Oil company plans to pass through Mineral County
Jim Schultz talks with Imperial Oil representative Harry Lillo about the route they intend to take and could have taken.
Around sixteen Mineral County residents gathered to listen to what Harry Lillo had to say last week in a meeting sponsored by the Chamber.
Harry Lillo demonstrates how the hydraulic trailers work with a model.
Last week, Harry Lillo, from Imperial Oil Company, talked with Mineral County Commissioners and also at the Mineral County Chamber of Commerce, about the megaloads the company hopes to move through the state up to their plant north of Fort McMurray, as part of the Kearl Oil Sands Project.
Lillo has been traveling to several communities along the proposed route that the loads would travel in hopes of letting everyone know ahead of time what to expect and to gather concerns and information from stakeholders in the community.
The project in Fort McMurray is an eight billion dollar project and is expected to first produce oil at the end of 2012.
Lillo explained that when plants are built, it is built into modules that are then transported to the plants where they are plugged in together and set in place. Lillo explained that the winters in Canada can be harsh, which can make the units hard to build on site and that when the project was conceived in 2005, the area was experience a super heated economy so it was difficult to get workers in.
The company ended up having about several units built overseas in Korea. Lillo said that they had hoped to take a different route from Lewiston up to the plant, utilizing Highway 12, but they ran into delays acquiring the necessary permits. Now, they hope to have the modules travel from Lewiston down I-90, through Missoula, and travel north through communities including Shelby and Boulder.
“In Canada, we have avalanche sheds and we can’t fit through those and there are also some bridge structures with overhead beams, which we couldn’t go through,” Lillo explained. “Highway 12 became the next feasible routes, but with the delays we’ve experienced, we can’t wait. We need to get some critical components on site.”
In order to ship the modules through on I-90, the heights are being reduced. Some of the loads can go through during the day, and already have, as they travel at highway speed and are on conventional trailers. The larger loads will be on hydraulic trailers and be roughly about 15 feet high, 24 feet wide and 124 feet long. These loads will have to travel from midnight to 6 a.m. in the morning as not to slow up traffic. They are designed to fit under the overpasses.
The loads, if they are allowed to travel through, will potentially give businesses in Superior and surrounding area income. Lillo said that should they travel through Mineral County on I-90 they will also be stopping at a spot along the interstate near mile marker 41 in the county. The crews, which will include around 10 people, will need meals and a place to sleep through the day before resuming the next night. This could be money in the pockets of local businesses.
“As far as businesses go, if ten people need rooms and meals, using our grocery stores and maybe our gas stations, hopefully that we would see money coming in for our businesses,” said Mary Jo Berry, from the chamber.
One of the reasons the chamber held the meeting prior to Lillo meeting with the commissioners last Wednesday was so the local businesses could hear about what was going to happen.
Lillo said they would have about 60 loads coming through and they could start coming through sometime in mid-April to the end of the month. Thirty-three are currently sitting in Lewiston as they await permits. The loads don’t travel on weekends so workers could also potentially stay for more than a night.
Lillo noted that anything that needs to be modified on the route is paid for by the company and that the travel of the loads will not cost taxpayers any money. He also said that there are no hazardous materials in the loads and the only liquids are those in the hydraulic trailer and truck. Lillo said they would take precautions when refueling if they choose to go with a mini tanker. Security would also probably travel with the loads.
Lillo said that there is also potential they could get back to the base route, but noted it doesn’t seem to be happening at the current time.
“If we can get back on our base route, we would move this operation back to the base route,” Lillo said.
Lillo said that about 200 units in all will be built in Korea and 600 are being built locally since the economy cooled down.