|
As a layman on this issue, I agree that a spill from a pipeline will cause way more damage than other forms of transportation methods. At the same time, I think the failure rate of such a dramatic event is quite low. I'd expect them to seep / leak instead of outright bursting. Whereas with rail or truck shipments, the damage per payload is lower compared to a pipeline, but the frequency of accidents causing spills are far higher.
It's kind of like how the passenger death rate of airplane accidents are quite high, but the actual frequency of accidents are quite low, so the total number of deaths from airplane accidents are still fairly small. Whereas with vehicular accidents, the death rates from accidents are quite low, but because of the much higher frequency, you end up having higher death tolls from vehicular accidents compared to airplane accidents.
|