The Senate Commerce Committee last week voted out pipelinesafety reauthorization legislation that the natural gas pipelineindustry has billed as a “gross overreaction” to an explosionbrought on by a rupture in a products pipeline last June.

The panel’s bill would give states inspection and oversightauthority over interstate pipes; require interstate pipelines toconsult with states about their integrity plans; create localcitizen advisory boards to address pipe safety standards; requireuncooperative pipeline employees to be either relieved of theirduties or reassigned during a National Transportation Safety Board(NTSB) investigation of an accident; remove the cap on civilpenalties that judges could levy against pipeline safety violators;require the results of pipeline inspections to be posted on theInternet; and offer protection to whistle-blowers who reportviolations.

“The natural gas industry is really frustrated because we’rebeing dragged down with the products line,” a gas pipeline sourcesaid. “Am I allowed to curse?” he quipped when asked to comment onthe committee’s bill. “It was not the happiest of moments. It was amess.” Citizen groups called the committee’s action a “modest” or”small first step” toward ensuring safer interstate pipelines.

The legislation, if not drastically changed in conferencecommittee or on the Senate floor, “could frustrate a lot ofefforts” to build new interstate gas lines, the pipe source said.Some pipeline insiders, however, doubt the committee’s legislationwill ever see the Senate floor this year since it will take aunanimous consent of all the senators to bring it up. The HouseCommerce Committee marked up a “simple reauthorization” bill morethan a year ago — prior to Bellingham. The existing pipelinesafety reauthorization bill is scheduled to expire on Sept. 30.

What was expected to have been “routine” pipeline safetylegislation in the Senate turned into a “substantive” measure inthe wake of a pipeline-related explosion that left three dead inBellingham, WA, a year ago, said Sen. Slade Gorton (R-WA), aleading proponent of pipeline safety reform, during mark-up of thecommittee’s bill last Thursday.

But interstate gas pipes felt the final committee bill went farbeyond substantive; they felt they were unduly punished. About”42,000 people get killed by automobiles each year and nobody’stalking about that,” the pipeline source noted, whereas gaspipelines were responsible for one death in 1998 and two fatalitiesin 1999.

The final committee legislation, S. 4238, reflected many of thereforms proposed in three separate Senate bills, including oneintroduced by Chairman John McCain (R-AZ), and a series ofamendments that were acted on during mark-up.

Pipelines lost a key battle to block states from sharingoversight of interstate natural gas and hazardous liquid lines withthe federal government. Sens. Sam Brownback (R-KS) and John Breaux(D-LA) tried to limit the states’ authority to “inspection” only,removing the provision that would give them “oversight” power overinterstates. But their amendment lost by one vote.

Awarding states such power over interstate pipelines made nosense, Brownback argued, particularly when many of thesafety-related problems were occurring on LDC and intrastate linesthat are under state jurisdiction. Moreover, he said such actionwould lead to a “patchwork” of differing state standards forinterstates to follow. Breaux argued that the committee’s billviolated the interstate commerce clause of the Constitution, whichprecludes states from interfering in interstate activities.

“That’s a fantastic argument,” countered Gorton. Under thelegislation, he said states’ authority would be kept in check bythe Department of Transportation (DOT). In other words, “I’m sayingthe state would only be able to do what [the DOT] allows it to do.”

The defeat of the Brownback and Breaux amendment “was terriblyfrustrating” for interstate gas pipelines, noted the pipelinesource. “We just have a major problem with the way the committeewants to exercise state and local control over interstates.”

The Senate legislation also would require individual pipelinesto consult with state and local officials about their integrityplans. So if a pipeline system traverses 12 states, it would haveto meet with state and local officials in every state.

“That doesn’t make sense. You can’t consult with 2,000 stateofficials. You aren’t going to have a lot of pipelines carryingnatural gas” then, said Breaux.

“Now that’s absurd,” said Martin Edwards of the InterstateNatural Gas Association of America (INGAA), referring to pipesbeing required to meet with officials in each state. In a preparedstatement, INGAA President Jerald V. Halvorsen said the group was”disappointed” by the committee’s action, but he thanked Sens.Brownback and Breaux for their efforts — albeit unsuccessful —to make the legislation “more balanced.”

Brownback also lost out in his effort to squelch the creation oflocal citizen advisory committees to address pipe safety standards.He said he was concerned this would lead to 50 differentcommittees, none of which would include pipelines. Instead, heproposed that the location of the meetings of DOT’s two existingtechnical safety standards committees (one for gas and one forliquids) rotate between the five regions of the Office of PipelineSafety (OPS) throughout the year. This would help to get pipesafety issues out to the entire nation, he said. Also, he preferredthe existing technical committees because their membership was morediverse: five members from industry; five state and localofficials; and five from the general public.

Even Gorton, who favored citizen advisory committees, saidpipelines should sit on the committees. He tried to allayBrownback’s concern that 50 different advisory committees would becreated. At most, Gorton saw the DOT allowing two or three of themto be organized.

Another amendment, which was introduced by McCain and passed,would require pipeline employees who refuse to cooperate with aNTSB probe of an accident to be either relieved of their dutiesduring the investigation or reassigned to other tasks. This “doesnot constitute a federal mandate that [an uncooperative] employeeshould be fired,” McCain said.

But Breaux couldn’t be swayed. He said pipeline employees refuseto talk to the NTSB because they would run the risk of being heldcriminally liable if negligence is proven. “We are making theproblem worse,” he said, adding the best way to get pipe employeesto open up was to change the criminal statute.

In approving the amendment, some lawmakers said they wereconcerned they would be passing premature judgment on pipelineemployees, and interfering with their “due process” rights underthe fifth amendment of the Constitution. “There’s not a judgmenthere of guilt or innocence,” McCain assured them. In an effort toallay their fears, he asked Breaux to work with him to refine thelanguage of his amendment before it is sent to the Senate floor.

After citing his frustration over the OPS’s failure to takestrong enforcement actions against interstate pipelines, Sen. JohnKerry (D-MA) proposed the committee uncap the amount of civilpenalties that judges could impose on pipelines that are found tobe negligent. His amendment was adopted.

Also adopted was an amendment proposed by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR)requiring the results of interstate pipeline inspections to beposted on the Internet, and the OPS to publicly report the actionsit takes to correct safety problems on pipelines. The committeebill furthermore would provide protection for whistle-blowers whoreport pipeline safety violations to the federal government.

Susan Parker

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