PHMSA Publishes Pipeline Safety NPRM

Today the DOT’s Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration (PHMSA) published a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) in the Federal Register (81 FR 20721-20856) pertaining to the safe operation of gas transmission and gathering pipelines. The advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPRM) was published in August of 2011.

Proposed Changes

The NPRM addresses a number of new and revised pipeline safety program requirements that were addressed in the ANPRM. These include:

• Modifying the definition of high consequence area (HCA) by adding a new term – moderate consequence area (MCA);

• Adding requirements for selected preventive and mitigative measures (internal and external corrosion control);

• Revising the repair criteria for pipelines in HCAs;

• Adding specificity to the data integration language in the IM rule to establish a number of pipeline attributes that must be included in these analyses, by explicitly requiring that operators integrate analyzed information, and by requiring that data be verified and validated;

• Making requirements related to the nature and application of risk models more specific;

• Strengthening integrity management requirements for applying knowledge gained through the IM Program;

• Strengthening requirements for the selection and use of assessment methods;

• Revising subpart I, including a general update to the technical requirements in appendix D to part 192 for cathodic protection;

• Revising the integrity management requirements in § 192.917(e)(3) to specify that longitudinal seams may not be treated as stable defects unless the segment has been pressure tested;

• Requiring each operator of an onshore gas transmission pipeline to develop and follow a management of change process;

• Requiring verification of maximum allowable operating pressure (MAOP) in accordance with new § 192.624 for certain onshore, steel, gas transmission pipelines; and

• Modifying the regulation of gas gathering lines.

A number of topics not specifically addressed in the ANPRM have been added to this rulemaking by Congressional mandate (except for the last two). They include:

• Inspection of pipelines following a severe weather event;

• Notification for 7-year reassessment interval extension;

• Reporting exceedances of maximum allowable operating pressure;

• Consideration of seismicity;

• Safety regulations for in-line inspection (ILI), scraper, and sphere facilities; and

• Consensus standards for pipeline assessments.

A number of provisions proposed in the ANPRM were removed from this rulemaking so that they could be addressed in more detail in separate rulemaking actions.

Public Feedback

PHMSA is soliciting public feedback on this proposed rulemaking. Comments may be submitted via the Federal eRulemaking Portal (www.Regulations.gov; Docket # PHMSA-2011-0023). Comments should be submitted by June 7^th, 2016.

PHMSA Publishes ‘Lessons Learned’ from Enbridge Spill

Today the DOT’s Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration (PHMSA) published a notice in the Federal Register (79 FR 25990-25994) identifying lessons learned from the Enbridge pipeline spill near Marshall, Michigan on July 25^th, 2010. The lessons are based upon the results of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigation of the incident published last July.

The NTSB report identifies the probable cause of the spill as being “corrosion fatigue cracks that grew and coalesced from crack and corrosion defects under disbonded polyethylene tape coating, producing a substantial crude oil release that went undetected by the control center for over 17 hours”. Three Enbridge failures were identified as contributing to the extent of the spill:

• Deficient integrity management procedures, which allowed well-documented crack defects in corroded areas to propagate until the pipeline failed.

• Inadequate training of control center personnel, which allowed the rupture to remain undetected for 17 hours and through two startups of the pipeline.

• Insufficient public awareness and education, which allowed the release to continue for nearly 14 hours after the first notification of an odor to local emergency response agencies.

The PHMSA notice identifies specific actions that other pipeline operators should take based upon these lessons. They include:

• Reviewing their own IM programs for similar deficiencies and to take corrective action;

• Training their control room staff as teams to recognize and respond to emergencies or unexpected conditions;

• Evaluate their leak detection capabilities to ensure adequate leak detection coverage during transient operations;

• Assessing the performance of their leak detection systems following a product release to identify and implement improvements as appropriate;

• Reviewing the effectiveness of their public awareness programs;

• Reviewing whether local emergency response teams are adequately prepared to identify and respond to early indications of ruptures; and

• Reviewing NTSB recommendations following accident investigations.

It seems to me that all facilities that handle hazardous materials could do well to follow these recommendations.

PHMSA to Renew Two Pipeline Safety ICRs

The Pipeline Safety and Hazardous Material Safety Administration post a 60-day notice in the Federal register (77 FR 51848-51849) of their intent to renew two information collection requests (ICRs) that were approved earlier this year to allow data collections mandated in two recently approved pipeline safety rules on control room management (2137-0624) and integrity management for gas distribution pipelines (2137-0625). The current ICR approvals expire on January 31^st, 2013.

There is a major change in the record keeping burden numbers being reported in the control room management ICR. The current ICR predicts 2,702 annual responses will be required under these reporting requirements and estimates that the data collection and reporting for those responses will take 127,328 hours. This notice reports the same number of responses but greatly increases the burden hours to 1,018,807 hours (77FR 51849), an eight-fold increase in the burden to 377 hours per response. No explanation is given for this increase.

PHMSA is soliciting public comments on the renewal of these two ICRs. Comments can be submitted via the Federal eRulemaking Portal (www.Regulations.gov; Docket # PHMSA-2012-0215). Comments need to be submitted by October 26^th, 2012.