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Industry
Statistics
> Transportation of Oil and Petroleum Products
Transportation of Oil and Petroleum
Products
Amount of Petroleum and Petroleum
Products Moved by Tank Barges 1994-2003
Since 1994, tank barges moved on average about 69 billion
gallons of petroleum and petroleum products in a year. As
the chart shows, the range is narrow, with a low of 66.0 billion
gallons in 2002 and a peak of 71.5 billion gallons in 1997.
Source: U.S. Coast Guard, Oil Spill Compendium; U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers, Waterborne Commerce of the U.S.
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Tank Barge Oil Spills 1994-2010
Shown are the gallons of oil spilled from tank barges. Since the establishment of the Coast Guard - AWO Safety Partnership, the highest spill amount, 1.9 million gallons, occurred in 2005. The 2005 spill amount included 1.8 million gallons from the allisiion of the tank barge DBL-152 with an oil platform that was sunk by Hurricane Rita. The chart also shows this series without the hurricane-related spill as the dashed line. More recently, 2010 shows the lowest spill amount from tank barges since 1973, when the Coast Guard recordkeeping began.
In addition, historic spill data shows that, in any given year, one spill accounts for the majority of the annual volume. The 2007, 2009 and 2010 record lows include no significant incidents. Conversely, nearly all of the oil discharged for 2008 came from the MEL OLIVER - TINTOMARA collision (282,828 gallons).
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Tank Barge Oil Spill Rate (1994-2010)
Gallons of Oil Spilled From Tank Barges, Per Million Transported
The tank barge oil spill rate is calculated using a denominator from the annual U.S. Army Corps of Engineers publication, "Waterborne Commerce of the United States," Part 5, Table 2-3. The most recent data year of that publication is 2009. The 2010 value is a projection.
For 2009, the Corps of Engineers reported that 236.0 million short tons, or approximately 64.7 billion gallons of oil, was transported by barge on U.S. waterways. That amount represents 73.8% of all oil carriage on domestic waterways. When compared to the amount transported, the spill rate for 2010 is approximately 1 gallon per 71.4 million gallons transported (projected).
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Double Hull Tank Barges
AWO estimates
that as of November 2005, the combined inland and coastal
tank barge fleet consisted of 3,697 vessels. The number of
double-hull tanks barges is 2,938 or 80% -- 10 years before
the mandate of the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 for the exclusive
use of double-hull vessels in the transport of petroleum and
other hazardous liquids.
As the chart shows, only 298 barges, or 8%, are single-hulled.
The other 461 barges (12%) are double-bottom, double-sided,
or another type of reinforced hull design.
The data to produce these estimates are from the U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers, U.S. Coast Guard, industry publications,
and other sources believed reliable.
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