Pipelines move nearly two-thirds of the ton-miles of oil transported annually. Pipelines are, by far, America's most important petroleum supply line, including crude oil, refined fuel and raw materials.
Practical and Safe
Because of the volume that must be transported, pipelines are the only feasible method for moving the enormous quantities of petroleum America requires to keep going each day.
- Replacing even a modest-sized pipeline, which might transport 150,000 barrels per day, would require 750 tanker truck loads per day, a load delivered every two minutes around the clock.
- Replacing the same pipeline with a railroad train of tank cars carrying 2,000 barrels each would require a 75-car train to arrive and be unloaded every day.
Cost Efficiency
Petroleum pipelines depend on a relatively small national workforce of about 16,000 skilled men and women, yet that workforce transports over 600 billion ton-miles of freight each year. These workers accomplish this job so efficiently that America's oil pipelines transport 17% of all U.S. freight, but cost only 2% of the nation's freight bill.
Total Freight Transported
Interstate pipelines deliver over 12.9 billion barrels of petroleum each year. (There are 42 gallons in a barrel.) About 59% of the petroleum transported by pipelines is crude oil (7.6 billion barrels) and the remainder (5.3 billion barrels) is in the form of refined petroleum products. The cost to transport a barrel of petroleum products from Houston to the New York harbor is about $1, or about 2 1/2 ¢ per gallon at your local gasoline station.
Energy to You
Everyone knows where their local gas station is, your home may be warmed by heating oil or natural gas and many homes use natural gas for cooking. But did you know that those products - gasoline, home heating oil, and natural gas - travel long distances from refineries and natural gas plants to communities all over the nation through underground pipelines?
These pipelines are one of the unsung heroes among the many utilities - water, sewer, telephone lines, oil pipelines and natural gas pipelines - tucked under our streets, through neighborhoods and communities, and stretched across farms, forests, and deserts. These same pipelines provide fuel to generate electricity and fertilizers to increase crop production. Pipelines also collect crude oil from many rural, and some not so rural, areas and deliver that crude oil to refineries and chemical plants to create all the products that come from petroleum and petrochemicals.
For an overview of the nation's petroleum pipelines, view: (Windows Media Player)|
America's Supply Line Video (9:24 minutes) | ||
 | Broadband (ISDN, DSL, etc) version | Dial-up (Modem) version |
 | Broadband (ISDN, DSL, etc) version | Dial-up (Modem) version |
printer friendly