BNSF Railway will pay a $600,000 fine to resolve alleged violations of environmental regulations in Colorado and three other states.
The Environmental Protection Agency conducted an unscheduled inspection at BNSF’s rail yards in Denver and Guernsey, Wyoming. The agency found that the company was unable to deploy needed equipment into a nearby river in order to adequately respond to the hypothetical spill.
The company also had four instances in which the train spilled thousands of gallons of diesel fuel in North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming. The EPA says the company’s rail yards are now better prepared to safely manage large volumes of oil.
Across the country, the amount of oil traveling by rails decreased in 2015 by nearly 17 percent.
