NTSB makes safety recommendations to PHMSA.
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Press Release Summary:
According to the NTSB, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration should require operators of natural gas and hazardous liquid pipelines to provide system-specific information about pipeline systems to emergency response agencies of communities and jurisdictions in which pipelines are located. All operators should be required to equip SCADA systems with tools to assist in recognizing and pinpointing location of leaks, including line breaks.
Original Press Release:
Safety Recommendation P-11-8 through -20 and P-11-1 and P-11-2
The National Transportation Safety Board makes the following safety recommendations to the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration:
Require operators of natural gas transmission and distribution pipelines and hazardous liquid pipelines to provide system-specific information about their pipeline systems to the emergency response agencies of the communities and jurisdictions in which those pipelines are located. This information should include pipe diameter, operating pressure, product transported, and potential impact radius. (P-11-8) This recommendation supersedes Safety Recommendation P-11-1.
Require operators of natural gas transmission and distribution pipelines and hazardous liquid pipelines to ensure that their control room operators immediately and directly notify the 911 emergency call center(s) for the communities and jurisdictions in which those pipelines are located when a possible rupture of any pipeline is indicated. (P-11-9) This recommendation supersedes Safety Recommendation P-11-2.
Require that all operators of natural gas transmission and distribution pipelines equip their supervisory control and data acquisition systems with tools to assist in recognizing and pinpointing the location of leaks, including line breaks; such tools could include a real-time leak detection system and appropriately spaced flow and pressure transmitters along covered transmission lines. (P-11-10)
Amend Title 49 Code of Federal Regulations 192.935(c) to directly require that automatic shutoff valves or remote control valves in high consequence areas and in class 3 and 4 locations be installed and spaced at intervals that consider the factors listed in that regulation. (P-11-11)
Amend Title 49 Code of Federal Regulations 199.105 and 49 Code of Federal Regulations 199.225 to eliminate operator discretion with regard to testing of covered employees. The revised language should require drug and alcohol testing of each employee whose performance either contributed to the accident or cannot be completely discounted as a contributing factor to the accident. (P-11-12)
Issue immediate guidance clarifying the need to conduct post accident drug and alcohol testing of all potentially involved personnel despite uncertainty about the circumstances of the accident. (P-11-13)
Amend Title 49 Code of Federal Regulations 192.619 to delete the grandfather clause and require that all gas transmission pipelines constructed before 1970 be subjected to a hydrostatic pressure test that incorporates a spike test. (P-11-14)
Amend Title 49 Code of Federal Regulations Part 192 of the Federal pipeline safety regulations so that manufacturing- and construction-related defects can only be considered stable if a gas pipeline has been subjected to a post construction hydrostatic pressure test of at least 1.25 times the maximum allowable operating pressure. (P-11-15)
Assist the California Public Utilities Commission in conducting the comprehensive audit recommended in Safety Recommendation P-11-22. (P-11-16)
Require that all natural gas transmission pipelines be configured so as to accommodate in-line inspection tools, with priority given to older pipelines. (P-11-17)
Revise your integrity management inspection protocol to (1) incorporate a review of meaningful metrics; (2) require auditors to verify that the operator has a procedure in place for ensuring the completeness and accuracy of underlying information; (3) require auditors to review all integrity management performance measures reported to the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration and compare the leak, failure, and incident measures to the operator's risk model; and (4) require setting performance goals for pipeline operators at each audit and follow up on those goals at subsequent audits. (P-11-18)
(1) Develop and implement standards for integrity management and other performance-based safety programs that require operators of all types of pipeline systems to regularly assess the effectiveness of their programs using clear and meaningful metrics, and to identify and then correct deficiencies; and (2) make those metrics available in a centralized database. (P-11-19)
Work with state public utility commissions to (1) implement oversight programs that employ meaningful metrics to assess the effectiveness of their oversight programs and make those metrics available in a centralized database, and (2) identify and then correct deficiencies in those programs. (P-11-20)
http://www.ntsb.gov/doclib/recletters/2011/P-11-008-020.pdf
