- ls | Ollſ - A as S. HRG. 106–1093 j JUNE 10, 1999 OLYMPIC PIPE LINE ACCIDENT S. - -\ſ Ø # 9 FIELD HEARING 6 BEFORE THE o-, * * COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, dº SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDRED SDXTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION MARCH 13, 2000 Printed for the use of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation # § . UNIVERSITY OF MICHHGAN • Ł{3}{AR#ES APR 0 1 2003 s DEPCŞiTÉ{} {}^' UNITED STATES Cºf A#ER#CA U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 78–574 PDF WASHINGTON : 2003 # For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office º *...* Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800 The jñiversity Fax: (202) 512–2250 Mail: Stop SSOP, Washington, DC 20402–0001 Giff Michigan Documents Center SENATE COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION JOHN MCCAIN, Arizona, Chairman TED STEVENS, Alaska ERNEST F. HOLLINGS, South Carolina CONRAD BURNS, Montana DANIEL K. INOUYE, Hawaii SLADE GORTON, Washington JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER IV, West Virginia TRENT LOTT, Mississippi JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas JOHN B. BREAUX, Louisiana OLYMPIA J. SNOWE, Maine RICHARD H. BRYAN, Nevada JOHN ASHCROFT, Missouri BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota BILL FRIST, Tennessee RON WYDEN, Oregon SPENCER ABRAHAM, Michigan MAX CLELAND, Georgia SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas MARK BUSE, Republican Staff Director MARTHA P. ALLBRIGHT, Republican General Counsel KEVIN D. KAYES, Democratic Staff Director MOSES BOYD, Democratic Chief Counsel (II) C O N T E N T S Page Hearing held on March 13, 2000 ............................................................................ Statement of Senator Gorton .................................................................................. 1 Prepared statement .............. tº e s e º s e º 'º - e o 'º - - e s - e s tº s & © e º e º e º e º 'º º s - e. e. e. e. e. e. e. e. e. e º 'º e º e º e º ºs e s sº tº e º 'º e s tº € $ 3 WITNESSES Asmundson, Mark, Mayor, Bellingham, Washington ........................................... 37 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 41 Brabec, Bruce ….......…........….....................…....…. 25 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 27 Chipkevich, Robert, Director, Office of Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safe- ty, National Transportation Safety Board ......................................................... 82 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 84 Corso, Mary, State Fire Marshal, Olympia, Washington ..................................... 90 Prepared statement ................................... • * tº e º 'º º e - - - - - - - - - - - -> * > 0 tº e > * * 93 Dalen, Katherine ..................................................................................................... 20 Prepared statement ............. e - - - e. e. e. e. e s e º e s e s e s e º 'º - © - e. e. e. e s e º 'º e e º e º e º 'º - - - - - e º e s e º e g º º º 22 Felder, Richard B., Associate Administrator, Office of Pipeline Safety, Re- search and Special Programs Administration, U.S. Department of Transpor- tation …....….................…........…...…. 77 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 79 Gast, Carl, Manager and Vice President, Olympic Pipe Line Company, Renton, Washington ............................................................................................. 102 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 105 Harper, Susan, Executive Director, Cascade Columbia Alliance, Seattle, Washington ........................................................................................................... 136 Hoggard, Calvin, City Manager, SeaTac, Washington .... 55 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 57 King, Frank … 11 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 15 Locke, Hon. Gary, Governor, State of Washington ............................................... 30 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 32 Marshall, Connie, Deputy Mayor, Bellevue, Washington .................................... 52 Prepared statement ... - - - - - e º ºs º e º ºr e - - - - - - - - - - - tº º e º º ºs º º - - - - - - - - - - e º ºs º e º 'º e º 'º - - - - - - - - - - - - - e º ºs e º 'º -> 54 Matsuyama, W. Brian, Chairman and CEO, Cascade Natural Gas Corpora- tion, on behalf of the Local Distribution Companies of Washington State ..... 120 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 122 Murray, Hon. Patty, U.S. Senator from Washington 5 Prepared statement ............ e - e. - - - - e = * > * > - - - - - - - - - - - - - © e º e º 'º - e - - - - - - - - - - - - © tº e º ſº e º - 7 Robinson, Marlene ................................................................................................... 23 Prepared statement ................ • * * * * * * e º s e s is e º e º e º a e º e º sº e e s e s s e º ºs e º e º e º 'º e s e e s e º º is a tº 24 Showalter, Marilyn, Chairwoman, Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission, Olympia, Washington .................................................................... 65 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 67 Sluder, Robert L., Vice President, Williams Gas Pipeline-West, Salt Lake City, Utah ............................................................................................................. 110 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 113 Stohr, Joe, Spill Program Manager, Department of Ecology, Olympia, Wash- ington .................................................. 73 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 75 Tanner, Jesse, Mayor, Renton, Washington .......................................................... 45 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 47 Weimer, Carl, Executive Director, on behalf of Safe Bellingham, Bellingham, Washington ..........................................................................................…. 130 Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 132 IV Page APPENDIX Joint Prepared Statement of Harriet A. Spanel, State Senator, 40th District and Kelli Linville, State Representative, 42nd District, Washington ............. 143 Montonye, James Terrence, Technical Program Director for the SPIE, Inter- national Society of Optical Engineering, prepared statement .......................... 145 Written questions submitted by Hon. Patty Murray to: Carl Gast ….................…..........…...........…. 143 JUNE 10, 1999 olyMPIC PIPE LINE ACCIDENT MONDAY, MARCH 13, 2000 U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, SCIENCE, AND THANSPORTATION, Bellingham, WA Hearing held pursuant to notice, at 2 p.m. at City Hall, 210 #. Street, Bellingham, Washington, Hon. Slade Gorton, pre- SIGIng. Staff members assigned to this hearing: Ann Begeman and Char- lotte Casey, Republican Professional Staff; Carl Bentzel, Demo- cratic Senior Counsel; and Debbie Hersman, Democratic Profes- sional Staff. OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. SLADE GORTON, |U.S. SENATOR FROM WASHINGTON Senator GORTON. I’m both honored and humbled to be here today with my colleague, Senator Murray, to conduct this field hearing on the Bellingham pipeline accident. This provides us with an op- portunity not only to commemorate the three young citizens of Bel- lingham who lost their lives last June 10th, but to learn from and apply the lessons of that day to the reauthorization of the Federal Pipeline Safety Act. This is a formal hearing of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, and the rules of the Senate and the Senate committees are much more restrictive than what most of you are accustomed to in public hearings. Only witnesses who have been invited to testify may do so. Nevertheless, the point of the hearing is to obtain information and opinions that will inform and instruct the full Commerce Committee in its work on revising the Federal law. So I invite anyone who is interested to submit written comments to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation within the next 10 days. Those written comments will be made a part of the record of these proceedings. Because I’m here to listen rather than to talk, and given the length of the wit- ness list, I hope these comments will be brief. Until three young men were killed in a devastating liquid pipe- line explosion in Bellingham last year, most of us paid little or no attention to pipeline safety. The tragic events of June 10th changed that. While pipelines continue to be the safest means of trans- porting liquid fuels and gas, and though accidents may be infre- quent and the more than two million miles of pipelines in the United States often invisible, Bellingham has shown us that pipe- lines pose potential dangers that we ignore at our peril. (1) 2 State government, local governments and citizen groups in this state lost no time in answering the wake-up call from Bellingham and examining what they could do to improve pipeline safety. What they found was that while there are significant actions Washington can take to prevent and respond to accidents, such as improving the state’s “call before you dig" requirements, increasing public awareness and training emergency response personnel, there is a lot the state cannot do with respect to prescribing safety standards, because this area is preempted by Federal statute. In that light, I believe that Congress has an absolute obligation substantively to revise the Federal statute. To this end I advised my colleagues on the Commerce Committee last year that I in- tended to be actively involved in the reauthorization process this year, and my staff and I have spent considerable time talking to and meeting with people in Washington State and with Federal regulators and industry representatives about what should be in these revisions. \ . Last week I cosponsored a bill, S. 2004, introduced by