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APGA Speaks at Carolina Public Gas Association and SGA Conference

By John Erickson posted 03-15-2017 10:08 AM

  
On March 13, APGA’s Vice President of Operations, John Erickson, spoke at a meeting of the Carolina Public Gas Association in Charlotte, N.C. John addressed two current issues: pipeline safety management systems (PSMS), and tracking and traceability standards for plastic pipe. The former is the subject of an American Petroleum Institute (API) recommended practice RP 1173 that prescribes PSMS requirements for large interstate oil and gas transmission pipeline operators. John related that public gas systems were vastly outnumbered on the group that developed this RP and as a result, the RP provides little or no guidance for public natural gas systems that wish to improve their safety management. He advised that the APGA Operations and Safety Committee was developing safety management guidance for public natural gas systems that took into account the unique circumstances of a publicly-owned utility compared to a large investor-owned interstate operator. APGA hopes to release its SMS guidance for public gas systems by the end of 2017.

On tracking and traceability John reviewed the proposed Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) rule that would require utilities to record information about piping and components installed on the system and a new American Society of Testing Materials (ASTM) standard that requires plastic pipe manufacturers to bar code critical information on piping and components. APGA supports the concept of tracking and traceability but not necessarily PHMSA’s specific proposal, which goes beyond the ASTM standards marking requirement.

John also spoke at the Southern Gas Association (SGA) Operations Conference on March 14, addressing pending regulations from PHMSA. There is uncertainty if any of the proposed and final regulations will take effect given the executive orders limiting new regulations; but until PHMSA issues formal announcements about whether these rules will be delayed, operators should be prepared to comply on the posted effective date of the rules. An excess flow valve rule is scheduled to take effect April 14 and rules on incident notification and post-incident drug and alcohol testing on March 24.

For questions on this article, please contact John Erickson of APGA staff by phone at 202-464-0834 or by email at jerickson@apga.org.

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