Transport Committee on March 27th, 2014

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Mr. McGuinty, we're talking about rail safety here, so keep your questioning to that.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Let me go to the rail safety, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

I look forward to that.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

I will. If you can't see the question relating to rail safety, I'll explain it to you, Mr. Chair.

This is about the relationship between labour and the Government of Canada regarding rail safety, and it has everything to do with rail safety. It's about managing relationships with industry. It's about managing relationships with your regulators. It's about managing relationships with your unions.

Monsieur Boudreault.

[Richard Boudreault]

Mr. Chair and members, we never said we had any problem with the government. What we said was that the government and Transport Canada should take the leadership. They should take the leadership and consult everyone who's involved—the communities, the workers, the union representatives—when they change the safety regulations.

Right now, we're just trying to find a way so that every Canadian in Canada can say, “Our trains are safe and there's no danger for the community; there's no danger for the people; and there's no danger for our members.” That's all.

In 2007 we presented a report—and we still have the same problem—in which we talked about speed. Look at this report. We were all saying that speed was a problem. The only thing we want is to work together. We don't have any argument with the government.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Monsieur Boudreault, why haven't these recommendations been implemented?

[Richard Boudreault]

It's because of deregulation. I'm not blaming one particular government, but since 1986 the deregulation favoured some small companies over big companies. Deregulation means that we have one-man crews. The rule about stopping the train on the main track is not the same and it's done, as I said, like handing out Halloween candy to everyone.

With regard to handbrakes, one company has its own system; another company has its own rules. As for the track and how it is and the quality of the track, some small companies do whatever they want. They don't have any inspections.

What we want is the same rules for everyone, and we think Transport Canada should be the one to lead that, in consultation with unions, people, the community, and the workers.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

So the problem here, you're saying, historically, in fairness, goes back to deregulation, the idea of devolving responsibility to the railways through the SMSs. You said clearly you don't think the SMSs are being implemented. You've also said the SMSs should be fully disclosed, made fully public to everybody, every party, every citizen, every municipality.

[Richard Boudreault]

I didn't say that. I'm sorry to interrupt you. We're not asking the railway to disclose any information that could make the public vulnerable. We're asking them to release information so the public can make informed decisions about their safety. That's what we want.

As an example, when this thing happened, if we'd had in Lac-Mégantic a team of first responders who knew how to react and what kind of product they were facing—because, as you remember, they put water on the fire for about a day and a half spreading the crude oil all over the community and in the river, and after a day and a half they found out that they needed some kind of a foam—I don't know the exact name—instead of water to stop the fire.

I'm not saying to disclose all this information to the public, but at least some people in the community need to be informed about what exactly goes through their community, and workers also need to know what they're working with, so we can react safely when an incident or accident happens.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

I've got your verbatim quote here, you said and you just repeated it: “...by a Minister of Transport that grants exemptions to railway companies like handing out Halloween candy to kids”. That's a very serious allegation, so what has got to happen here to stop ministers of transport from handing these out like Halloween candy to kids?

[Richard Boudreault]

They should take leadership. When they implement safety rules, they should at least find a way to check what's going on. Fine, if it's respected. If not, do what they have to do. Take the permit from the delinquent. That's it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Your time has expired.

We'll now move to Mr. Komarnicki for seven minutes.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Thank you, Chair. I certainly appreciate having you attend and address issues of safety.

I'm going to question primarily the area of hauling crude oil and ethanol. I know National Steel Car Limited has been here for over 100 years, you say, and congratulations on that—the only manufacturer and producer in Canada. You spoke essentially about the legacy cars, or the old cars, and the new good-faith cars. Are the new cars being manufactured based on 2011 design standards established by the Association of American Railroads?

[Jamal Hematian]

That's correct.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Okay.

If I were to say there were approximately 80,000 legacy cars... If one were going to use the present facilities both in Canada and the United States—I understand you say there are four or five major.... If one were to replace 80,000, the manufacturing capacity in North America, if I understand you correctly, is about 20,000 a year.