Senator Murray, to amend the Pipeline Safety Act. Though we still have a lot more listening to engage in, I feel the bill’s fundamental direc- tion is correct, and I hope that the hearing today will help us sig- nificantly in refining the bill. Based on what I’ve heard to date, I’m committed to seeking the following changes in Federal law: First, I will support efforts to allow states greater authority to adopt and enforce safety stand- ards for interstate pipelines, particularly in light of the absence of meaningful Federal standards. While there may be good arguments for why pipelines should be managed systemically, and why incon- sistent state restrictions could erode rather than promote safety, these arguments are fatally undermined by the absence of mean- ingful Federal standards. To tell state and local governments as the Pipeline Safety Act effectively does, that they cannot require internal inspections of pipelines passing through their commu- nities, under their schools and homes and senior centers when the development of Federal safety requirements is years overdue strikes me as the worse kind of Federal conceit. This increase in authority should be accompanied by an increase of grants to states to carry out pipeline safety activities. Second, I agree with Senator Murray that we need to improve the collection and dissemination of information about pipelines to the public and the local and state officials responsible for pre- venting and responding to pipeline accidents. We also need to en- sure that operators are collecting information necessary to assess accurately the risks of the particular line and are responding ap- propriately to these risks. State and local governments as well as the public should be informed about where pipelines are, what con- dition they are in, when they fail, and why they fail. That said, inundating people with unwanted technical detail may lead them to ignore it entirely and may not be the best way of meeting the public's right to know. We should, however, ensure that relevant information is gathered and made available over widely accessible means like the Internet. Third, in addition to providing an explicit mechanism for states to seek additional regulatory authority over interstate pipelines, 3 Federal legislation must ensure that meaningful standards for pipeline testing, monitoring and operation are adopted at the na- tional level. Congress has directed the department of transpor- tation to do some of this in the past, but as I mentioned before, some of the rulemakings are years overdue. To the extent that lack of funding can account for some of the delay, we should ensure ad- ditional appropriations to allow the Office of Pipeline Safety to complete the necessary rulemakings and to develop the technology needed to conduct reliable tests of pipelines. In addition to ensuring that the Office of Pipeline Safety offers meaningful national standards, I agree with the recommendation of the Department of Transportation’s Inspector General that the Of- fice of Pipeline Safety should act upon, either to accept or to reject, the recommendations of the National Transportation Safety Board. I don’t pretend to know whether the Board’s recommendations that have been accumulating for years will advance safety. It's unac- ºple. however, for the Office of Pipeline Safety simply to ignore them. Fourth, I have heard from citizens’ groups who support the cre- ation of a model oversight oil spill advisory panel in Washington State. I see real value in creating such a body and imbuing it with meaningful authority not only to respond but to initiate the devel- opment of pipeline safety measures. As I said earlier, however, the purpose of this hearing is not to lecture but to learn. Senator Murray is here with me, and I think we can both say that Congressman Metcalf and Congressman Ins- lee and other members of our congressional delegation would have liked to be here. The House, unfortunately, is in session this week and while we’re in recess, they’re in Washington, D.C. With that, I defer to Senator Murray for her opening remarks. [The prepared statement of Senator Gorton follows:] PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. SLADE GORTON, U.S. SENATOR FROM WASHINGTON I am honored to be here today with my colleague Senator Murray to conduct this field hearing on the Bellingham pipeline accident. This is an opportunity not only to commemorate the three young citizens of Bellingham who lost their lives last June 10th, but to learn from and apply the lessons of that day to the reauthoriza- tion of the federal Pipeline Safety Act. The rules of the Commerce Committee of the United States Senate, under the auspices of which this hearing is being conducted, regrettably are far more restrictive than what most of you are used to from public hearings. Only witnesses who have been invited to testify may do so. Since the point of this hearing is to obtain information and opinions that will inform the full Com- merce Committee in its work on revising federal law, however, I invite anyone who is interested to submit written comments to the Committee within 10 days. Your written comments will be made a part of the record of these proceedings. Because I am here to listen rather than talk, and given the length of the witness list, I will keep my comments brief. Until three young men were killed in a devastating liquid pipeline explosion in Bellingham, Washington, last year, most of us paid little or no attention to pipeline safety. The tragic events of June 10, 1999, changed that. While pipelines continue to be the safest means of transporting liquid fuels and gas, and though accidents may be infrequent and the more than two million miles of pipelines in the U.S., often invisible, Bellingham has shown us that pipelines pose potential dangers that we ignore at our peril. State government, local government, and citizen groups in this state lost no time in answering the wake-up call from Bellingham and examining what they could do to improve pipeline safety. What they found was that while there are significant ac- tions Washington can take to prevent and respond to accidents, such as improving the state's call-before-you-dig requirements, increasing public awareness, and train- 4 ing emergency response personnel, there is a lot the state cannot do with respect to prescribing safety standards because this area is preempted by federal law. In light of this, I believe that Congress has an absolute obligation substantively to revise this federal law. To this end, I advised my colleagues on the Commerce Committee last year that I intended to be actively involved in the reauthorization process this year, and my staff and I have spent considerable time talking to and meeting with people in Washington state and with federal regulators and industry representatives about what should be in these revisions. Last week I co-sponsored a bill, S. 2004, introduced by Senator Murray to amend the Pipeline Safety Act. Though we still have a lot more listening to do, I feel the bill’s fundamental direc- tion is right and I hope that the hearing today will help us significantly in refining the measure. Based on what I have heard to date, I am committed to seeking the following changes in federal law: First, I support efforts to allow states greater authority to adopt and enforce safe- ty standards for interstate pipelines, particularly in light of the absence of meaning- ful federal standards. While there may be good arguments for why pipelines should be managed systemically and why inconsistent state prescriptions could erode rath- er than promote safety, these arguments are fatally undermined by the absence of meaningful federal standards. To tell state and local governments, as the Pipeline Safety Act effectively does, that they cannot require internal inspections of pipelines passing through their communities, under their schools and homes and senior cen- ters, when the development of federal safety requirements is years overdue, strikes me as the worst kind of federal conceit. This increase in authority should be accom- panied by an increase in grants to states to carry out pipeline safety activities. Second, I agree with Senator Murray that we need to improve the collection and dissemination of information about pipelines to the public and to local and state offi- cials responsible for preventing and responding to pipeline accidents. We also need to ensure that operators are collecting information necessary to assess accurately the risks to the particular line and are responding appropriately to these risks. State and local governments as well as the public should be informed about where pipelines are, what condition they are in, when they fail (we need to lower the threshold for reporting failures), and why they fail. That said, inundating people with unwanted technical detail may lead them to ignore it entirely and may not be the best way of meeting the public's right to know. We should, however, ensure that relevant information is gathered and made available over widely accessible means like the Internet. Third, in addition to providing an explicit mechanism for states to seek additional regulatory authority over interstate pipelines, federal legislation must ensure that meaningful standards for pipeline testing, monitoring, and operation are adopted at the national level. Congress has directed the DOT to do some of this in the past, but as I mentioned before, some of the rulemakings are years overdue. To the extent that lack of funding can account for some of the delay we should ensure sufficient appropriations to allow OPS to complete the necessary rulemakings and develop the technology needed to conduct reliable tests of pipelines. In addition to ensuring that OPS adopts meaningful national standards, I agree with the recommendation of the DOT's Inspector General that OPS should act upon, either to reject or accept, the recommendations of the National Transportation Safe- ty Board. I don’t pretend to know whether NTSB's recommendations, that have been accumulating for years, will advance safety. It is unacceptable, however, that OPS simply ignore them. Fourth, I have heard from citizens’ groups who support the creation of a model oversight oil spill advisory panel in Washington state. I see a real value in creating such a body, and imbuing it with meaningful authority not only to respond to but to initiate the development of pipeline safety measures. As I said earlier, however, the purpose of this hearing is not to lecture but to learn. That said, I invite my colleague, Senator Murray's, opening remarks. 