spill and the fuel that had spread through the area.

Cleanup crews say a beaver dam helped stop the fuel from reaching Willard Bay, but a pair of beavers were covered in the fuel and sent to the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center in Ogden for cleanup and recovery.

Employees at the center spent six hours bathing the two beavers, washing them twice with Dawn dish detergent. The pair were put on medication to help recover.

The beavers were reported doing a little better on Wednesday. One of the two is still lethargic, nauseated and didn’t have much of an appetite. The second has started moving around and has started eating a bit.


Rehabilitators say they’re taking the recovery one day at a time and hoping to prevent further damage, including neurological damage.

“They can absorb the substance through their skin. They face things like liver issues, it burns their eyes, respiratory issues, digestive issues, so whenever you get that it’s a little bit frightening,” said Dalyn Erickson with the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center of Northern Utah.

The beavers are just under a year old, and crews are hoping they’ll eventually be nursed back to health and returned to the wild.
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(Reuters) - Exxon Mobil on Sunday continued cleanup of a pipeline spill that loosed thousands of barrels of heavy Canadian crude in Arkansas as opponents of oil sands development latched on to the incident to attack plans to build the Keystone XL line.

Exxon's Pegasus pipeline, which can carry more than 90,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude from Pakota, Illinois to Nederland, Texas, was shut after the leak was discovered late Friday afternoon in a subdivision near the town of Mayflower. The leak forced the evacuation of 22 homes.

The company did not have an estimate for the restarting of the pipeline, which was carrying Canadian Wabasca Heavy crude at the time of the leak. An oil spill of more than 1,000 barrels into a Wisconsin field from an Enbridge pipeline last summer kept that line shuttered for around 11 days.

The Arkansas spill drew fast reaction from opponents of the 800,000 bpd Keystone XL pipeline, which would carry heavy crude from Canada's tar sands to the U.S. Gulf Coast refining center.

Environmentalists have expressed concerns about the impact of developing the oil sands and say the crude is more corrosive to pipelines than conventional oil. On Wednesday, a train carrying Canadian crude derailed in Minnesota, spilling 15,000 gallons of oil.

"Whether it's the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, or ... (the) mess in Arkansas, Americans are realizing that transporting large amounts of this corrosive and polluting fuel is a bad deal for American taxpayers and for our environment," said Representative Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat.


Supporters of Keystone XL and oil sands development say the vast Canadian reserves can help drive down fuel costs in the United States. A report from the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association, put together by oil and gas consultancy Penspen, argued diluted bitumen is no more corrosive than other heavy crude.

CLEANUP

Exxon said that by 3 a.m. Saturday there was no additional oil spilling from the pipeline and that trucks had been brought in to assist with the cleanup. Images from local media showed crude oil snaking along a suburban street.


Officials from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Transportation's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration were deployed to the scene.

"Cleanup efforts are progressing 24 hours a day," said Exxon spokesman Alan Jeffers, who added the oil had not leaked into nearby Lake Conway.

"We were very fortunate that the local responders made sure the oil did not enter the water."
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