While the United States and Canada are near agreement on a tougher standard for oil-by-rail tanker cars, they may diverge on the phase-in period, Transport Minister Lisa Raitt told Reuters. She said they were close "on a tank car standard agreement, but not necessarily on the time frame. ... Time is of the essence for us." A rash of oil-train derailments in the United States and Canada have added to pressure to make tankers less vulnerable to rupture and explosion in the event of a mishap. Oil increasingly goes by rail due to swelling output in the two countries and a shortage of pipelines. The deadly peril came to the fore in July 2013 when an oil train derailed in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, killing 47 people and destroying the heart of the town. Long oil trains regularly pass through larger metropolitan areas. Raitt said the new regulations would "absolutely" be stronger than the CPC-1232 standard for oil tank cars that Canada has already required to be implemented by 2017. They are deemed somewhat safer than the old DOT-111 cars, but nine CPC-1232 cars ruptured nonetheless in a fiery Canadian National Railway Co accident in northern Ontario on Saturday. Raitt said the United States and Canada were cooperating on the standard "because the trains have to go across the border." (Reuters)