OK perhaps a alternative from ND could be a pipeline or rail to Duluth and then oil by Great Lakes Ships to refinery’s and ports. If it works for grain and coal why not oil. The problem is I don’t know if there is any Great Lakes Oilers left.
IINM, there are a fair number of tank barges in operation on the Great Lakes system although I do not know if any of them transport crude.
Liquid asphalt is a common commodity moved by barge on the lake, I would imagine these barges could be adapted for carrying crude oil.
There already is a major crude oil pipeline thru Duluth, and there is also a plan for a boat transfer.
http://www.superiortelegram.com/event/article/id/259640/publisher_ID/36/
I doubt that a new fleet of high capacity oilers has much of a future on the Lakes. First, one contributor made reference to “barges.” If a company is considering moving large quantities of oil down the Lakes, a barge is not the right vessel to use. Such a flat bottomed vessel would be up-ended in no time. Barges are better suited to rivers rather than the Great Lakes. So secondly, a new fleet of ships would be required, at no small cost. As another person here mentioned, the environmental dangers and resulting costs would likely be seen as prohibitive; I concur. Such transmission of oil is, in my opinion, better done by the various competing railroads or perhaps a pipeline, but not via the Great Lakes.
I appreciate seeing the word “boats” in parenthesis. The traditional ore, coal, and wheat-carrying ships of the Lakes have always been called “boats,” although their size belies that term. For those who’ve never seen one up close, you’re missing something.
There is a lot of petroleum product already safely carried by vessels on the Great Lakes.
A barge is any vessel that’s unpowered. There are many barges of all kinds active on the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Seaway system and they range all the way up to a massive 1000’ tug/barge combination that is articulated together and engaged in things like the iron ore trade and they do so safely. So that’s not an issue and some of these already carry petroleum products like the ATB Michigan/Great Lakes.
American flagged powered tankers (Those that are actually a ship versus a barge) on the Great Lakes are now gone. The last was the Gemini, a 432’ double hulled tanker built in the late 1970’s. But she was sold to Algoma Central a few years ago and has been reflagged Canadian. And because of the Jones Act, she can no longer engage in American trade from one US port to another (But she can carry cargo to and from an American port if the origin or destination is elsewhere like Canada). Of side interest to railfans, she was built with Alco 251’s for her power plant.
But there are tank barges on the American side like the Michigan I linked to a picture above. And Algoma Central operates a large fleet of powered tankers on the Canadian side and have been busy replacing and expanding that fleet in recent years. So if the cargo originated or terminated at a Canadian port, they’d be willing and ready to take on the task.
And there is some idle capacity in the US flagged bulk carrier fleet. If a long-term contract was offered, there’s a possibility that a presently idle vessel due to this recession like the American Victory could be retrofitted and modified. But it would be an
Barges are better suited to rivers rather than the Great Lakes
Barges see plenty of open OCEAN use, they are used regularly between Seattle and many ports in Alaska, where conditions can get much worse than what the “Lakes” see.
West coast barges tend to run much larger than those seen in the Mississippi, where they tend to run larger numbers of smaller barges, to keep their draft shallower. A barge typically found on the Mighty Mississippi may not be suitable for Great Lake service, but there are barges more than capable of handeling any conditions found on the lakes, just a matter of using the appropriate vessel for the intended sevice.
Doug
Conversion of a idle Great Lakes bulk carrier would be prohibitive since a tanker is required to be double hulled. The reason that there was a significant number of ATBs built or converted was due to a loophole in Coast Guard crewing requirements for Tug/Barge combinations allowing a smaller crew versus Ships(Boats). The Coast Guard looked at the issue and revised the regulations such that the crewing requirements are now the same. With a ship having greater hydrodynamic efficiency, it is doubtful that any more ATB or ITBs will be created, at least for the Great Lakes.
Single hull tankers have expensively been converted to double hull before. So it doesn’t strike me as an impossibility for a single hull bulk carrier to be converted to a double with the necessary tanks then installed in her former cargo holds. Doesn’t seem a whole lot more involved than things like replacing tank tops, entire ballast tanks, installing the slopes in cargo holds when converting one to be a self-unloader, etc.
