Union Pacific ends embargo on coal line
Powder River Basin rail line open for new business again
By Dave Hannon -- Purchasing, 3/28/2007 8:05:00 AM
Rail carrier Union Pacific Tuesday lifted an embargo on new shipments of coal in Powder River Basin region of Wyoming, ending a nearly two-year ban.
After two derailments in May 2005 on the 102-mile coal line shared by UP and BNSF, it was discovered that coal dust accumulated in the rail bed made the line unstable, prompting the embargo from UP.
In a statement, Doug Glass, vice president of energy at UP, said, "The embargo was originally put in place during the summer of 2005 when an aggressive track work program was under way to restore full capacity to the joint line. The embargo allowed us to protect service to our existing customers without being forced to transport coal to new customers."
UP spokesman James Barnes told the Associated Press UP decided to lift the embargo after reducing the amount of time trains spend in its railyard in North Platte, and completing several projects that increased capacity.
BNSF has access to the region from another line so it never had to issue an embargo.
"We felt we had the capacity to address the demand we were seeing in the marketplace," BNSF spokesman Steve Forsberg said in the Associated Press report.
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