Extension Needed for Positive Train Control

You many or not have heard about Positive Train Control — it is a set of highly advanced technologies designed to make freight rail transportation, even safer — and all rail carriers must have this new technology by the end of the year. While progress has been made to comply with PTC, The Fertilizer Institute President Chris Jahn says the vast majority of rail carriers will not meet the deadline

Jahn: "Absent of the extension, the fertilizer industry will not be able to ship android ammonite on lines where that technology has not yet been implemented. Anhydrous ammonia is the most cost efficient source of nitrogen. So if we don't have an extension by the end of October there will be severe consequences for the availability and cost of ammonia in this fall season."

Last week, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee leadership introduced the Positive Train Control Enforcement and Implementation Act to extend the deadline. The bill needs to be passed by the end of this month to avoid any disruption in rail service. Without the extension, rail carriers have said they will start pulling rail cars out of the transportation system.

Jahn: "The railroads have said, 'Yea, the deadline is the end of the year but we were going to cycle out all the tank cars — even the empty tank cars — out of the system.' So that takes an amount of time to do. So we are really in an unprecedented situation — this has never happened before."