Calgary Alberta - The explosion of transportation of oil by rail has gone a long way to alleviate pipeline bottlenecks, but CP Rail boss Hunter Harrison is not convinced it has been a boon for his own industry.
 
Speaking to reporters Tuesday after a speech to the Calgary Chamber of Commerce, the president and CEO of Canadian Pacific Railway Co. said he's "not excited" about moving more crude, partly because it's hard to tell whether there is a long-term future in it, or whether it's just another rush that will taper off over time.
 
"We got to haul the crude, I am going to do as good a job as I can do, as safely as we can do, but I am not going out there lobbying to get rules changed and making it easier for crude," he said.
 
"It's not my game."
 
Mr. Harrison said crude transportation accounts for less than 5 percent of CP's revenue, even less of its profit, and is one of the railway's lowest-margin businesses.
 
Delays in obtaining permits for pipelines such as the proposed Keystone XL have prompted projections that as much as one million barrels a day of Western Canadian crude will move by rail in 2015.
 
CP is not building up its infrastructure to accommodate the projections, Mr. Harrison said, but is improving it cautiously.
 
"Our assets typically last 40 years. Where is fossil fuel going to be in 40 years?" he asked.
 
"There are a lot more exciting things internally at CP in growing the business than crude."
 
Mr. Harrison said controversy around crude transportation is also contributing to its low attractiveness.
 
The rail industry has come under increased scrutiny over a string of accidents involving crude oil, including the Lake Megantic railway disaster last summer that Mr. Harrison blamed in his speech on human error.
 
He said the disaster made CP question whether it wanted to be in the crude business.
 
Mr. Harrison said crude can be moved safely, particularly if older tank cars are removed from North American tracks.
 
Railways have also been blamed by farmers for causing a backlog in grain shipments by moving their attention to oil.
 
Mr. Hunter said cold temperatures have made it difficult to ship a bumper crop.
 
But he told reporters that grain is less attractive to haul than other commodities because it's regulated.
 
"If you had one commodity where you made this much on, and another that you were capped, and you made that much on, which one would you give the attention to?" he asked.
 
Still, he said CP is trying to clear out the grain backlog.
 
"The best thing for us to do right now is to move grain, and that is what we are trying to do, and we are setting records."

Claudia Cattaneo.