why that should change. Because for one reason, if nothing else, slurry 

 pipeline have been around since about the 1890's and I think that their 

 assets' and their virtues are pretty well known and I think it is significant 

 today>^hat every railroad, every company in the world, could not survive 

 without rail transportation. But the pipelines are still quite few 

 throughout the United States. There is only one operating today. There 

 was one which was in operation which has since been put out of busines 

 by unit coal trains, and I state this only as background. I should add to 

 this that we are at the present time undertaking a very expensive 

 expansion program and are preparing by the mid 1980's to haul between 

 115 to 140 million tons of coal. 



A couple more comments briefly on what Fred had to say here because 

 I think it is important. I think his remarks were important and very 

 pertinent. I think that I'd like particularly to comment on these 

 comparisons with on-site development, and I don't intend to get into the 

 technicalities of that or to debate the assets or the virtues or the 

 detriments or anything of liquefaction or gasification or on-site power or 

 any of the other uses--which may or may not be comsumptive uses of 

 water. And, I think I should point out here that while some of them do 

 use large quantities of water, the power people, in particular, have found 

 ways to use air cooling to a very great extent and I am sure their 

 research is going to produce greater results in the past on that than it 

 has up to this moment. I do want to say, however, that I consider this 

 argument--and I have said this openly to everyone in ETSI for a long 

 time--as comparing apples and oranges. We should not be discussing any 

 type of on-site development regardless of what it is, or the question of 

 whether a slurry pipeline is needed or not needed. A slurry pipeline is 

 not a substitute for any type of on-site development. No matter what you 

 do with this coal, how you move it from one place to another, you are at 

 some time going to have on-site development, even if it's nothing but 

 burning it in your kitchen stove. So whether this coal is moved by 

 rail--by unit train, by slurry pipeline or by dirigible or however you want 

 to move it--it's inconsequential as far as the development itself is 

 concerned. We must consider the question of whether this is to move by 

 slurry pipeline or by some other means such as a unit train. Now I want 

 to make that clear without getting into any of the arguments regarding 

 those particular developments. I was quite interested in some of the costs 

 cited here and of course this is a factor. And we all know that it takes a 

 ton of coal to move a ton of water and we have to consider that in the 

 water use. I think it's important, I think it's very important, I think it's 

 critical. And I want to make Burlington Northern's position very clear to 

 all of you at this time as far as that particular thing is concerned. We 

 just simply do not consider the use of a valuable, scarce material essential 

 to agriculture... essential to our very lives through adding it to our body 

 by drinking, through the use of all sorts of domestic uses for cleanliness, 

 anything that you care to bring up... that these are essential sources. 

 That it is not essential to use water for a slurry pipeline when there is a 

 means of transporting that coal--a perfectly satisfactory one that is proven 

 by the amount of use that is being made of it today and it is increasing all 

 the time. That if this is available, and it is, that we should not consider 

 the use of a very valuable western resource in order to duplicate what is 

 already being done and being done well. 



