The Uinta Basin Railway is a development that is being driven by the Seven County Infrastructure Coalition. The Coalition is currently comprised of seven counties Carbon, Daggett, Duchesne, Emery, San Juan, Sevier and Uintah. Castle Country Radio was able to sit down with Carbon County Commissioner Casey Hopes who sits on the board to get an update about the development.
“Our communities the Seven County Infrastructure Coalition communities are energy producing communities. This whole project is about getting that strand of oil from the Uintah Basin out to markets and as we know today with the price of gas and everything it would be great to have an outlet for the oil and be able to help bring prices down,” said Commissioner Hopes. Right now, the only place that the oil from Uintah Basin can be distributed is to the refineries along the Wasatch Front. The Unita Basin Railway would allow for them to increase compacity and get that strand of oil to other refineries.
The oil from the Uintah Basin is very unique as Hopes explains, “This oil, the Uintah Basin oil has a lot of other properties that are really valuable, it’s got a lot of wax in it. Those paraffins and those waxes could be stripped off and used for cosmetics and lubricants and different things, that a lot of your other crude oils don’t have a lot of that wax, they’re a little thinner. So this is a really valuable oil and its good to get it to market.” This could open up many doors for not only the Uintah area for all seven counties.
The organization finally received their signed record of decision from federal agencies which means that the design phase can begin. “That doesn’t mean that we’re done, there’s still potential legal hurdles that have to be overcome and different things. But it gives us the opportunity to move forward, to finish the engineering on the design and hopefully next year we’ll start to see some actual construction taking place,” said Commissioner Hopes. This has been a long process but there is finally some headway being made now.
Many folks may be wondering what this development could bring to our local area. “Once it’s built, it will lead to jobs in our community because the trains will leave from here, from Helper and head over to the basin, pick up a load of crude, and then bring it back. Then put it on the Union Pacific Railroad and the BNSF Railroad and then they will take that load to where ever its going. So it will be good for our community because it will add jobs, and good paying jobs to our community,” stated Commissioner Hopes.
To learn more about the Uinta Basin Railroad visit their website at http://uintabasinrailway.com/ or visit their Facebook page.