Serious pipeline incidents happen ‘every other day,’ expert says

SAN BRUNO, Calif. – An ominous theme has emerged from the wreckage of a deadly pipeline explosion in California: There are thousands of pipes just like it nationwide.

Utilities have been under pressure for years to better inspect and replace aging gas pipes – many of them laid years before the suburbs expanded over them and now at risk of leaking or erupting.

But the effort has fallen short. Critics say the regulatory system is ripe for problems because the government largely leaves it up to the companies to do inspections, and utilities are reluctant to spend the money necessary to properly fix and replace decrepit pipelines.

“If this was the FAA and air travel we were talking about, I wouldn’t get on a plane,” said Rick Kessler, a former congressional staffer specializing in pipeline safety issues who now works for the Pipeline Safety Trust, an advocacy group based in Bellingham, Wash.

Investigators are still trying to figure out how the pipeline in San Bruno ruptured and ignited a gigantic fireball that torched one home after another in the neighborhood, killing at least four people. Pacific Gas & Electric Co., the pipeline’s owner, said Monday it has set aside up to $100 million to help residents recover.

Experts say the California disaster epitomizes the risks that communities face with old gas lines. The pipe was more than 50 years old – right around the life expectancy for steel pipes. It was part of a transmission line that in one section had an “unacceptably high” risk of failure. And it was in a densely populated area.

The blast was the latest warning sign in a series of deadly infrastructure failures in recent years, including a bridge collapse in Minneapolis and a steam pipe explosion that tore open a Manhattan street in 2007. The steam pipe that ruptured was more than 80 years old.

Thousands of pipelines nationwide fit the same bill, and they frequently experience mishaps. Federal officials have recorded 2,840 significant gas pipeline accidents since 1990, more than a third causing deaths and significant injuries.

“In reality, there is a major pipeline incident every other day in this country,” said Carl Weimer, Pipeline Safety Trust’s executive director. “Luckily, most of them don’t happen in populated areas, but you still see too many failures to think something like this wasn’t going to happen sooner or later.”

Congress passed a law in 2002 that required utilities for the first time to inspect pipelines that run through heavily populated areas. In the first five years, more than 3,000 problems were identified – a figure Weimer said underscores the precarious pipeline system.

Even when inspections are done and problems found, Kessler said, there is no requirement for companies to say if or what kind of repairs were made. And Weimer added industry lobbyists have since pushed to relax that provision of the law so inspections could occur once a decade or once every 15 years.

Other critics complain that the pipeline plans are drafted in secret with little opportunity for the public to speak out about the process.

The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration is the federal regulatory arm that enforces rules for the safe operation of the nation’s pipeline system, and has direct authority over interstate pipelines. Most state public utility agencies have adopted the federal rules and carry out inspections and enforcement of pipelines running inside state boundaries.

Asked if it plans to step up oversight in response to the San Bruno accident, the PHMSA issued a statement saying it has investigators at the scene providing technical assistance as agencies investigate the pipeline failure.

“We will evaluate what further action is necessary once we have complete information,” the agency said.