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Not seeing your normal garbage pickup? Blame that B.C. pipeline blast

caption: This Tuesday, Oct. 9, 2018, photo provided by Dhruv Desai shows an explosion near the community of Shelley, British Columbia.
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This Tuesday, Oct. 9, 2018, photo provided by Dhruv Desai shows an explosion near the community of Shelley, British Columbia.
Dhruv Desai via AP

For a second day, Puget Sound Energy is asking its 1.1 million customers to limit their gas and energy use. And now the pipeline blast that caused the disruption is affecting garbage pickup and bus service.

The pipeline that supplies the majority of PSE's natural gas ruptured Tuesday in British Columbia. No injuries were reported.

PSE spokesperson Grant Ringel said the natural gas supply is stable now, but the company does have a plan if there's a sudden shortage: "Injecting liquefied natural gas at various points at various utility locations, including our facility at Gig Harbor."

Ringel said PSE's biggest commercial customers are conserving natural gas, putting less strain on the system.

Waste Management said it was suspending service Thursday to most of its customers in King and Snohomish Counties because of the disruption. Its trucks run on natural gas. The company said it was unclear how long the suspension would last.

Waste Management said service in the Marysville area, along with Skagit and Kitsap Counties, would not be suspended because it had different fuel suppliers for those trucks.

And Sound Transit warned riders that some ST Express buses that run on natural gas were moved to shorter routes to conserve fuel. That means smaller buses are serving some routes in Pierce County.

On Wednesday, two oil refineries near Anacortes shut down some units that rely on natural gas to run, goskagit.com reported.

It's still unclear what caused the pipeline explosion in British Columbia.

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