PHMSA Clarifies Pipeline Safety Terms

Today the DOT’s Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration (PHMSA) published a safety advisory in the Federal Register (81 FR 54512-54514) clarifying terminology used to describe the operational status of pipelines and identifying the regulatory requirements operators must follow for the abandonment of pipelines. PHMSA was directed to take this action by Congress via Section 23 of PIPES Act of 2016 (PL 114-183).

As a result of a number of incidents where releases of natural gas or hazardous liquids resulted from inadequate maintenance of pipelines that were not active service PHMSA is issuing this safety advisory to remind pipeline operators that PHMSA only recognizes two types of pipeline status; active and abandoned. To be classified as abandoned the pipelines have to meet all of the standards under  49 CFR 192.727 (gas pipelines) 49 CFR 195.402(c)(10) (hazardous liquid pipelines). All pipelines not meeting the regulatory standards for being abandoned, must comply with all pipeline safety regulation requirements.

PHMSA is considering a rulemaking action addressing permissible deferred pipeline maintenance activities on pipeline segments that have not been abandoned, but that have been emptied and purged. Pending completion of that rulemaking, pipeline operators that intend to defer such activities on this type of idled pipeline should coordinate with PHMSA first.

HR 4624 Introduced – Abandoned Pipelines

Earlier this week Rep. Hahn (D,CA) introduced HR 4624, the Pipeline Inspection Enforcement Act of 2016. The bill would require the inspection of abandoned and transferred pipelines.

Bill Provisions

The bill would amend 49 USC 60108 by adding two new paragraphs to the section. The new paragraph (e) would require an organization acquiring a pipeline to conduct an inspection of the pipeline within 180 days of the acquisition. The new paragraph (f) would require State or Federal pipeline safety authorities to conduct inspections of newly reported abandoned pipelines to ensure that they are abandoned and presumably drained.

Moving Forward

Hahn is a mid-ranking member of the Railroad, Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Subcommittee of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee to which the bill was referred for consideration. It is likely that she has the political pull necessary to get the bill considered in Committee. According to her press release on this bill, she has requested that the language from this bill be included in the PHMSA re-authorization bill currently being drafted.

The language in this bill (either as this bill or as part of the PHMSA re-authorization) would likely be adopted in Committee. As part of the re-authorization bill it would certainly be considered and adopted by the full House. As a stand-alone bill, it is not clear that Hahn has the necessary clout to get the bill to the floor.

Commentary

As a briefly mentioned in an earlier post Hahn’s bill was written in response to an oil spill in her district in 2014 from an abandoned crude oil pipeline. A similar pipeline leak was reported October of last year. The Wilmington leak was from an abandoned pipeline that had been assumed to have been empty.

One would like to assume that a pipeline owner would ensure that their pipeline was empty before officially abandoning it. After all, there would be some value of the material in the line that the owner should be interested in recovering. Obviously, this is not always the case and I suspect that there will be additional crude oil pipelines being abandoned or transferred as the oil industry continues to retrench due to the decline in crude oil prices. Because of the economic situations of the owners, I further suspect that, without legislation like this, there would be a number of these pipelines where all the i’s were not dotted nor all the t’s crossed.

Bills Introduced – 02-25-16

With both the House and Senate in session yesterday there were 54 bills introduced. Of those two may be of specific interest to readers of this blog:

HR 4624 To amend title 49, United States Code, to provide for the inspection of pipeline facilities that are transferred by sale and pipeline facilities that are abandoned, and for other purposes. Rep. Hahn, Janice [D-CA-44]

HR 4628 To require reporting of terrorist activities and the unlawful distribution of information relating to explosives, and for other purposes. Rep. Lowey, Nita M. [D-NY-17]

Hahn’s bill addresses concern about recent leaks from abandoned pipelines.

Lowey’s bill would appear to address concern about the availability of information on the manufacture of improvised explosives and explosive devices on the internet.

In both bills the inclusion of the phrase “and for other purposes” in the descriptive title of the bill opens up the possibility of coverage of only vaguely related matters. This is sometimes used to add controversial legislative proposals to a relatively innocuous bill.