5 - STATEMENT OF HON. PATTY MURRAY, U.S. SENATOR FROM WASHINGTON Senator MURRAY. Thank you very much to Senator Gorton for calling this hearing and lending your leadership to this very impor- tant cause. I also want to thank all of the panelists who have come here today who are taking their time to testify on this very important issue. I’m looking forward to hearing all of their comments. Today's hearing is one more step in a process to make pipelines safer and certainly has been a group effort. I want to first com- mend you Mayor Mark Asmundson for the tremendous amount of work you have done. He's done more than anybody I know to edu- cate the public about this issue and to call for higher safety stand- ards, and we all thank you for your tremendous amount of work. I also want to take this opportunity to thank Transportation Sec- retary Rodney Slater for his sensitivity and his quick response to me in positioning a pipeline inspector here in the State of Wash- ington. I also want to thank Governor Locke for convening a task force in response to this accident, and also to your representatives, Kelli Linville and Harriet Spanel, who are here today and the tremen- dous work that they’ve done in this session of the legislature to move this issue forward, but most of all, I would like to really ex- press my appreciation and gratitude to the families of the victims who are here today. I can’t imagine how difficult it must be to live with this tragedy, and I want to applaud the courage all of you have shown all of us. I want to tell the families that are here today that I will not stop working until we have changed our nation’s laws to makes it less likely that another family will experience your loss. We owe all of you at least that much. I wish that we didn’t have to be here today. I wish this commu- nity was whole again. I wish that June 10th, 1999, was just an- other pleasant summer day instead of a black mark in all of our memory. I remember that day well when my sister, who lives here in Bel- lingham and works at Shuksan Middle School, called me within hours after the accident to tell me frantically what had occurred here. I couldn’t imagine the loss that she was describing and the Scenes that she was describing. When I came here to Bellingham a few weeks later and saw what had occurred, I was just absolutely amazed. One and a half miles of creek side was reduced to ashes in an instant. A salmon spawning ground that I was actually supposed to dedicate just a few weeks after the accident was nothing but an environmental disaster area. - When I first started looking at this, I thought that the Bel- lingham disaster was a freak, a fluke, something that hardly ever happened. I have been amazed to find out as I’ve started to inves- tigate this issue at what I have been astonished to learn. We have a map here that shows a sampling, a sampling of some of the major pipeline accidents that have occurred in the last 20 years. It shows you how far reaching this problem is. I want to tell you some of the statistics. 6 Since 1986, 14 years ago, there have been 5,700 pipeline acci- dents, 5,700 accidents in the last 14 years. These accidents have killed 325 people and have injured another 1,500 people. They have shattered communities from coast to coast, and there are literally hundreds of Bellinghams out there that have happened and hun- dreds more waiting to happen. On average there is one reported pipeline spill in our country every single day. These accidents have destroyed families like they have here in Bellingham, and they have destroyed our environ- ment. Each year six million gallons of hazardous liquids are re- leased. That's like having an oil spill the size of the Exxon Valdez every 2 years. This environmental damage has been estimated to cost almost a billion dollars in the last 14 years. Now, it’s true, and we all know that pipelines offer one of the safest ways to move these hazardous materials. Statistically, they are much safer than using trucks or barges, and all of us rely on the pipelines to bring us the fuel we need to heat our homes and power our cars, but none of us should accept the status quo. Unfortunately, efforts to improve safety have not worked. Recent events tell the story. In 1997 we witnessed the third highest net loss of material since the Office of Pipeline Safety began keeping records. 1998 was the worse year for property damage, and 1999 was tied for the second worse year in fatalities. The changes that have been made so far have not worked, and we must do more. In fact, environmentalists and the National Transportation Safety Board have been complaining about safety problems and lax regu- lations for years. Specific recommendations from NTSB have gone unheeded and ignored for more than a decade, and I find that un- acceptable. That’s why a few months ago I asked the Inspector General of the Department of Transportation to investigate the policies and practices of the Office of Pipeline Safety. On last Friday, I received the inspector general’s final report. Not surprisingly they were critical of the lack of pipeline regulation and called on Congress to force the Office of Pipeline Safety to issue long overdue safety rules. The report also notes that had we need significant investments in research and development to better test and inspect our pipelines. To date the Office of Pipeline Safety has failed to address con- gressional mandates in training, testing and other key areas. While I’m pleased that had they have recently committed to fulfilling our congressional requirements, I want them to know that they have to follow through on this commitment. I believe that we can and must do better, and the time to act is now. I want to make sure that we don’t just talk about making pipe- line safety. We need to make pipelines safer. That's why last Janu- ary after researching this issue for a number of months, I wrote and introduced a bill that will make changes to improvement the pipeline safety in this country. My bill has in-depth testimony that, Mr. Chairman, I will submit for the record, but basically it expands state authority, and improve inspection practices and prevention practices. I was shocked to find out that we only require inspection of these pipelines when they’re first laid. We in our bill require them to be routinely inspected at least every 5 years, more if the geography of the region requires it. We invest in new safety tech- 7 nology. We have not done enough to improve the safety technology to inspect these pipelines. It expands the public's right to know. Everybody that lives or works or goes to school near these pipelines has a right to know when they were last inspected, what was found and what has been done to repair the pipes, and finally we in- creased the funding to improve pipeline safety. I have been work- ing closely with Congressmen Metcalf and Inslee and other House members and along with Sentor Gorton, and I believe that we have to act this year in this session of Congress before another tragedy OCCUITS. In closing let me say that we cannot undue what happened here last June. We still don’t know why it happened, but we can learn from it, and we can change the law so it doesn’t happen again. I hope that in the coming days and weeks we can work together to put the lessons of the Bellingham tragedy into Federal law. Never again should our children be afraid to play outside. Never again should our environment be scarred by pipeline disasters, and never again should another community suffer what Bellingham has gone through this past year. Our work will only be done when families can feel confident that the pipelines near their homes are safe. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. [The prepared statement of Senator Murray follows:] PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. PATTY MURRAY, U.S. SENATOR FROM WASHINGTON I want to thank my colleague, Senator Gorton, for calling this hearing and for lending his leadership to this important cause. Let me also thank our panelists for coming today. I’m eager to hear your comments. I’m going to take what I learn from i. of you today back with me to the Senate and use it as we work to change the a W. Today’s hearing is one more step in a process to make pipelines safer, and this has certainly been a group effort. • I’d like to thank Mayor Asmundson. He has done more than anyone I know to fºucate the public about pipeline safety and to call for higher safety stand- a TOIS. • I want to thank Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater for his sensitivity and for his quick response in stationing a pipeline inspector here in Washington state last year. • And I’d like to thank Governor Locke for convening his task force in response to the accident. But most of all, I’d like to show my appreciation to the families of the victims for being here today. I can’t imagine how difficult it must be to live with this trag- edy, and I applaud the courage you have shown us all. I want to tell the families that I will not stop working until we have changed our nation’s laws to make it less likely that another family will experience your loss. We owe you at least that much. I wish we didn’t have to be here today. I wish this community were whole again. I wish June 10, 1999 was just another pleasant summer day—instead of a black mark in our memory. I’ll never forget how I first heard about the explosion. That evening, I stepped off a plane