Instead of as a “climate change agency,” the Senate hears important steps to refocus pipelines and hazardous material safety management to transport energy.
Of course, pipeline operators and independent monitors, including those involved in carbon and methane emissions, did not agree on what increased federal involvement should be, but agreed that regulations need to be updated and implemented better.
Five years have passed since Congress reviewed federal safety and environmental standards for the country’s 3.3 million miles of oil and gas pipelines, and nearly 18 months have been reapproved for modernisation of regulations, since an agency established in 2004 was established to implement them.
During that time, demand for natural gas has increased dramatically, while environmental regulations have increased during the Biden administration, but the industry has nothing to do with the safe transport of energy-generating fluids.
Pipeline operators told the Surface Transport, Freight, Pipeline and Safety Subcommittee that reapproving the Department of Transport’s pipeline and safety management of dangerous goods is essential to implementing President Donald Trump’s energy policy.
They called on Congress to update laws, standardize the damage intake process, streamline testing programs, develop regulatory regimes that promote technologies such as artificial intelligence, develop standards for dealing with the transport of hydrogen and carbon dioxide, increase penalties for vandalism and ecoterrorism, and strengthen cybersecurity safeguards.
Safety is paramount. Andy Black, president and CEO of the Liquid Energy Pipeline Association, testified that the pipeline is “13 times safer than both trains and trucks, with the pipeline experiencing only over 720 million gallons of incidents, with the pipeline’s “incidents” falling 13% since its final review.
However, he rebutted Bill Caram, executive director of Pipeline Safety Trust, “Since the final markup of the subcommittee in July 2019, 67 people have been murdered and 182 have been hospitalized in the pipeline incident.”
“The last two years have been the most fatal,” he said, and 30 deaths are linked to the pipeline incident.
Founded in 1999 as an independent safety monitor, the Pipeline Safety Trust supports the mandate of distribution lines that power pipelines, particularly homes and businesses, and includes fire shutoff valves and meters to detect leaks of natural gas and methane.
“But even the best regulations can be pointless without robust enforcement,” he says, starting with a reapproval of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Agency (PHMSA).
Committee Chairman Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said.
“One of the political sayings is personnel,” Cruz said the Biden administration did not nominate PHMSA administrators.
A group of climate activists will protest before the US Supreme Court as oral debates will be heard in the U.S. Forest Service and the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, LLC v. Kaupascharibaaasun. Incident, February 24, 2020 in Washington. Mark Wilson/Getty Images
Priorities, threats
Cruz said the agency he said became a “climate change agency” under the Biden administration must focus on pipeline safety.
He accused federal agencies of promoting the climate agenda under previous administrations, rather than serving their goals. They “not only replicate the work of other agencies, but also ignore the express statutory language carefully negotiated by Congress,” he said.
An example of “overreach” under the previous administration, he said, is the natural gas leak detection and repair rules that imposed restrictions on underground natural gas storage and liquefied natural gas facilities.
Robin Rorick, vice president of American Petroleum Institute Midstream Policy, said that, among other issues, he is creating an “official status” for IDLE’s offline pipeline. He said the change has placed a bureaucratic burden on operators.
Black said Congress must reapprove demonstration programs approved under the special permitting process. He accused the Biden administration of compromising the process by requiring research and development projects to meet the standards of the National Environmental Protection Act.
“The Congress created a special permit for good reason, right?” he said. “And this was the way the pipeline operator went to PHMSA and said, “There’s an equivalent way to do this, and that’s better,” but Phmsa “smashed the special permission program by “applying unrelated conditions and PHMSA and taking it forever.”
All said there should be no tolerance and harsh penalties for pipeline vandalism by people called “ecoterrorists.”
Black has spoken about “many dangerous and destructive circumstances due to attacks on the pipeline” since 2016. “And sadly, in 2022 there was a nationwide release called “How to Blow Up the Pipeline,” he said.
Lorik said protesters in the peaceful pipeline are one thing, and those trying to hurt the destroyers and others are completely different concerns.
“We’re not talking about crushing the right to first amendment to speech,” he said. “What we’re talking about is a May 9 incident in Tennessee, where “individuals tampering with gas lines” caused 430 residents to evacuate homes, close businesses and paralyze the community.
When the damaged pipeline suddenly closes, “events cascade events” ripple through the community, saying that “there are hospitals, critical care facilities and local police stations that are free of gasoline, we can no longer protect us and we can’t care for our citizens.”
Cruz said Congress intends to strengthen penalties for such conduct, and he is co-hosting with Sen. Tim Sheehee (R-Mont).
