Benicia’s representative in the state Senate has introduced a bill that would provide funding for adequate local emergency response to accidents and spills associated with trains carrying crude oil.

Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis, said she wrote the measure because of the increase in crude oil rail shipments planned for Benicia and along the Capitol Corridor route.

That route takes trains through some heavily populated areas of California, Wolk said.

Her bill also addresses rail shipment of other hazardous materials.

The measure would levy a fee on railroad tank cars transporting crude oil and other hazardous materials in California to fund development and maintenance of an emergency response system to deal with accidents and spills involving these materials.

Under Senate Bill 506, railroad operators transporting hazardous materials by tank car in California would be required to register with the State Board of Equalization, which would collect the fees on a quarterly basis based on the number of tanks cars transporting hazardous materials.

“Starting early next year, there are plans to run 100 train cars of crude oil a day through the heart of the Capitol Corridor to the Valero Refining Company in the city of Benicia, in my district,” Wolk said.

“And, as things stand, local governments along these transport corridors don’t have sufficient funding to protect their communities.”

She said her bill, if passed, would help communities prepare for and respond to potential accidents or spills.

Besides Wolk, Senate Bill 506 is jointly authored by Sen. Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, chairperson of the Senate’s Standing Committee on Environmental Quality.

Wolk noted that several destructive crude oil rail accidents have taken place in the United States and Canada in recent years, including the July 2013 derailment of 72 tanker cars loaded with 2 million gallons of flammable crude oil in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, Canada.

That crash, accompanied by fire and explosions, killed 47 people and caused more than $1 billion in damages, she said.

Last year oil shipments by train increased in California by more than 500 percent, to 6.3 million barrels, Wolk said.

The shipments are expected to increase even more, by up to 150 million barrels, by 2016, according to a report released Tuesday by the California Public Utilities Commission, California Environmental Protection Agency and other state agencies.

The report recommended increasing the number of state rail inspectors, emergency response program improvements and real-time information from railroads.

“California needs to keep in step with the significant increase in shipments of these dangerous materials in order to respond to the growing risk to California’s citizens,” Wolk said.

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