from Washington, D.C. into Sea-Tac airport, and my cell phone started ring- ing almost immediately. It was my twin sister, who lives here in Bellingham where she works as a middle school teacher. Her vºice was frantic. She said, “Patty, have you heard? Our whole world just blew up!” At first, I didn’t know what she was talking about. Then she told me that a pipe- line running directly under the parking lot of her school had blown up. It was just i. º away from her classroom, and it took place just hours after the last student ad left. 8 The explosion rocked the school. Since it happened in the weeks just after Col- umbine, many teachers raced from their classroom fearing the worst. Instead, they encountered a nightmare of a different sort—a hailstorm of burning branches falling into their school parking lot, singeing their clothing and leaving them in fear. I know I don’t have to recount the events of that day for any of you. You experi- enced them and were shaped by them, and many of you have shared your own sto- ries with me. I came to Bellingham a short time after the accident, and I was amazed at the wreckage I saw: • One and a half miles of creek side were reduced to ashes in an instant. • A salmon spawning ground I was to have dedicated a few weeks later had been turned into an environmental disaster area. At first, I thought the explosion was a fluke—something that hardly ever hap- Pººl. ºt then I started to investigate the issue, and I was astonished by what earſleCI. This map shows a sampling of some of the major pipeline accidents in the past 20 years. It gives you a sense of how far reaching the problem is. Now I’d like to point out some statistics that show the frequency of pipeline acci- dents. Since 1986: - • There have been more than 5,700 pipeline accidents—5,700. : These accidents have killed 325 people and have injured another 1,500 peo- ple. • They have shattered communities from coast to coast. There are literally hun- dreds of “Bellinghams” out there, and there are hundreds more waiting to hap- pen. • On average, there is one reported pipeline spill in our country every day. Not only have these accidents destroyed families, they have destroyed the envi- ronment. Each year, 6 million gallons of hazardous liquid are released. That's like having an oil spill the size of the Exxon Valdez disaster every two years. This envi- ronmental damage has been estimated to cost almost $1 billion. Now it is true pipelines offer the safest way to move these hazardous materials around. Statistically, they are much safer than using trucks or barges. And each of us relies on pipelines to bring us the fuel we need to heat our homes and power our cars. But none of us should accept the status quo. |Unfortunately, efforts to improve safety haven’t worked. Recent events tell the story: • 1997 witnessed the third-highest net loss of material since the Office of Pipe- line Safety—or OPS–began keeping records. • 1998 was the worst year for property damage. • And 1999 was tied for the second-worst year in fatalities. The changes made so far have not worked. We must do more. In fact, environmentalists and the National Transportation Safety Board—the NTSB–have been complaining about safety problems and lax regulation for years. Specific recommendations from NTSB have gone unheeded and ignored for more than a decade. I find that unacceptable. - That's why a few months ago I asked the Inspector General of the Department g ºportation to investigate the policies and practices of the Office of Pipeline afety. On Friday, I received the Inspector General’s final report. Not surprisingly they were critical of the lack of pipeline regulation and called on Congress to force OPS to issue long-overdue safety rules. The report also noted we need significant invest- ments in research and development to better test and inspect pipelines. To date, the Office of Pipeline Safety has failed to address congressional mandates in training, testing and other key areas. While I’m pleased that recently they have committed to fulfilling these congressional requirements, I want them to know they must follow through on their commitment. I believe we can and must do better. And the time to act is now. - I want to make sure that we don’t just talk about making pipelines safer. We need to actually make pipelines safer. That's why in January, after researching the issue for several months, I wrote and introduced a bill that will make the changes we need to improve pipeline safety. - My bill, which is number S. 2004, is called the Pipeline Safety Act of 2000. I intro- duced it on January 26th. I appreciate Senator Gorton's support of my bill. I’m also pleased Senators Inouye, Lautenberg, and Bayh have co-sponsored my bill as well. 9 To gain support for this effort, I went door-to-door and met with many of my col- leagues. I told them your stories, and I showed them pictures of Bellingham's pipe- line explosion. Then I showed them the statistics and counted off the number of ac- cidents that happened in their own home states. Few other senators knew much about pipeline safety. Those discussions showed me that for too long, pipeline dangers have been “out of sight, and out of mind.” In preparing my bill, I looked at a lot of different ideas. I also reached out to in- dustry groups, federal oversight officials, and local officials. I designed my bill to ad- dress five problem areas, and I’d like to spend a moment to review how my bill will address these problems. Expand State Authority The first way to improve pipeline safety is to give states more authority to oversee pipelines. Unfortunately, states have been virtually shut out of the process when it comes to regulating interstate pipelines. While interstate activities are the responsibility of the federal government, states should be partners in preventing and responding to accidents. Ideally, states should be able to test and inspect pipelines within their boundaries if they have the exper- tise and resources to do so. States like Washington and Virginia have asked for this authority. Other states have received notice that their authority is being stripped from them. My bill would establish a process that would make it much more difficult for OPS to disapprove or withdraw a state's authority. My bill would give states the ability to address any objections by OPS before their authority is rejected or withdrawn. So the first step in our efforts is to empower states to be partners in the safety proc- €SS. Improve Inspection and Prevention Practices The next thing we can do to make pipelines safer is to improve pipeline testing. Many pipelines are decades old, and they haven’t been inspected since they were first put into the ground. I find that unacceptable. I’ve talked to many companies that do a good job of testing their pipelines. Unfortunately, the industry has an in- consistent record. We must ensure pipeline operators are properly testing their pipelines for corro- sion, leaks and other problems. That’s why we need strong testing and inspection standards. These should include mandatory periodic internal testing, valve moni- toring, the use of reliable leak detection devices, and other preventive activities. For this to work, the operators must be required to take specific action when they discover problems. My bill would require periodic testing at least every five years with an option of more frequent testing if required. Certification As we test pipelines, we should make sure the people operating and inspecting them have the skills and training they need. In other fields affecting public safety— such as aviation—we have procedures in place to ensure that the people we depend on are properly trained and qualified. My bill would require individual certification of pipeline operators. - Invest In New Safety Technology Another way to make pipelines safer is to develop the best tools to find problems in pipelines before those problems turn into disasters. Investing in the research and development of new testing and inspection devices may well be the best thing we could do to improve safety. The lack of good technology is surprising. I didn't know that for many pipelines there are no devices available to do the type of testing that is needed. I was also surprised to learn that hydrostatic testing can have serious side-effects, such as stressing pipes and creating wastewater that is costly to dispose of. Many of our most dangerous pipelines—natural gas lines—bend and move in ways that make it impossible for any internal inspection device to accurately detect internal corrosion. I’ve been told by OPS and industry representatives that there is some progress toward new technologies to detect problems in all pipelines. That is why my bill en- courages more money for research and development, and today, I call on industry to partner with OPS in developing these new technologies. Public Right To Know Another way we can reduce the risk of pipeline tragedies is to expand the public's right to know about pipeline hazards. Too many communities are in the dark about what is going on with the pipelines that run under their homes, by their places of work and near their schools. 