But with everything else that would be involved, it’s probably safe to assume that it’s cost prohibitive. And since there has been a small amount of large barge construction on the American side of the Great Lakes, 100% fresh construction has some level of viability and likely would be more economical than such a drastic renovation and result in a more efficient tanker.
As I undersyand it, ATB’s still have slightly smaller crewing requirements than powered ships. But a ship is now more competitive primarily because crew sizes on Great Lakes ships have been driven down so much over the years. The days of 30-40 men aboard ship are long gone and the typical large bulk carrier now operates with around 15 men on the Great Lakes on the American side and I think even less on the Canadian.
And you forgot about their second significant advantage. Regulations in general have traditionally been much more lax for barges in regard to standards, mandatory inspections, etc. It’s not just smaller crews that have given them a financial advantage but these loopholes have slowly narrowed over the years. And they also have other advantages. For barges on the smaller side, it can be convenient to have the flexibility to have a tug that can disengage and be used such as for clearing ice away from a dock face.
And while fuel prices have swung the equation back to ships, don’t forget about the Lakes Contender. She’s almost brand new, is a giant, and she’s an ATB. And the Reserve and Buckeye, two large American freighters, were
I don’t think the greenies or this administration would allow it.
Here’s a consideration: Any vessel moving oil from the upper Lakes to the lower ones will, ipso facto, return empty. At least ore, or wheat, could move down, while coal was sent up. How does a half-the-time empty vessel pay for itself? And since empty vessels would have to be ballasted, they would need double walls, too.
Nothing wrong with “the greenies” or the Administration for wanting to keep the Great Lakes from getting any more polluted than they already are. After all, if the Keystone pipeline is not built that means more traffic for railroads, does it not?
I am not a, “Greenie,” - but I was at sea within a few hundred miles of the scene when the Stockholm collided with the Andrea Doria. The bottoms of all the Great Lakes are carpeted with ships that went down due to collision, storm or pure bad management.
The very last thing I would want to hear about would be a multi-thousand-ton crude oil spill in the Great Lakes. And if a lot of tankers (ships OR barges) start moving crude from Duluth, such a spill would be a matter of WHEN, not IF.
Chuck (Former engineer cadet)
There are currently millions of gallons a year of liquid asphalt products being moved by barge on the Great Lakes so that scenario could occur anyway…
There is very little bulk freight moved upbound on the Lakes any more. Other than an occasional load of limestone or salt there is nothing left to move upbound any more. Duluth/Superior ship almost as much coal downbound as iron ore, next to no coal is shipped upbound.
How is this any different than an empty oil tank car train returning empty?
There are lots of runs on the Great Lakes where a cargo isn’t back hauled. Especially on the American side of the Great Lakes. The Canadians are blessed with being able to often haul grain down the Seaway and then iron ore back up the Seaway into the Great Lakes. Especially for their remaining straight deckers and during the Spring and Fall when there’s a lot of grain to be hauled. And any large ship is going to have to have ballast tanks so that doesn’t present a special problem like someone suggested it would be.
And there’s a lot of petroleum already hauled on the Lakes and St. Lawrence and has been safely handled for many years. The only major accident I can even think of throughout the the years has been the Saturn accident at a dock back in the 1990’s. And there have been some large tankers over the years like all of the Imperial Oil tankers built during a boom in the late 40’s and early 50’s that were safe carriers and among the largest Canadian flagged merchant vessels of their day and among the largest anywhere at the time. And many salt water tankers have entered the Lakes and continue to do so, particularly since the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway that made possible passage for larger vessels like T-2 tankers that were still in common use at the time.
Great Lakes shipping is incredibly safe these days. You have to go back to the 70’s for the last loss of a major vessel at sea and most incidents have been minor and often occur while at dock with little real concern and nothing that a containment boom couldn’t hold back until it was cleaned up. I can only think of a few noteworthy incidents over the past 30 years and most of those were nearly 30 years ago and few have resulted in anything that a little bit of time at a shipyard couldn’t repair. And capacity is just increasing on our shipping lanes as industry continues to die out or evolve that the Great Lakes shipping industry serves and things like advancements in electronic