Keeping a 700-mile pipeline system—and its paperwork—in working order
Project Overview
Full-service integrity management program support for 700 miles of active natural gas and hazardous liquid pipeline.
Project Impact
- Increased threat resistance
- Reduced risk of pipeline failure
- Achieved increased ongoing regulatory compliance
- Enhanced documentation quality and organization
- Improved audit process
Pipelines carrying natural gas and hazardous liquids run through the communities where we live, work, and play. Pipeline operators bear the responsibility to make sure those pipelines do not leak and that they aren’t in danger of imminent failure. However, it is no simple task for operators to adequately manage all of the work involved or to document that work appropriately for regulatory compliance purposes.
In 2005, a major Midwest liquid petroleum transportation services company turned to the pipeline specialists at HT Engineering to help manage the integrity of 700 miles of active pipelines. Since then, HT Engineering has partnered with the company to help build and continually improve a comprehensive program that allows the organization’s leaders to better understand the threats and resistances for each line, prioritize repairs, and select and initiate the right projects to maintain the safety and compliance of the infrastructure. The HT Engineering team is hands-on with the operator’s team in all aspects of the program, from conducting baseline and ongoing integrity assessments, including inspections and tests for all threat types, to coordinating digs, managing repair plans, and ensuring quality of the work.
In 2015, in response to a regulatory environment of increased scrutiny, the company asked HT Engineering to begin overseeing the documentation of all integrity dig, inspection, and repair work and to ensure compliance with PHMSA requirements. The HT Engineering team works shoulder-to-shoulder with responsible parties at the organization to steward the funding, planning, scheduling, and coordination of the digs. Our experts provide quality assurance for all field records, working closely with the crews to provide training and reinforce the notion that “if it’s not documented, it didn’t happen.” HT Engineering collaborated with the company to create a cloud database for housing repair plan and dig records along with tools that make information easy to find and communicate. The solutions work well for both field and office team members and have made a significant difference during recent PHMSA audits.
“The work that you all have done to improve our documentation organization and the major improvements to the repair reconciliation process is best in class. We have never been so organized. I appreciate all your efforts. It truly makes my job easier when I have a team who is so good at what they do.”
Integrity management is critical work. Yet, its ever-increasing scope and complexity can strain the bandwidth of operators and cause important details to slip through the cracks, resulting in costly fines, or worse, catastrophic leaks or failures. By bringing HT Engineering on board to provide the expertise and long-term commitment its integrity management team needed to succeed, the operator has significantly increased the resistance of its pipeline system to threats and reduced the risk of failures. The team has consistently met regulatory compliance standards and streamlined the audit process. Most importantly, the liquid petroleum transportation services company is doing its part to protect the environment, the public, and its own business and to ensure an even safer future for everyone.
