Places Ruined: Spills, Fires, Explosions

I follow a lot of environmental news networks so I see a lot of news that doesn't always get much mainstream coverage. I can't help think that if people heard about how frequently there are oil and oil related disasters more frequently they would be more fired up to get off of fossil fuels. Your energy source shouldn't kill you or the world around it. This list doesn't even include the evils of fracking.

How many of these disasters have you heard of? Almost all of them occurred in North America this year:

1. Canada's largest coal wastewater spill (264 million gallons) in Alberta, Canada on Halloween 2013. Downstream municipalities were told not to withdraw drinking water until it was deemed "safe."
2. Nearly 300 pipeline spills in North Dakota went unreported until the story broke in October 2013.     
   
3. Petroleum coke is now fouling Chicago and areas around Midwest refineries. "Petcoke" is a byproduct of tar sands mining. The Koch Brothers have been storing petcoke on Chicago's South Side as it waits export to countries with poor environmental laws that will burn this cheap and dirty form of energy (dirtier than coal!). It is blowing in the wind and fouling the air of middle and working class communities.                                                 
4. Exxon's Pegasus pipeline spill in Mayflower, AK, Mark 2013. At least 12,000 barrels of crude were spilled. This pipeline carries tar sands oil and made homes uninhabitable around the spill and left residents with health problems. 
   
5. A Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd train derailed in March 2013 (one week prior to the Pegagsus pipeline spill) and spilled 30,000 gallons of Canadian tar sands oil.
6. July 2013, a train carrying 7.6 million liters of crude derailed and ignited in Lac-Megantic in Quebec. The town was devasted by the resulting fire and 47 people were killed.
   
7. October 2013, Gainford, Alberta (Canada) Train Derailment. A  Canadian National tanker train transporting 13 cars of oil and gas derailed and caught on fire forcing 100 people from their homes.
8. Also in October 2013, another Canadian National train carrying propane derailed, exploded and caught fire near Edmonton, Alberta (Canada). Firefighters did not even bother to battle the blaze, they just let it burn itself out. No people were injured.
9. Just LAST WEEK (Nov 8) a 90-car train carrying 2.7 million gallons of crude oil derailed and spilled its contents into a wetland near Aliceville, Alabama. The fire is being allowed to burn itself out.                                                    

Though it occurred in 2010, I also want to mention BP's Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico which was not contained for 5 months and dumped 210 million gallons of oil into the Gulf. There are reports that it may still be leaking. The oil, combined with deadly dispersants that were supposed to help with clean up, left an ecosystem in crisis: fisheries decimated, cancerous shellfish, dead dolphins, tarballs still washing up on beaches that contain high concentrations of bacteria flesh eating. It will take decades for the Gulf to recover.

If you want to see a more comprehensive list of spills that goes back even further in time see this Wikipedia entry. It contains spills since 2012 that I wasn't even aware of.