APGA has submitted testimony for a House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing, titled Legislative Solutions to Make Our Nation’s Pipelines Safer. That event was held on June 19, and it focused on provisions regarding the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) reauthorization in two recent pieces of legislation, H.R. 2139, the Leonel Rondon Pipeline Safety Act, and the Energy and Commerce Committee’s Majority draft bill, the Safer Pipelines Act of 2019.
At the hearing, Energy Subcommittee Chairman Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) mentioned the need for additional overpressure protection for distribution operations. This is being driven as a result of learnings of the Merrimack Valley, Mass., incident. The full Committee Chair Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) focused on eliminating PHMSA’s statuary cost benefit requirement and inserting a mandamus clause. He believes this would help complete outstanding PHMSA rules and regulations but didn’t offer evidence for this. Subcommittee Ranking Member Fred Upton (R-Mich.) pushed back on Rep. Pallone’s support of mandamus and eliminating statutory cost benefit requirements and urged the committee to make this a bipartisan effort. Questions and responses from members and witnesses focused on varying topics, but significant time was spent on mandamus and cost benefit. Agreeing with Rep. Pallone’s position, Democrats on the subcommittee argued that the statutory cost benefit requirement in PHMSA’s underlying authorization slows down the rulemaking process and effectively kills rules. Democrats also posit that a mandamus provision, allowing citizen suits to compel PHMSA to complete rules, is necessary to hold the agency accountable. Industry witnesses disagreed with both arguments, stating that they would hurt rather than help efforts to expedite PHMSA’s rulemaking process. To review APGA’s testimony, click
here. To learn more on the hearing, click
here.
APGA staff still expect draft legislation to come from the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, as well as the Senate Commerce Committee and will seek input on this from members when it is published.
For questions on this article, please contact Stuart Saulters of APGA staff by phone at 202-464-2742 or by email at
ssaulters@apga.org.