Is there a pipeline under your house? This new online CEPA tool tells you

A new online CEPA tool allows Canadians to enter their address or postal code and find out just how close a pipeline may be to them, how old it is, and which oil and gas products it transports.

The map, which was created by the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association (CEPA) lays the location of the 117,000 kilometres of pipeline in Canada over Google Maps.

“We recognized the need to develop a user friendly tool that people can use to see exactly where transmission pipeline infrastructure is located,” said CEPA CEO Brenda Kenny. “As part of our About Pipelines website, it’s a great resource for people to get better informed about this critical infrastructure that impacts all of our lives.”

CEPA says Canadian pipelines moved about 1.2 billion barrels of liquid petroleum products and 5.3 trillion cubic feet of natural gas last year.

A recent study from The Fraser Institute found that pipelines are much safer at transporting oil and gas than rail. The study found a 4.5 times greater incident occurrence with rail. What’s more, authors Taylor Jackson and Kenneth P. Green found that jusy 17% of pipeline accidents happen in the actual line. Most take place in facilities that are often equipped with secondary containment mechanisms and procedures.

Still the issue of pipelines has been a particularly controversial one in Canada over the past decade.

“The Great Bear Rainforest is not a place for an oil pipeline,” Trudeau told a crowd of supporters at Vancouver’s Jericho Beach Park in June. “If I win the honour of serving as prime minister, the Northern Gateway Project will not happen.”

The proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline, a project to build a twin pipeline from Bruderheim, Alberta to Kitimat, British Columbia, thus linking Alberta’s oil sands to Canada’s coast and lucrative Asian markets, appears to be dead after the decisive federal election win for Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party.

“The Great Bear Rainforest is not a place for an oil pipeline,” Trudeau told a crowd of supporters at Vancouver’s Jericho Beach Park in June. “If I win the honour of serving as prime minister, the Northern Gateway Project will not happen.”

Trudeau, however, was in favour of the controversial Keystone XL project, and even traveled to Washington to express his support for it before it was ultimately nixed by U.S. President Barack Obama. Trudeau said the big difference between Keystone and Northern Gateway was that the latter had gotten the thumbs up from Canada’s National Energy Board. Trudeau has said that all projects, including existing ones, would be placed under review and that there would be a stronger consideration of community input.

“It’s important that we get our resources to market, but it’s also important that we understand that it’s not just up to governments to grant permits anymore,” he explained. “We have to get communities to grant permission and that’s something that we need to spend more time focusing on.”

As for the rail business, one prominent exec hopes the Liberal win will help the industry by doing less.

“Just leave us alone, give us a level playing field and let us run our business,” said Canadian Pacific Railway CEO Hunter Harrison on a conference call to discuss the company’s third-quarter results the day after Trudeau was elected. Harrison said he believed the Conservative government under Stephen Harper was too hands on and introduced too much red tape. Harrison said the industry would gladly fade into the background.

“I think (The Liberal Party has) larger issues than to worry about than rails in Canada,” he said.

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