UPDATE: Keystone Pipeline Restarts After Oil Spill That Roiled Markets

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CALGARY — TC Energy Corp. says it has restarted the southern extension of its Keystone pipeline after repairing a Dec. 7 leak that led to the worst oil spill in the pipeline’s history.“After completing repairs, inspections and testing we proceeded with a controlled restart of the Cushing Extension,” the company said in a statement. “The Keystone Pipeline System is now operational to all delivery points.”The Calgary-based company says it will operate the pipeline under plans approved by U.S. regulators, including additional safety measures such as reduced operating pressure.

TC Energy restarted most of the 4,324-kilometre Keystone pipeline system on Dec. 14, while the 154-km Cushing Extension, running from just south of Steele City, Nebraska to Cushing, Oklahoma, had remained shut following the leak.

The cause of the estimated 14,000-barrel spill, which eclipsed a 2017 6,600-barrel spill in North Dakota and a 2019 4,500-barrel spill in South Dakota, is still under investigation.

The company says it is committed to remediate the spill site in Washington County, Kansas, which includes a stream and agricultural land.

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A report released last year from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GOA), a congressional watchdog agency, said Keystone’s accident history has been similar to other crude oil pipelines since 2010, but the severity of spills has worsened in recent years.

The massive crude pipeline, which can carry more than 600,000 barrels a day, is a major conduit linking oil fields in Canada to refiners in the US Gulf Coast. A leak on a section of the pipeline that extends to the Cushing, Okla., storage hub spilled 14,000 barrels of oil in Kansas in early December, becoming one of the largest onshore US oil spills since 2010, according to government data.

Two other legs of the line — one to Patoka, Ill., and one from Cushing to the Gulf — are also operating at reduced rates.