Crude-By-Railroad From the Canadian Oil Sands --

Updates

June 28, 2012: See first comment. I've correct the errors in the original posting. 

Original Post

Maybe it's just me, but I think this is a huge story. A huge "thank you" to "bc" for sending me the link.

CN has signed an agreement with Southern Pacific Resource Group to ship Canadian oil to the US gulf coast.

CN expects to begin moving the bitumen from Fort McMurray to Natchez beginning in the fourth quarter. Volumes will ramp up to more than 12,000 carloads per year as production increases, CN officials said.

The pact represents an important milestone in the Class I's growing business of shipping crude oil by rail, said James Cairns, CN’s vice president-petroleum and chemicals. The year, the railroad expects to move about 25,000 carloads of crude oil, up significantly from about 5,000 loads last year.

A unit train is 100 - 120 tank cars, so 12,000/100 --> 120 unit trains, or about one unit train every third day. But look at how huge that ramp up has been: from 5,000 loadings last year to around 25,000 loadings this year.

Canadian National (CN) route map is here.

The Keystone XL looks less and less critical.