10 My bill has a very strong “right to know” provision that would require operators to inform state, local, and neighboring residents when there are problems with a pipeline. My bill requires companies to provide summaries of testing and inspection data, and my bill makes them tell us what they are doing to correct problems. Cur- rent law provides the public with little opportunity to learn what is happening around them. Without new federal legislation, we’ll continue to be left in the dark about possible hazards. - Increase Funding to Improve Pipeline Safety A final key step we must take is to make sure we have the money to improve pipeline safety. It does no good to pass new safety rules unless we also provide the money to carry them out. My bill provides funding for new state and federal pipeline safety programs. Those are the five key areas my bill will address. Changing the Law The next question is: how do we take these ideas and actually put them into law? First, in Washington, D.C. the Commerce Committee needs to debate a pipeline safety bill. Senator Gorton is on the Commerce Committee, and I look forward to working with him to ensure that a bill is marked up this year. I’ve asked for consideration of a bill. I’m pleased that Senator Inouye from Ha- waii—who is the senior Democrat on the subcommittee of jurisdiction—has called for a hearing and mark-up as well. I’ve also personally asked the Secretary of Transportation and the Administration to present their proposal to the Hill. They need to do it very soon. Without meaning- ful federal legislation, whatever temporary measures we institute will not protect us in the long-run. I’d also like to mention the legislation that Representatives Metcalf and Inslee have introduced in the House. Their measure is similar to my bill, and I have been asking people to support it. I hope it passes in the House. In the end, we have learned many lessons from Bellingham and the 5,700 acci- dents around the country. We have a good idea of what needs to be done. We need greater state involvement, more testing, better testing devices, and we need to com- F. OPS to act on congressional directives and give them the tools to enforce the a W. Today must not be the last day of our work to make pipelines safer. Today must be the start. And our work will only be done when we have passed a bill that ad- dresses these critical safety issues. Again, I thank my esteemed colleague Sen. Gor- ton for bringing us together today to work on this issue. In closing, let me say we can’t undo what happened in June. We still don’t know why it happened. But we can learn from it and we can change the law so it doesn’t happen again. I hope that in the coming days and weeks we can work together to put the lessons of the Bellingham tragedy into federal law. • Never again should our children be afraid to play outside. • Never again should our environment be scarred by pipeline disasters. • And never again should another community suffer what Bellingham has suf- fered. Our work will only be done when families can feel confident that the pipelines near their homes are safe. Thank you. Senator GORTON. Thank you, Senator Murray. We will first hear from the families of the victims of last June 10th, Mary and Frank King, Edward Williams and Katherine Dalen, Marilyn Robinson and Bruce Brabec. There are seats for all six of you up here. Mr. and Mrs. King, you may start. We—whenever you have writ- ten testimony, it is, of course, a part of the record, but in the case of each of you, we’re going to let you speak as you will, under- standing the very difficult nature of your coming here in public today to do this. So take your time and tell us what you believe we need to hear. 11 STATEMENT OF FEANK KING Mr. KING. My name is Frank King. This is my wife, Mary, and my 10-year old son died as a result of burns over 90 percent of his body, along with Stephen Tsiorvas, and Liam Wood was overcome by gas fumes and drowned. - I want to correct a quote in the Seattle Times that was made today that I do not hold Olympic Pipeline responsible for my son's or Stephen Tsiorvas' or Liam Wood's death. Unequivocally their negligence, their gross recklessness caused my son to die and Ste- phen Tsiorvas and Liam Wood to die. My family wants to thank all of Whatcom County and our friends, our relatives, the rest of the families that were involved in this, because without them we could not have gotten through this horrible, horrific ordeal. We have received so much support from our community that it is absolutely unfathomable. We live in a nice, nice place. I wouldn't wish the grief and anguish that I felt over the last 9 months on my worst enemy. It takes 9 months for a fetus to mature in a mother's womb, and it’s been 9 months now, and I wish that I had the words so that I could make you feel how we actually feel, be- cause before this happened to me, I can honestly say I had no idea how it felt. I want to thank Senator Murray and Senator Gorton for their ef- forts in going forth with this. I also want you to know that I’ve talked with Jay Inslee. I’ve talked with Jack Metcalf's office, and I appreciate their efforts, and I’m sure that we’re going in the right direction. I want to make sure that this kind of accident never hap- pens again. You, as part of the Federal Government, have two problems. You've got an industry that regulates itself. All you have to do is look at the article that I put in your briefing there about Koch In- dustries. Koch Industries was fined 35 million dollars by the De- partment of Energy and what the DOE found out in the investiga- tion was they found the weak spots in their pipe the easy way. They let them break, and then to boot, they found out that when they did report a spill, they underreported their spillage by as much as 90 percent. Those are standards of the industry. Fix it when it breaks and lie to the public. Secondly, you’ve got an Office of Pipeline Safety that was man- dated to keep the public safe. They have far wide ranging authority over the pipeline industry. We don’t really need anymore legisla- tion to legislate against the pipeline industry. We need an Office of Pipeline Safety that is going to do the job that they were man- dated to do. They can’t demand that these guys hydrostatically test their lines. Do you know that there aren’t even any mandates that they need to internally inspect—you just said that. Senator Murray }. said that. They don’t even have to internally inspect their II].62S. As far as I’m concerned, the 35 million dollars that's spent on the Office of Pipeline Safety is a waste of taxpayers money. Somebody needs to be put in charge of the Office of Pipeline Safety that is not in the hip pocket of the oil industry. The whole idea of pipeline safety has to be revamped. There needs to be a zero spill tolerance. Ms. DALEN. That's right. - 12 Mr. KING. Not we only kill two or three kids a year. Ms. DALEN. That's right. Mr. KING. I’m going to say in a general statement the pipeline industry as a whole is an outrage. Can we really make the pipeline industry too safe? If we had no spills that harm the environment and no deaths by the pipeline industry, are we making it too safe? Nobody should have to go through this, and I can’t think of a more horrible way for three children to die, and that’s what they all were—was children—than to be burned over 90 percent of their bodies. On June 10, 1999, I want to tell you what Olympic Pipe Line's behavior was, because their behavior is an outrage. It’s an outrage to the citizens of the Bellingham. It's an outrage to the citizens of Washington and it’s an outrage to the Federal Government. I asked this question last October when I testified before Con- gress. Why is Olympic Pipe Line still operating south of Bayview? Give me a logical reason. Congressman Frank wasn’t able to do it. I’ve written to President Clinton. I’ve written to Secretary Slater of the DOT. You’ve gotten the faxes. Jay Inslee has gotten the faxes. Janet Reno has gotten the faxes. I am not going to relent on this thing. This company needs to be shut down. They have eight employees that have information that would help us in the why question, and you mentioned we still don’t know why this accident happened, but we can learn from it. We won’t learn anything until we know why this accident happened. The owners of Olympic Pipe Line, Shell, Texaco, GATX, ARCO, just since June 10th, have been able to generate 2.7 billion dollars worth of revenues operating south of here. That's an outrage. They should be called on the car- pet to tell us why this accident happened. In January 1997, Olympic Pipe Line did run pigs to internally inspect their lines. In May 1997, Olympic Pipe Line wrote the De- partment of Energy and said they had problems in this section that split 2 years before this accident. In July 1997, an inspector from Olympic Pipe Line named R.J. Clauson goes into the park with a backhoe to inspect that section of pipe that split, and guess what he said? “Gosh, you know, I got all the equipment here, and you know, I’m ready to dig this pipe up to look at it visually,” but it was too difficult to get to it. So he wrote his office back, and he said, “I didn’t inspect this section of pipe. It was too difficult to get to.” The DOE wrote them back and told them go in and replace this section and tell us what happened. They never got back with DOE. So instead what Olympic Pipe Line does is they spend forty mil- lion dollars, and they build Bayview station so that they can in- crease their flow through the pipe by 20 percent, and somehow they ill-design Bayview station, and they have a blocked valve up- stream from Bayview station that closes uncommanded 59 times in less than 6 months, 59 times. Olympic Pipe Line says hydrostatic testing is not the way to go to inspect the pipeline, and yet they hydrostatically tested the pipeline 59 times in less than 6 months, and then on June 10th it closed for the 60th time and slammed shut for the 60th time and blew a hole in the pipe that they al- ready knew was in disrepair. That's seven inches by 27 inches, and the rest is history. 