As the week of the worst natural gas pipeline disaster on recordever drew to a close, with the last victim dying on Friday, federalregulators weren’t saying when El Paso Natural Gas could re-open atleast one of the three lines comprising its South Mainline systemthat was ordered shut down following the explosion in New Mexicothat claimed 12 lives (see Daily GPI, Aug. 25).

El Paso must provide “written documents [in] black and white inthe hands of this department” spelling out testing results beforethe Department of Transportation (DOT) can make a decision aboutrestoring service on Line 1110, said Stacey Gerard, associateadministrator of the DOT’s Office of Pipeline Safety (OPS). Line1110 apparently was the least affected of the three lines by theAug. 19 blast.

The twelfth victim of the explosion, who had been in criticalcondition throughout most of last week, died early Friday, makingthe El Paso explosion not only “the most serious gas transmissionfailure ever,” but tying it with the worst gas-related failure (adistributor) of all time, Gerard told Daily GPI. The NationalTransportation Safety Board (NTSB) last week cited internalcorrosion as one of the causes of the fatal blast.

“It’s possible that it [Line 1110] could be [re-opened] within afew days. But I don’t want to presume the outcome of those tests”being conducted by El Paso on its line, she said Friday. “It wouldnot be correct to make any statements about when the line is goingto open at this time. What has to happen is the results of thetests that we required have to be completed, and I’m not awarewhether or not they’ve been completed yet. They should have been.We have to get the test results and decide if they are good. Thenwe need to [receive] a plan from the company on their re-start, andto my knowledge we have not received that either.” At this point,”it would be presumptive of anybody to say what’s going to happennext.”

In one of its most aggressive actions ever against a gaspipeline, the OPS last Wednesday ordered the continued shutdown ofsegments of the three pipes that make up El Paso’sTexas-to-California leg until extensive tests could be done toensure they are safe to operate.

Gerard said the results of El Paso’s hydrostatic testing on Line1110 “are good,” but she hadn’t yet seen the results of theOPS-ordered X-ray and ultrasound tests, or the plan for proceedingwith the re-start of the line. “We were hoping that those resultsmight have been final today [Friday].” She noted she personallywill decide when to restore service to the affected 2,000 feet ofLine 1110, between Valve #6 and the Pecos River Compressor Station.

Before giving the go-ahead, Gerard said “I’m going to want tohear our [Southwest] regional director and his engineers say thatthe test results were satisfactory, and that they have approved theplan to re-start.” Similarly, she declined to make any predictionsabout when the other two affected lines, 1103 and 1100, would berestored to service.

El Paso last Thursday began notifying its customers that the30-inch Line 1110 would be back in service by the end of the week.That line runs adjacent to the 30-inch Line 1103, which rupturedand led to the blast and fire at a Pecos River crossing nearCarlsbad, NM. El Paso later changed the timetable for re-openingLine 1110 to “early” this week. However, Gerard and other OPSofficials wouldn’t commit to that.

There was consensus in the market that a drawn-out outage ishighly unlikely. “California needs the gas too much, so there’s noway the politicians there are going to stand for depriving theirstate of gas supplies in what is often its hottest month of theyear,” a marketer commented, summing up the feeling of most.

Because of the internal corrosion discovered on the failedsection of pipeline (Line 1103), the OPS last week in its orderdirected El Paso to submit a corrective action plan for OPSapproval that “will identify all areas on approximately 330 milesof pipeline that may be subject to internal corrosion.” The 330miles is a combined amount on all three lines, and includes themajority of El Paso’s facilities in New Mexico to the Texas border.

“…[W]e’re going to be in the process of gathering data for atleast several weeks in the area 50 miles in either direction [ofeach line]. We’re focusing on that area because based on theirproximity to production facilities we would think that we’d have ahigher likelihood of corrosive elements being present in thoseareas,” Gerard said. “That information will give us the best ideaabout if other actions will be required or needed” against El Paso.

The corrosive action plan requires El Paso to conductinspection, assessment, and repair or replacement of all damagedareas. “Based on the results of these and other tests, El Paso mustdevelop a plan to assess the integrity of the remainder of its10,000 mile pipeline system.” Gerard said OPS required the reviewof the entire El Paso system because “while the indications fromthis accident are pointing in a particular direction [internalcorrosion as being one of the causes], we have to be concernedabout the system-wide integrity issues.” She noted no timetable “atthis time” has been established for when El Paso must complete itssystem-wide assessment.

Even if El Paso passes all these tests and OPS allows it toreturn to service, each of the three lines will be subject to a 20%pressure restriction. The restriction will be reviewed in 10working days, and may be removed upon the receipt of moreinformation about the factors that contributed to the Aug. 19explosion.

Gerard echoed the sentiment of others, who stressed theimportance of El Paso being able to accommodate devices to detectinternal corrosion, such as smart pigs. “Long-term, what we’ll belooking for is the ability of these segments to be able to betested in the manner that [NTSB Chairman Jim] Hall referred to, byinternal inspection instruments which were not available to usbecause of the configuration” of El Paso’s system.

The damaged section of pipe (Line 1103) last week was sent toWashington, DC for additional examination. El Paso reported itconducted a corrosion test on the pipe in question in February. Apatrol inspection, or visual inspection, also was conducted on theabove-ground portion of the pipes Aug. 2 by El Paso.

Gerard said the OPS had conducted 20 inspections of the threeaffected lines during the past five years, and was in the processof another one at the time of the explosion. As for El Paso’soverall compliance record, she said the OPS imposed a $10,000penalty in 1992 with respect to the pipeline’s external corrosionmonitoring, and initiated non-penalty actions in 1997 and 1985 thataddressed El Paso’s unclear written operating procedures and theadequacy of employee training for emergencies, respectively.

Gerard said NTSB’s Hall and Kelley S. Coyner, head of DOT’sResearch and Special Programs Administration, discussed the needfor pipeline safety reauthorization legislation with El PasoNatural Gas President John W. Somerhalder II last week. “…[T]histragic accident further dramatizes the need to get this legislationpassed in this Congress. I know they talked to Mr. Somerhalderabout the importance of his supporting passing that legislation.”

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