{"id":47687,"date":"2019-08-07T06:55:30","date_gmt":"2019-08-07T11:55:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=47687"},"modified":"2019-08-07T06:55:33","modified_gmt":"2019-08-07T11:55:33","slug":"explosions-in-three-states-highlight-dangers-of-aging-fossil-fuel-infrastructure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=47687","title":{"rendered":"Explosions in Three States Highlight Dangers of Aging Fossil Fuel Infrastructure"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Explosions in Three States Highlight Dangers of Aging Fossil Fuel Infrastructure<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"Site<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

On August 1, for the third time in as many years, Enbridge’s Texas Eastern Transmission gas pipeline exploded. This tragic incident in central Kentucky killed a 58-year-old woman, Lisa Denise Derringer, and injured at least five others. Flames towered 300 feet high when the 30-inch diameter pipe ruptured at 1 a.m. and forced at least 75 people to evacuate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe opened the backdoor and it was like a tornado of fire going around and around and he said we were trapped,\u201d survivor Jodie Coulter, 53, told<\/a> CBS News, describing her efforts to flee on foot. Coulter, whose house was within 600 feet of the pipeline, suffered third-degree burns on her arms. \u201cIt felt like we were standing next to a blow torch.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This explosion joins a string of others in the past several weeks involving America\u2019s aging fossil fuel infrastructure \u2014 including a network of 2.6 million miles of pipelines, roughly half of which are over 50 years old, and over 130 oil refineries, many of which are 50 to 120 years old<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Kentucky incident came less than 24 hours after ExxonMobil\u2019s Baytown, Texas, petrochemical plant saw its second major fire this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last week\u2019s Baytown explosion injured 66 workers and has already spurred at least three lawsuits against the company, including one by a worker alleging his burns were far more serious than ExxonMobil had indicated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just over a month earlier, a\u00a0massive fireball and series of explosions<\/a>\u00a0ripped through the largest refinery on the East Coast, the Philadelphia Energy Solutions\u00a0complex.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Flare
Flare at ExxonMobil’s Baytown, Texas, refinery following Hurricane\u00a0Harvey. Credit: Julie Dermansky for\u00a0DeSmog<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Aging Pipelines, Aging\u00a0Refineries<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It may be months<\/a> before federal investigators reach conclusions about the cause of each accident, but all three incidents took place at sites with a long history of operations \u2014 and accidents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Explosions in Three States Highlight Dangers of Aging Fossil Fuel Infrastructure On August 1, for the third time in as many years, Enbridge’s Texas Eastern Transmission gas pipeline exploded. This tragic incident in central Kentucky killed a 58-year-old woman, Lisa Denise Derringer, and injured at least five others. Flames towered 300 feet high when the 30-inch diameter pipe […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[5317,26484,1729,11167],"class_list":["post-47687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-environment","tag-desmog-blog","tag-fossil-fuel-infrastructure","tag-oil-and-gas-industry","tag-sharon-kelly"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47687"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47687\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47688,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47687\/revisions\/47688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}