13 I ask the Office of Pipeline Safety didn’t Olympic Pipe Line have the obligation to find out why this blocked valve slammed shut? Yeah, Rick Felder said yeah. I said, “Why haven’t you followed up on it to find out?” “Well, it was never reported to us.” I said, “It wasn’t reported to you?” “No.” “Why?” “That’s a good question,” was his answer. That's a good question. This same blocked valve closes on June 10th at 3:28 and sends a shock wave that takes 23 seconds to go back up stream over Lookout Mountain almost 21 miles, 23 seconds, and split that pipe, and Olympic Pipe Line calls ARCO at 3:45, 7 minutes after this blocked valve slams shut, and there's no room in the pipe for any fuel, because it’s already full of fuel. It’s already full of two million sixty-three thousand gallons of fuel, a 37-inch line. So then supposedly Olympic Pipe Line's computers go on the fritz, and Jim Hall from the NTSB testified before Congress he hasn’t been able to get their computers to act that way; but then guess what Olympic Pipe Line does? They call ARCO at 4:16 and tell ARCO to turn the pumps back on, and the pumps are running at 9,000 barrels an hour, and it was at this point in time that the river of gasoline runs down Hanna Creek and into Whatcom Falls Creek and overcomes Liam Wood by fumes in a cloud fume that's 12 to 16 feet high, and he falls in the creek unconscious, which I’ve never heard of a person becoming unconscious because of gas fumes, and he drowns. ARCO (sic) finally calls ARCO at 4:32 and says, “Turn off the pumps. We got a problem.” Sixteen minutes later my son who works at my dealership which is a block off of Whatcom Falls Creek, and I was not fortunate enough to be there. I was unfortu- nately home at the time. He said, “Dad, I stood on the showroom floor, and I watched the fumes, the gas, the fire ball come down Whatcom Falls Creek” in front of his eyes. He said, “Dad, the fire ball was a 150 feet in the air,” and it just rolled down Whatcom Falls Creek about a mile, and he watched it for about a mile right in front of his eyes. - I think that everybody, every businessman along Whatcom Falls Creek was absolutely horrified and thought they were dead, be- cause Cascade Natural Gas is right across the street. Now, let me tell you about Olympic Pipe Line, and I’m going to keep reiterating this, why is this pipeline company still operating south of here? This company is an outrage. In May 1999 when Olympic Pipe Line was trying to get this Cross Cascades pipeline to go from Seattle, I guess, over to Spokane, Ron Branson, who is Olympic Pipe Line's supervisor of product movement testifies that the company's leak detection system is nearly fail safe and is capa- ble of detecting the smallest of leaks in 15 minutes. This leak went undetected for an hour and 34 minutes. In that same article he's quoted as saying there may have been a time when some pipeline companies treated leaks and spills as normal and acceptable part of doing business. Olympic does not, and yet if you ask Olympic Pipe Line for any maintenance records and the DOE has confirmed this when they had this last leak in August, they don’t have any maintenance records, because the pipeline industry as a whole only fixes valves and pipes when they break. 14 Of course, now Ron Branson is pleading the 5th Amendment along with seven other Olympic Pipe Line employees, and it’s be- yond belief that the Federal Government can allow these people to plead the Fifth Amendment. I’m not going to say allow them to plead the Fifth Amendment. That’s not the right question. I’m ap- palled that the Federal Government is going to allow these people to continue to operate south of here pleading the Fifth Amendment, and I maintain that had this pipeline company been shut down completely from the start, Equilon would have sacrificed these peo- ple in a heartbeat to get their 2.7 billion dollars. The lawyers that are working for these attorneys—the attorneys that are working for these employers were hired by Olympic Pipe Line. They’re working for Olympic Pipe Line, not the employees. Olympic spokeswoman, Maggie Brown, poor Maggie. Every time she opens her mouth, she puts her foot further down her throat. She's quoted in the paper on March 2, 2000, saying Olympic from the beginning has been in- terested in finding out exactly what happened. Really? So you tell your employees to plead the Fifth Amendment and don’t give the NTSB any information that might help them conclude their inves- tigation. Olympic says the leading cause of spills is construction damage, outside construction damage, and yet if you look at their spills over the years, 80 percent of their spills are caused from equipment fail- ure and operator failure. Olympic tells the public that they have voluntarily closed the 16-inch line south of Bayview. I talked to Chris Hoidal of the Office of Pipeline Safety, and Chris Hoidal says, he laughed. He said without the 16-inch pipe going through Bellingham, that 16-inch pipe is useless. Before the City of Bellingham signed their franchise agreement, Olympic Pipe Line goes into this section of pipe after they’ve checked their pig runs from 1997, and they find nine other sections of pipe that they know won’t withstand hydrostatic testing. So they go in, and they replace these nine sections of pipe, because they’re going to have a nightmare, a public relations nightmare if they have nine sections that split under hydrostatic testing. So they re- place them, and they still had one split that I believe that was § 30 yards of Shuksan Middle School—Kulshan Middle CI) OOl. Now, Olympic is suing Imco. What an outrage. We didn’t do it. We didn’t have any responsibility in it. Imco was in there in 1994 and hit the pipe. That was the cause, and yet they knew that that pipe was in disrepair in 1997 and didn’t do anything about it. This company is an outrage. It needs to be shut down. This company needs to be shut down. We need to be asked why, and I want to applaud Mark Asmundson's efforts, he's done a lot of work, and I know spent a lot of time in talking about pipeline safety, but the “why” question, since he won’t return my calls, there's nothing wrong with the City of Bellingham's mayor asking the “why” ques- tion. We need to know why this accident happened. It is the first step in learning what do we have to do. There are no other steps. I want to thank Jim Hall from the NTSB. I got to tell you I asked a reporter this morning who she thought the busiest person in government was today, and she, without, you know, batting an eyelash, she said undoubtedly Jim Hall. This man is so responsive 15 and so sympathetic. Last week I called him at 3:10, which is 6:10 Washington, D.C. time. He's in a meeting. I leave a message for him. He called me back at 9:30, and he can’t answer my question. So he calls Bob Chipkevich, and has Bob Chipkevich call me at 10:00 his time to answer my question. Olympic Pipe Line's gross, wanton recklessness killed my little man. He was the light of my family’s life. Wade was a little man that had an uplifting spirit that touched many, many people. My son said, “Dad, you know, all he had to do was come into the deal- ership, and he lifted my spirits.” He was our joy in life. He was a joy to many people in Bellingham. Olympic Pipe Line needs to answer why this accident happened, and they need to be forced to do it. Thank you. [The prepared statement of Mr. King follows:] PREPARED STATEMENT OF FRANK KING My name is Frank King. My 10 year-old son, Wade, died as a result of burns over 90% of his body along with his 10 year-old playmate, Stephen Tsiorvas. Liam Wood, 18, was overcome by fumes, rendered unconscious, and drowned. Three little boys died because of the gross negligence of Olympic Pipe Line Co. No one could ever explain to you what it is like to lose a child at the height of innocence. My family wants to thank our friends, neighbors, and citizens of Bellingham and Whatcom County. We are extremely lucky to live in this Community. Because of their support we were able to find strength that we never knew we had. My family would not wish this grief and anguish on our worst enemy. It takes nine months for a fetus to mature in a mother's womb . . . and it has been nine months since this accident happened. And my family will always miss its son, brother, nephew, cousin . . . every day of our lives. I wish that I could begin to explain our families loss in a manner that you may have some comprehension of what we are feeling so you would realize the importance that this kind of accident will never be allowed to happen again anywhere. The Federal Government has two major problems. First, the pipeline industry has no concern for public safety. Profits always come before people. Read the attached article about Koch Industries. The DOE recently fined Koch Industries $35,000,000. What the DOE found out is that Koch Industries found weaknesses in their pipeline the easy way . . . they let it break; and when Koch Industries reported a spill . . . they under reported them by as much as 90%. This is standard behavior in the pipe- line industry . . . if it breaks we fix it and don’t tell the amount that really leaked. This is exactly how Olympic Pipe Line runs their operation, and it is unbelievable that they are still being allowed to operate from Bayview Station south. Secondly, the Office of Pipeline Safety (The Federal Government's regulatory agency) is in the pipeline industry’s hip pocket and consequently refuse to regulate the industry. They let the industry regulate itself, even though OPS has a $35,000,000 budget and wide ranging authority over the pipeline industry. There is no doubt that if the OPS had been doing the job that it was mandated by the Fed- eral Government to do, we would not be here today. Wade King and Stephen Tsiorvas would be skateboarding on the front sidewalk and Liam Wood would still be fishing and probably taking some college courses today. The whole idea of pipeline safety needs to be revamped. The OPS must do the job it was mandated to do and that is to protect the public and the environment. No spills. Someone needs to be put in charge who isn’t in the hip pocket of the pipe- line industry. Someone needs to be put in charge of the OPS who will make the pipeline industry accountable. Put someone in charge that will welcome help from the states that want to help with oversight and regulation. And if one state finds that a regulation is good for its state, make it a regulation for all states. That way there will be consistency in regulations throughout the states. The pipeline indus- try's complaints really stem from the fact that they are against any kind of regula- tion. Can the pipeline industry ever be too safe? The OPS needs to be completely revamped so that it does the job that it was mandated to do, and accepts the help