The myth of save pipelines

I initially planned to only include local news but the Arkansas pipeline accident less than 3 years after the enormous Kalamazoo pipeline spill in July 2010 should have an influence on the City of Adrian's decision to sell up to 8 acres of Witt Farm to Savoy Oil and grant them right of way to build pipelines from any close-by well (including any well in Heritage Park) to the central processing plant at Witt Farm.
According to statements by the Adrian's mayor Greg DuMars, the city administrator Dane Nelson and several city commissioners on the city commission meeting on April 1, Savoy could do all of the above under the current lease but nobody was able to explain, why the city administrator and Savoy wanted the above mentioned sale to pass a vote in the commission, and why Savoy would pay $80,000 to get something they already own? This is exactly the same situation we had with the tabled decision to build the central processing facility in Heritage Park - that was supposedly also not really needed by Savoy according to the understanding of mayor DuMars and Dane Nelson. Lucky for us Savoy moved the planned facility to Witt Farm and that was the end of the tabled city commission decision.

OK - back to the actual topic of this post: the myth of save pipelines. I had some discussion about this topic with commissioner Jacobson after sending a EPA photo link of the Arkansas pipeline spill ( http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/2013/04/05/exxon-oil-spill-photos-mayflower-arkansas_n_3024336.html?ir=Green ) to Dane Nelson and some city commissioners. The controversy started with telling me that there are no plans for Adrian to lay 20" pipes carrying 95,000 barrels a day of tar sands diluted bitumen. It is true that tar sands diluted bitumen is a much dirtier stuff than crude oil, and that the size of the pipeline and the pumping volume are much higher than what would go underground in Adrian. However, fact is that such large pipelines are less numerous and better equipped with a so-called spill detector system than smaller pipelines like the ones that would go underground here, and thus major spills should statistically only occur at max every 10-years - and we had more than 2 of them in the last 3 years. Just have a look at the great collection of pipeline accidents here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pipeline_accidents_in_the_United_States_in_the_21st_Century  This hints strongly to a spill incidence of small pipelines of several spills every year as they are much more numerous. Spill detection is poor as spill volumes are usually small, and pipes are laid underground. However, small spills can have a destructive impact on the environment and water resources if pipelines are laid through sensitive wetlands and highly permeable soils, which happens to be just the case between Heritage Park and Witt Farm. Pipelines would be laid through wetlands, crossing Beaver Creek or the South Branch of River Raisin, climb up the floodplain bluff, crossing farmland and Howell Hwy before reaching the central processing plant. The adjacent farm land and Witt Farm are both on highly permeable soil, meaning that every spill from a leak in a pipe could percolate quickly into the ground water and the aquifer.

I hope the city will not pass the motion of April 1 that was unsuccessful due to a 3:3 vote behind closed doors - or in a second attempt at the next meeting before finally organizing a public forum to investigate what Adrian citizen really think about what is going on with oil and gas extraction in and around the city.