While both air travel and pipelines are safer than their road alternatives, the analogy only extends so far. Airplanes are replaced routinely and older equipment is monitored regularly for airworthiness and replaced when it reaches its safety limits. Pipelines, on the other hand, can stay underground, carrying highly pressurized gas and oil for decades – even up to a century and beyond. And while airplanes have strict and uniform regulations and safety protocols put forth by the Federal Aviation Administration, such a uniform set of standards does not exist for pipelines.
Critics maintain that while they're relatively safe, pipelines should be safer. In many cases, critics argue, pipeline accidents could have been prevented with proper regulation from the government and increased safety measures by the industry. The 2.5 million miles of America's pipelines suffer hundreds of leaks and ruptures every year, costing lives and money. As existing lines grow older, critics warn that the risk of accidents on those lines will only increase.
While states with the most pipeline mileage – like Texas, California, and Louisiana – also have the most incidents, breaks occur throughout the far-flung network of pipelines. Winding under city streets and countryside, these lines stay invisible most of the time. Until they fail.
Since 1986, pipeline accidents have killed more than 500 people, injured over 4,000, and cost nearly seven billion dollars in property damages. Using government data, ProPublica has mapped thousands of these incidents in a new interactive news application, which provides detailed information about the cause and costs of reported incidents going back nearly three decades.
Pipelines break for many reasons – from the slow deterioration of corrosion to equipment or weld failures to construction workers hitting pipes with their excavation equipment. Unforeseen natural disasters also lead to dozens of incidents a year. This year Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc on the natural gas pipelines on New Jersey's barrier islands. From Bay Head to Long Beach Island, falling trees, dislodged homes and flooding caused more than 1,600 pipeline leaks. All leaks have been brought under control and no one was harmed, according to a New Jersey Natural Gas spokeswoman. But the company was forced to shut down service to the region, leaving 28,000 people without gas, and it may be months before they get it back.
One of the biggest problems contributing to leaks and ruptures is pretty simple: pipelines are getting older. More than half of the nation's pipelines are at least 50 years old. Last year in Allentown Pa., a natural gas pipeline exploded underneath a city street, killing five people who lived in the houses above and igniting a fire that damaged 50 buildings. The pipeline – made of cast iron – had been installed in 1928.
A fire rages through Allentown, PA, after a gas line explosion in Feb. 2011
Not all old pipelines are doomed to fail, but time is a big contributor to corrosion, a leading cause of pipeline failure. Corrosion has caused between 15 and 20 percent of all reported "significant incidents", which is bureaucratic parlance for an incident that resulted in a death, injury or extensive property damage. That's over 1,400 incidents since 1986.
Corrosion is also cited as a chief concern of opponents of the Keystone XL extension. The new pipeline would transport a type of crude called diluted bitumen, or "dilbit." Keystone's critics make the case that the chemical makeup of this heavier type of oil is much more corrosive than conventional oil, and over time could weaken the pipeline.
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9 Comments
Add CommentThere's an incomplete list of significant US pipeline accidents on Wikipedia:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pipeline_accidents_in_the_United_States
I spent many hours this year cleaning a spill from an oil tank in my newly purchased home. I would rather heat with wood. Wood spills are easier to deal with. I can imagine what the previous owners had for health.Cars are leak prone. Asphalt roads and shingles emit oil.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs an engineer that designed and partially oversaw powerful crash test installations, I am well aware of the dangers over regulation can pose to complex, highly proprietary industries that carry significant intrinsic dangers.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOn the one hand, underdeveloped countries with virtually no regulative culture usually yielded us customers that encouraged us to skimp on safety in order to enhance performance. (Which we constantly refused to do, btw. American culture may be focused on results and profits, but we DO still value human life!)
On the other hand, very heavily regulated countries (read: Europe) were extremely oppressive and forced us to change our products without really understanding the situation themselves. It's like they were used to making change for the sake of change itself, as if ordering companies around automatically made things safer.
In general, well-funded regulatory agencies *do* enhance a culture of extreme safety, but too much oversight from regulators who don't understand the product can (and does) lead to safety compromise. The fact that regulators can have so much unchecked power over companies is a dangerous thing in of itself.
We really should re-think the whole technological progress thing, though it might get a bit expensive to produce the helmets and kneepads we all need, without mass-production factories.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThreats, threats - always some threats.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBig friggin' deal.
Back in the day, like, 500 years ago, more people died and died more frequently. Horrible deaths, too.
Today's people are a bunch of mincing nancys benefiting from the sweat and toil of prior generations of real men and women.
I partially agree with you; I think that regulators should know what they are doing, but that's mostly because all government officials should be intelligent enough to tie their own shoes.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOn the other hand, I am a socialist, and feel that market economies have a worrying track record (just check out any history book that covers the period from about 1880 to 1910). I feel that it is very hard to over-regulate corporations.
Anytime pipelines are used, above ground or buried, and the chief materials are iron and/or concrete, the degradation factors will play into the demise of said pipelines. If these pipes are carrying hazardous materials across this continent, as most of them do, there will be (accidents) and to be sure, those responsible know this to be true. The responsible action would be to make these lines impervious to conditions, but that would be too costly for them to carry, and reduce the profit margins to reasonable levels. The equation then becomes how much risk is it worth? and the answer usually is how much profit do we get if we do what is cheap... Business as usual, let everyone suffer our profit, because we dare to build with sub-standard materials.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI agree with your iron and/or concrete comment. And your 'usual answer' comment. Problems with iron and concrete used as if eternal elements are also 'evolving' with abandoned oil/gas wells. Here in Alberta these are often sold and resold until they end up 'owned' by entities that have are in the ditch-then the taxpayer ends up paying for the fix.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDepleted fields ended up rich in H2S-hydrogen sulphide. H2S directly and indirectly attacks iron, concrete-just about everything. Also deadly naturally gaseous poison that easily plumes from a faulty abandoned well. Any state in the USA that is like Ab with its 70,000+ abandoned wells, you already know this costs. Never mind the 'mincing nancys' and their health. Maybe some of them have psychological problems, but the economic costs are tangible enough. Problems like this should be paid for at the front end-off of any potential profits. I got .1% confidence that the governing entities-at least here in Alberta-are not going to end up 'doing it wrong'
'A sad population of im*eciles would our schemers fill the world with, could their plans last. A sorry kind of human constitution would they make for us—a constitution lacking the power to uphold itself, and requiring to be kept alive by superintendence from without—a constitution continually going wrong, and needing to be set right again—a constitution even tending to self-destruction. Why the whole effort of nature is to get rid of such—to clear the world of them, and make room for better.'
Herbert Spencer
Enbridge, here in Michigan, failed to use their corrosion devices! That's bad enough, they TURNED OFF the alarms. Results are predictable: Largest land spill in history.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this18 hours of non-response.
Bastards -- Enbridge.