of the states that want to help. And Olympic Pipe Line Co. needs to be shut down until we know why this accident happened. Look at the June 10, 1999 accident and Olympic Pipe Line's behavior and re- sponse. It is behavior that is an outrage . . . an outrage to the families of the vic- 16 tims; an outrage to the citizens of Bellingham; an outrage to the citizens of Wash- ington State; and particularly an outrage to the people who live along this pipeline that stretches from Cherry Point to Portland. It is an outrage to the OPS and the Federal Government that this company has been allowed to continue to operate south of Bayview Station, since they refuse to help the NTSB in finding answers as to why this accident happened. Why are they still operating their pipeline? I asked this question to Congress in October. No one answered. But Olympic Pipe Line and its owners, Shell, Texaco, ARCO, and GATX, have generated in excess of $2.7 billion in revenues just since this accident happened. I have written letters to President Clinton, Vice President Gore, DOT Secretary Rodney Slayter, Kelly Coyner, head of OPS, etc. You have gotten copies of all correspondence. So far I have received no response. Olympic Pipe Line must be shut down and their employ- ees forced to cooperate with the NTSB to determine the exact cause of this accident. It is the first step in assuring we are going in the right direction. In January of 1997 Olympic Pipe Line ran Smart pigs through their pipe. They found three anomalies (problem areas) in the very section of pipe that split on June 10, 1999. In May of 1997 Olympic Pipe Line wrote the DOE, yes the DOE, not the OPS, that they had problems in that section that split and would further evaluate those problems. The DOE wrote them back and advised Olympic Pipe Line to get back to the DOE concerning that section of pipe. Olympic Pipe Line never responded concerning this problem again. And note that this section of pipe that they had said was problematic was located in an area where there had been known construction. And Olympic Pipe Line has said on many occasions that the leading cause of pipe- line spills is construction damage. But they never bothered to visually inspect this section of pipe. Instead, Olympic Pipe Line spent $40 million building Bayview Sta- tion in Burlington, which was built to allow Olympic Pipe Line the ability to in- crease its product flow by 20%. Bayview Station was completed in late December 1998. Between then and June 10, 1999, a block valve just north of Bayview Station closed 59 times uncommanded by operators of the pipe. 59 times it slammed shut in less than six months, virtually hydro-statically testing the section that runs through Bellingham each and every time. And what does Olympic Pipe Line have to say about hydro-static testing? On numerous occasions they have stated that it over stresses the pipe. So by their own words, they over stressed a pipe that they knew was in disrepair. That's real preventive maintenance. Obviously, I’m being fa- cetious. Then on June 10, 1999 this same block valve slams shut for the 60th time at 3:28PM. It sends a shock wave back up north that takes 23 seconds to split the pipe in Bellingham. It creates a hole in the pipe that is 7” by 27" and a crater that is 25 feet in diameter at the top and 5 feet at the bottom. It is about 10 feet deep and will hold about 60,000 gallons of gasoline. Finally, Olympic calls ARCO and tells them to turn the pumps off at 3:35PM. The pumps have been running for 7 minutes and there is no room for any gasoline in the pipe because it is full of about 2,063,000 gallons of gasoline already. Now the pipe sits there and leaks until 4:16PM. At this point in time, Olympic Pipe Line calls ARCO and tells them to turn the pumps back on. The pumps run at 9000 barrels per hour or 378,000 gallons per hour. Finally, Olympic Pipe Line calls ARCO and tells them to turn the pumps off at 4:32PM–16 minutes later. A virtual river of gasoline now pours down Hannah Creek and into Whatcom Falls Creek, creating a fume bank that is 12 to 16 feet high. It leaks for another '/2 hour until 5:02PM. The resulting gas fumes ignite and explode in a fireball that runs down Whatcom Falls Creek 150 feet in the air for approximately 1% miles and approximately 3/4 mile back up Hannah Creek ending at the ruptured pipe. Now the outrage— • In May of 1999 Ron Berenston, Olympic's Supervisor of product movement, testifies that the Company’s leak detection system is nearly fail-safe and is ca- pable of detecting the smallest of leaks within 15 minutes. This leak went unde- tected for one hour and 34 minutes until it exploded in a fireball. • In July of 1999 Olympic tells the news media that there was some sort of mastic on the pipe that split, indicating that someone had damaged the pipe, repaired it and covered it back up. Allan Beshore the NTSB's investigator told me that there was no foreign substance on the pipe that split. He further indi- cated that he had called Olympic Officials and criticized them for reporting this information to the press. • Shortly after the accident 8 Olympic employees who were in the control room on June 10, 1999 invoked their Fifth Amendment rights, including Mr. Berenston. However, everyone goes back to work at their same jobs on June 11, 1999 as though nothing has happened. 17 • Olympic Spokesperson, Maggie Brown, is quoted in the Bellingham Herald on March 2, 2000 saying, “Olympic, from the beginning, has been interested in finding out exactly what happened.” Really . . . that must be why their employ- ees won’t cooperate with NTSB. And let me add that there is no assurance that these same employees won’t plead the Fifth Amendment once the criminal in- vestigation is completed. *x • Olympic says that the leading cause of spills is outside construction damage. However, if you examine the causes of their spills you will find that 80% of their spills are caused by operator error and equipment failure. • Mr. Berenston also testified that “there may have been a time when some pipeline companies treated leaks and spills as a normal and acceptable part of doing business. Olympic does not.” And yet Olympic cannot produce any type of maintenance records that shows anything was ever repaired unless there was a spill. That is preventive maintenance. Same old story, fix it when it breaks. • Olympic says they have voluntarily closed the 16" pipe south of Bayview Sta- tion. However, Chris Hoidal, OPS Western Region Manager, stated that the 16" pipe south of Bayview is useless unless the northern 16” pipe that goes through Bellingham is running product. • While the 37-mile stretch of pipe that runs through Bellingham lay idle, Olympic went back to its pig runs from January 1997 and found 9 sections of pipe that they knew would not withstand hydro-static testing. So before they had to comply with OPS Corrective Action Order to hydro-static test this pipe they replaced these nine sections of pipe. And they still had one section of pipe that split near Kulshan Middle School. What do you suppose the public would have thought had 10 sections split throughout this 37-mile stretch? For the first time in its 35 year history, Olympic Pipe Line Co. did some preventive mainte- Iła Il C62. • Olympic Pipe Line originally said that 277,000 gallons of fuel leaked out of their pipe, then revised it downward to 229,000 gallons of fuel which the news media now uses, but the OPS has not accepted. All you have to do is some sim- ple math and you realize that the minimum amount of fuel that would have leaked out of that pipe was 420,000 gallons of gas. By the time the experts are done determining exactly how much leaked, you will find that between 650,000 #,250,000 gallons of gasoline actually leaked out of that pipe on June 10, 1999. • Olympic Pipe Line did pig runs in January 1997, and admitted to the DOE that they had some problems in that section of pipe that split. Instead of check- ing that section, they spent $40 million building Bayview Station so they could increase their flow 20%. They misdesigned Bayview Station and had a block valve that closed 59 times in less than 6 months, over stressing a pipeline that is already in disrepair. - • Olympic Pipe Line goes to court and sues IMCo. Construction, a local con- tractor, for damaging the pipe. They are suing IMCO for any costs that have been incurred trebled. IMCO was a contractor to the City of Bellingham. Is the City of Bellingham next to be sued? Olympic Pipe Line has lied to the public before this accident happened and con- tinues to lie to the public in the aftermath of this tragic accident. If the Pipeline Industry is to learn anything from this tragedy, it is to do exactly the opposite of what Olympic Pipe Line has done. Tell the truth. Cooperate with investigators to find out the reason or reasons why an accident has happened. Again, why is this company allowed to operate south of here without providing any answers. Shut these people down and force those employees to talk to NTSB investigators. As we speak, there is a petition filtering through Bellingham and Whatcom Coun- ty to force our Mayor not to renew Olympic Pipe Line's Franchise agreement that comes due in May, until the people of Bellingham have an answer as to why this accident happened. The people of Bellingham are aware that this accident could be duplicated again if the valve closure problem is not resolved. And they are not about to let that happen. The actions of our Mayor in recent months, make me wonder what agenda he is working. His signature was on the first Safe Bellingham petition last July. But he has neglected to ask the why question since he signed the fran- chise agreement with Olympic in September . . . against public sentiment. The Chairman of the NTSB, Jim Hall (who by the way is one of the most compas- sionate and responsive individuals I have met throughout the last nine months), has told me that it will be at least June or September before he concludes his investiga- tion. And even then he has admitted that the real causes of this accident may never be known unless those operators in the control room on June 10, 1999 begin to talk about what happened that day. Is pleading the Fifth Amendment an admission of 18 guilt? As a law abiding citizen I believe it is. Shut Olympic Pipe Line down until they have told us why this accident happened and the NTSB has concurred. It is a sad state of affairs in this country when the Justice Department goes after Microsoft as a monopoly, merely because a judge took a personal disliking to Bill Gates. Then turns right around and allows Exxon and Mobil to merge forming the largest oil company in the world. Then turns right around and tells ARCO and BP Amoco they can't merge. And then allows Olympic Pipe Line Co. to continue its op- eration as though nothing has happened. Olympic Pipe Line's gross, wanton recklessness killed a “little man” that was the light of my family’s life. Wade was a “little man” that had an uplifting spirit, who touched many, many people he came into contact with. He had a knack for uplifting the spirits of everyone he came in contact with. He was our joy in life. He was a joy to many, many in Bellingham. And, unfortunately, we have been forced to live without that wonderful little being for the rest of our lives. Our family misses him every day. Olympic Pipe Line needs to be shut down until they have told us why this accident happened. - Oil leaker fined $35 million January 14, 2000, The Bellingham Herald Washington, D.C.