[Jamal Hematian]

That's correct. That's my estimate.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

That's your estimate. Everybody that currently exists.

So that's about a four-year prospect, would you say?

[Jamal Hematian]

That's correct.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Could you indicate the difference in safety between the legacy cars and the new cars, if you want to call it that, based on the 2011 design standards?

[Jamal Hematian]

We are talking about two types of cars. When we go to CPC-1232, you can have two car types: one is non-jacketed and the other one is a jacketed car. This one just shows the 31,800.

In this slide you see an unjacketed car, the CPC-1232. There are major features in this car.

[Max Vanderby, Director, Production Engineering, National Steel Car Limited]

I can tell you about the two areas of differences. I'll refer back to the slides I had up here first.

The two areas are basically the appurtenances that we add to the car and the car itself. The slide I have up here for CPC-1232 shows the appurtenances. We're just focusing on a few items, which I'll quickly go through.

Starting from the bottom of the car, there's an additional skid plate that's a half-inch thick. This skid plate is welded to what's called rebars along the length of the car. It actually truncates at a mechanically fastened area of the valve. The valve is protected within the skid, and a flange is bolted outside the skid. If there were any type of rollover or shear point, it would take off the flange but not affect the actual ball valve that holds the product in the car.

Going to the top of the car, we have a reclosing pressure relief valve. The newer regulations in here are for 27 psi start to release, at 27,000 minimum CFM, which is basically your flow of air outside of the car, or your product or your gases.

In terms of vacuum relief valves, in the past you could actually activate them by stepping on them. That's deregulated now. We have a vacuum relief valve that works on -.75 psi up to about 5 psi, depending on the product and the customer and their preference.

For the two ball valves that are on here, we have a two-inch and a three-inch ball valve. The three-inch ball valve could go up to four inches. That's for your loading and discharging, depending on your system. The two-inch valve is basically for vapour when you're loading it or unloading it.

These ball valves used to be able to be screwed into what's called your fittings plate. Now they're bolted on in place with gaskets so that there's no chance of even loosening it up when you're changing your caps or hooking up your equipment for loading and unloading.

At the end of the car on the 31,800, we have a half head shield added from 2011. It's a half-inch thick and bolted to the end of the car to prevent any, let's say, coupler impacts onto the head of the car.

Going down to the couplers, you have a double-shelf coupler, which prevents couplers from decoupling. It contains them so that you don't have a slip of a coupler going into the head of the car or the car adjacent to it.

[Jamal Hematian]

The other thing we have to pay attention to is the difference between legacy cars and this one. At the top you can see the big nozzle around those fittings. We call it rollover protection. If this car is derailed and is rolling, it's protecting the top portion. That's one of the changes.

The other one, which is very critical and important, is the material you use to build the tank. Based on this change, it's now TC-128, which is higher-resistance material: instead of 70 yield, it's 81 yield. The other one is the thickness; on the unjacketed they increased it to a minimum half-inch. If somebody wants to go more than that, they're welcome, but the minimum is half-inch TC-128, half head shield, and again, a half-inch thickness.

All of these things put together make the unjacketed tank car CPC-1232.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

I'm just going to ask a couple of other questions because my time is running out.

Knowing what it takes to manufacture a new one, if one wanted to retrofit the old legacy car to be the “equivalent of”, in manufacturing cost terms which is easier or cheaper, retrofitting or manufacturing new, from scratch?

[Jamal Hematian]

The second part of the story is this. Every car is designed to a clearance diagram. If the material has changed, you cannot do much about it. If you made this one from plastic, you can't just.... You have to scrap it and make it from steel or aluminum or whatever. So that's number one.

The second one is the clearance diagram around it. The size, the geometry, is confined in a clearance diagram. If you want to change it to new rules and be out of this, you cannot do it. It's not just a matter of how much money you pay to retrofit. It's feasibility. Is it possible or not?

We put together a package for AAR, and we think a very small percentage of old tank cars that are in service are feasible for this retrofit.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Okay, thank you.

Mr. Watson, you have seven minutes.