Dear Editor:
There’s nothing more important than the safety of our neighbours and the communities where our Trans Mountain pipeline and terminals operate.
Our storage terminal, located at the base of Burnaby Mountain, has been operating safely in the community for 60 years and has never had a fire incident.
The latest reports commissioned by the City of Burnaby Fire Department and SFU are an expected part of the National Energy Board process, and we will be responding to this report and others in more detail throughout the regulatory review. However, it is important we address some issues reported in the media about our level of consultation and communication of our emergency response plans.
Kinder Morgan’s emergency response plans have always been, and will continue to be, available to public safety agencies. Last October, as part of the National Energy Board’s review, Trans Mountain voluntarily filed its existing emergency management program (EMP) documents. Due to the public nature of this filing, it was necessary to redact some parts to protect privacy and security sensitive information that is not normally shared in this fashion. The EMP contains documents including emergency response plans and fire plans for each terminal.
In response to the City of Burnaby’s public statements regarding Trans Mountain not sharing these plans, the un-redacted documents for our operations in Burnaby have always been available to the city, and the fire plans were formally provided to Burnaby in November.
It is important when assessing potential consequences like those presented in the media over the last few weeks to include consideration of hazards, engineering controls, and mitigation strategies, which effect probability and ultimately, the risk of such events. We have filed our own risk assessment for our Burnaby terminal, which concludes that with proper tank design and management the risk of a fire is extremely low. As always, important conversations happen both inside and outside the regulatory process, and we would welcome a discussion with the City of Burnaby and SFU to better understand and address their concerns and questions.
Michael Davies, senior director marine development, Kinder Morgan Canada
