An anonymous governmental official says that Ottawa is looking at extending the insurance burden for crude-by-rail disasters, and create a special fund similar to once set up for maritime oil spills.
The comes over a year after an oil train exploded in Lac-Mégantic, Que., killing 47 people.
The cleanup and reconstruction bill, now being covered by various levels of government, is expected to be at least $400-million.
The insider information – told to a Reuters reporter – would naturally follow a federal government pledge from last year to make railways carry more insurance to deal with such disasters, while acknowledging that it is unrealistic for the industry to bear the entire cost.
“It’s not likely to be the railways alone,” the anonymous source told Reuters.
A representative for Transport Minister Lisa Raitt declined to comment on whether there would be a maritime-type fund set up, but confirmed that she was looking to shippers in addition to railways for extra coverage.
Montreal Maine & Atlantic Railway – the carrier responsible for the Lac-Mégantic crash – exhausted the $25-million insurance it was required it to carry and immediately declared bankruptcy.
The Manitoba government has told Ottawa that taxpayers should “in no way have to deal with the fallout” from such disasters, but added that it is unrealistic to have each railway get enough insurance to cover such extreme accidents, like the one in Lac-Mégantic.
One potential example of a pooled fund is the Ship-Source Oil Pollution Fund, which was funded with levies on oil tanker shipments during the mid-1970s.
