Magellan returns Nebraska pipelines to service after 2,834-barrel spill

NEMAHA, Neb. - Magellan Midstream Partners LP returned its products pipeline system to service in Nebraska late on Dec. 12.

Repairs to the pipeline that spilled an estimated 2,834 barrels of refined oil products have been completed, Bruce Heine, a company spokesman, said in an e-mail.

Two separate lines carrying diesel and gasoline were shut Dec. 10 after they were struck by a bulldozer. The pipelines were damaged when a bulldozer operator - the son of a landowner - was tearing out trees with a "rock ripper," Heine said. The plow-like piece of equipment is attached to the rear of a bulldozer and is used to break up hard soils, or remove tree stumps and boulders.

The landowner's son was clearing brush with the bulldozer when he hit the pipelines at a site 2 1/2 miles southwest of Nemaha. 

Some of the site was saturated with fuel to a depth of up to 15 feet, DEQ said, and the agency expected to drill wells to see if the fuel reached groundwater.

Magellan said the spill could have been prevented if the bulldozer operator would have called the Nebraska One-Call Center at 811 before excavating in the area near the pipelines.

Crews installed four underflow dams on a tributary of Jarvis Creek that flows to the Little Nemaha River in an attempt to keep the fuel from flowing to the river. An underflow dam draws water from the bottom of a stream through a tube and allows it to continue downstream. Because petroleum floats, the dam holds the fuels back so they can be removed. Such structures are preferred over holding back the entire stream flow, which would cause the contaminated water to flood surrounding property. However, some components of refined petroleum products dissolve into water and would flow downstream regardless.

The company also has built berms on the site to contain runoff from rain, which is forecast for Dec. 13-14.

State officials have set up monitoring sites downstream from the spill to measure for contamination. They also will drill deep into the soil to determine how far the fuel has penetrated. Contaminated soil will have to be removed.

"There have been no dead fish reported," said Jim Bunstock, spokesman for the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality, on Dec. 12. "There's a lot of monitoring going on."

The company spokesman declined to say how deeply the pipelines were buried. He indicated there had been no call to the digger's hotline, as required by state law before any underground work is done.

The incident was the biggest pipeline spill in Nebraska since 2001. The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) said the next worst spill happened in 2007, when 72,450 gallons spilled. However, the PHMSA figure ignores 5,000 barrels that spilled from the Platte Pipeline in 1996 near Lawrence, said Bunstock. Bunstock added that 6,300 barrels of petroleum products were spilled by Williams Pipeline in Omaha in 1989.

PHMSA draft report on pipeline safety called a dishonest PR puff piece

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The nation's top pipeline regulators have produced a draft report on the state of the nation's gas-transmission system that misrepresents accident statistics, overstates the industry's track record and omits key issues arising from the San Bruno, Calif., explosion and other recent disasters, according to a copy obtained by The San Francisco Chronicle.

The draft "Report to America on Pipeline Safety" - rolled out to a select audience a month ago by officials at the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) - also takes a much friendlier tone toward the pipeline industry than the National Transportation Safety Board did in its findings into what caused a Pacific Gas and Electric Co. transmission line to explode a year ago in San Bruno, killing eight people and destroying 38 homes.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood ordered the report in April in reaction to pipeline accidents in Texas, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Florida, as well as San Bruno.

A draft version was presented to a gathering of industry executives, government officials and two safety advocates in Arlington, Va., on Aug. 2. It is undergoing more review before it will be released, the pipeline agency said.

"We don't know if internal reviews will require a significant rewrite," the agency said in a statement.

Two prominent safety advocates who have been appointed to government committees to review pipeline safety initiatives gave the report a thumbs-down at the Aug. 2 meeting, a transcript shows.

"This report as currently configured is not credible," said Richard Kuprewicz, a pipeline safety consultant from Redmond, Wash. "It contains many errors of fact."

Carl Weimer, executive director of the nonprofit Pipeline Safety Trust in Bellingham, Wash., warned that the public is "going to start questioning the report right off the bat."

Donald Stursma, an Iowa pipeline official and a member of a federal gas pipeline advisory board, said at the session that the draft is "not really ready for prime time."

The critics were outnumbered, however, by a dozen industry officials who defended their safety record.

PHMSA orders ExxonMobil to improve safety at ruptured Montana pipeline

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Federal authorities have ordered ExxonMobil to make safety improvements to a ruptured pipeline in Montana that caused 750 to 1,000 barrels of crude oil to gush into the Yellowstone River.

The cause of the pipeline break is still under investigation, authorities said.

The U.S. Department of Transportation's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) issued a corrective action order to ExxonMobil Pipeline Co. that will require new safety measures along the Silvertip hazardous liquid pipeline, the federal agency said on July 5.

The order will require ExxonMobil to re-bury the pipeline underneath the river bed to protect it from external damage, the federal agency said in a statement. The oil company will also have to conduct a risk assessment on the pipeline where it crosses any waterway. Exxon will then need to submit a restart plan before operation can resume, officials said.

"The safety of our nation's pipelines is a priority and the investigation into this incident is ongoing," U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said in a statement. "It is our responsibility to ensure pipelines are safely delivering energy to U.S. households and businesses, and when companies are not living up to our safety standards, we will take action. We will continue to work with the EPA, while ensuring that those responsible are held accountable."

The Silvertip Pipeline is a 12-inch pipeline about 69 miles long that carries crude oil from the Silvertip station in Elk Basin, Wy., to an ExxonMobil Refinery in Billings, Mont., federal officials said.

DOT's LaHood says PHMSA will stop letting energy pipeline industry fund safety studies

WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, whose department oversees the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), has promised to repeal the outside funding requirement of land-based pipeline safety studies after a reporter briefed his spokeswoman on the findings of an investigation by Hearst Newspapers.

"Secretary LaHood believes that credible, independent research is a crucial component of the Department of Transportation's safety agenda, and he has directed the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration to end the practice of using industry resources to help finance research," spokeswoman Olivia Alair said.

According to the Hearst story, U.S. gas pipeline operators and their trade organizations shaped, managed and provided sizable funding for numerous safety studies conducted by the federal agency that regulates the industry.

The Hearst investigation revealed that two-thirds of the 174 safety studies of land-based pipelines that the federal agency has launched in the last decade were largely funded by pipeline operators or organizations they control. That's because the agency has required that in most cases, at least half the funding for its pipeline safety research come from outside sources - a policy that the Obama administration is now promising to change.

Regulators allow Keystone oil pipeline to restart after repairs completed

WASHINGTON - U.S. regulators have allowed TransCanada to restart its Keystone oil pipeline after the company completed repairs and safety tests.

In a letter to TransCanada, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) said, "Based on a review of the information submitted, the restart plan is approved."

PHMSA's approval to restart the pipeline marks a reversal of its decision on June 3 after it had issued a corrective action order or COA to TransCanada that barred the company from restarting the pipeline, citing two leaks in the pipeline in the month of May.

Oil from the 1,300-mile pipeline that extends from Canada to Cushing, Okla., and Patoka and Wood River, Ill., began flowing on June 5 under a revised order from the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA). The agency approved the revision on June 4.

The pipeline has been closed since May 29, when workers reported a 10-barrel leak in Kansas. That followed a leak of 400 barrels of oil in North Dakota on May 7.

Russ Girling, president and chief executive officer of TransCanada said, "TransCanada takes all incidents very seriously. Almost all of the oil releases over the last 11 months on Keystone have been minor - averaging just five to 10 gallons of oil. The vast majority of that oil was confined to our property and in all cases was cleaned up quickly. None of the incidents involved the pipe in the ground - the integrity of Keystone is sound."