NC Colonial Pipeline Spill Now Estimated At 2 Million Gallons--Largest In U.S. History

[Nevilledog]

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Robbie Jaeger 🔎
@RobletoFire
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ICYMI: The Colonial Pipeline spill in Huntersville, NC is now estimated to be 2M gals—making it the largest inland pipeline spill in US history.

Per Colonial, the leak could've gone undetected for 18 days.

The biggest environmental story in decades:

jaeger.substack.com
NC Colonial Pipeline Spill Now Estimated At 2 Million Gallons—Largest In U.S. History
Two million. That's how many gallons of gasoline Colonial Pipeline Company now estimates spilled from a crack in their pipeline running beneath the Oheler Nature Preserve outside Huntersville, NC in...
8:04 AM · Jul 23, 2022

https://jaeger.substack.com/p/nc-colonial-pipeline-spill-now-estimated

Two million. That's how many gallons of gasoline Colonial Pipeline Company now estimates spilled from a crack in their pipeline running beneath the Oheler Nature Preserve outside Huntersville, NC in August of 2020. The updated estimate, given as part of Colonial's settlement with the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, makes the Huntersville spill the largest inland pipeline spill in US history. The previous record was 1.68M gallons in Minnesota in 1991.

This latest estimate marks the fourth such time Colonial has been asked to revise what they believe to be the total volume of the spill—which started at 64,000, in August 2020, then roughly 250,000 in September that year. After state officials noticed discrepancies between the amount being reported as recovered far exceeded Colonial's expected number, they once again asked for another estimate, which Colonial provided to the tune of 1.2M gallons. Months went by while Colonial slowly pulled their released product from the ground, and again state officials knew that estimate would be surpassed, but this time Colonial declined to provide another estimate—until Colonial and the NC DEQ settled the matter earlier this month, resulting in a $4.75M fine for Colonial as well as handing providing new testing and information to the agency which they had declined to provide for over a year.

“Each estimate we have provided to-date has been based on the best available data we had at the time” Colonial said in their submitted estimate report, released today. The company would go on to blame the geographical layout of the site for their models’ inability to provide new estimates, until a recent change in models gave Colonial what they say is the more “responsible” approach to determining the potential volume.

Another interesting admission in Colonial's report comes in the way of their estimation of how long the leak actually went undetected. As previously reported, Colonial themselves did not discover their leak—instead to teenagers riding ATVs through the area smelled gas, and notified the authorities, who in turn alerted Colonial. Now it seems Colonial believes the pipeline could have been leaking for as many as 18 days—from July 27, 2020 until August 14, when it was discovered. While ot had been long speculated that the leak happened for a protracted period of time, Colonial's estimate is the first time anyone has placed a possible timeframe on the leak.

*snip*

[PortTack]

1. But we don't need no f..king EPA telling us what to do!