—Koch Industries, an oil pipeline company, found the weak points in its pipes the easy way, the government said Thursday. It simply waited for the pipelines to break and spill oil, part of a pattern of negligence that resulted Thursday in the biggest civil fine levied to a company for environmental violations. The Environmental Protection Agency said that the company, based in Wichita, Kan., had agreed to pay a $30 million penalty for more than 300 separate spills of crude oil, gasoline and other oil products between 1990 and 1997. Federal officials said it had taken them months to put the case together, partly because the company did business under many different names, and even when it reported spills it sometimes understated their volume by as much as 90 percent. Even after the Justice Department brought the case, Koch refused to say what pipe- lines it owned, officials said. . To save money, the company did not inspect its pipelines for corrosion, or pres- sure-test them, investigators said. “It was cheaper not to maintain them,” said Steve Herman, the EPA’s assistant administrator for enforcement. And so, officials said, Koch just waited for the pipelines to fail. The company leaked 3 million gallons of crude oil and other substances into ponds, lakes and rivers in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri and Ala- bama, according to Carol Browner, the administrator of the EPA, in announcing the settlement. The settlement was filed in U.S. District Court in Houston Thursday to settle charges brought by the government between 1995 and 1997. As part of the settlement, the company will also pay $5 million to buy environ- mentally sensitive land and protect it from development. “Today’s landmark fine against Koch Industries for egregious violations of the Clean Water Act sends a strong message that those who try to profit by polluting our environment pay a price,” Browner said. The company offered a totally different interpretation, asserting through a high executive that Koch had reduced its pipeline leaks by 90 percent in the last decade. Federal prosecutors file motion to test segment of pipeline March 2, 2000, The Bellingham Herald and the Associated Press Federal prosecutors have asked a judge to approve tests to determine what caused a pipeline rupture and resulting explosion that killed two 10-year-old boys and an 18-year-old man in Bellingham last June. Prosecutors filed a sealed motion last week with U.S. District Judge Robert Lasnik, The Seattle Times reported Wednesday, citing unidentified sources familiar with the case. The motion seeks permission for the National Transportation Safety Board to cut into a 20-foot section of pipe that was excavated from the rupture site. Olympic officials said they want the pipeline tests done. . “We are as anxious as anybody to allow those tests to go forward,” company spokeswoman Maggie Brown said following a Wednesday night meeting in Bel- lingham. “Olympic, from the beginning, has been interested in finding out exactly what happened.” - The NTSB had planned to conduct the test last fall, but was halted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Seattle, which feared the test would allow lawyers for pipeline operator Olympic Pipe Line Co. to argue that key evidence had been destroyed. 19 The new motion seeks to allow the tests, in addition to protecting federal prosecu- tors from any claims relating to altering of evidence if criminal charges are filed in the rupture and explosion, the Times cited criminal experts as saying. The testing could tell investigators whether defects or corrosion existed before the pipeline rupture, NTSB spokesman Keith Holloway said. h º key component to the investigation because it can tell us what happened,” € SalCi. Prosecutors filing the motion notified lawyers representing Olympic, its top offi- cials and a Bellingham construction company that previously dug near the pipeline, the Times reported. Investigators have looked into whether the pipe had been dam- aged by excavation work, and Olympic has filed a motion blaming the excavation contractor for the rupture. A federal grand jury is investigating whether environmental or pipeline-safety laws were violated. No charges have been filed, and the investigation is expected to continue for months. . The families of the two boys killed have filed a lawsuit against Olympic. Olympic could face a fine of as much as $10,000 in the Nov. 17 incident, when a significant amount of fuel was leaked during cleanup of the Bellingham spill, re- Sulting in some environmental damage, state Department of Ecology spokesman Ron Langley said. The company was told Friday it had violated state water-quality laws and now has 30 days to respond, he said. Olympic had failed to clean silt from a perforated pipe that draws fuel and con- taminated groundwater from soils in Whatcom Falls Park, causing an overflow. Olympic spokeswoman Maggie Brown said the amount of fuel spilled was too Small to be measured. “It was a sheen,” she said. But Langley said the cleanup system leaked for 30 hours before a state inspector noticed gas in the creek. ympic has appealed a $120,000 fine from Ecology for the June 10 spill of 229,000 gallons of petroleum fuel. Senate Hearing March 13, 2000 Additional Testimony From Frank King The question that was asked Senators Gorton and Murray still remains unan- Swered. Why is Olympic Pipe Line allowed to continue to operate their pipeline south of Bayview Station, when their employees refuse to help the NTSB investigate this accident? Senator Gorton asked that question of Mr. Gast from Olympic Pipe Line and Mr. Felder from the Office of Pipeline Safety. Both responded by saying that they felt the 20° line south of Bayview Station was safe and operating at 80% of normal operating pressure. My question does not ask if the pipeline is safe!!! This Company needs to be shut down, until such time their employees help the NTSB put together all the answers to the why question. Olympic Pipe Line did internal pig runs on their pipeline in January of 1997. In May of 1997, they wrote the Washington State Department of Ecology and advised them that they had three serious anomalies in that very section of pipe that split on June 10, 1999. The DOE wrote them back and told Olympic pipeline to go into the area and dig up that very section of pipe and replace it or repair it as necessary. In July of 1997, R. J. Klasen, Field Supervisor for Šºk Pipe Line, goes into the area with a crew and a backhoe to dig up that very section of pipe. He then reports back to his superiors at Olympic Pipe Line and the DOE that he did not dig up that very section of pipe because it was “too difficult to get to.” Olympic Pipe Line's gross, wanton, reckless negligence murdered my son, Wade, as well as Stephen Tsiorvas and Liam Wood. This same gross, wanton, reckless negligence is the same reason that these people need to be shut down until we know why this accident hap- pened. Shut them down now. As I sat in that Senate Hearing room and listened to Mr. Felder's testimony and heard him say that the OPS has gone back to all the pipeline operators and asked them all to come up with safety action plans for their pipelines, I couldn’t help but become extremely uneasy. That is exactly the type of attitude that must be elimi- nated out of the OPS. I thought that was why the OPS was created . . . to regulate the safety of the pipeline industry . . . not to ask the pipeline industry how it want- ed to be regulated. Go back and list all the recommendations that the NTSB has given to the OPS over the last 30 years. List them all, and then make those the regulations by which the pipeline industry is regulated. Then add one regulation. When a pipeline company has an accident, its entire operations will be suspended until the cause of the accident has been determined. It was very apparent that the NTSB has seen very little change in the OPS attitude to force the pipeline industry 20 to safeguard the public. The OPS needs to be a stronger advocate for public safety and needs to welcome states help to mandate that public safety. This morning I read in the Bellingham Herald that a maintenance supervisor at Alaska Airlines had been placed on administrative leave because he had bullied the mechanics who maintain the airplanes into not doing the proper job in their mainte- nance efforts. Olympic Pipe Line Co. needs to be put on administrative leave, until the NTSB has found the answers as to why this accident happened. Senator GORTON. Thank you, Mr. King. Does Mrs. King wish to add anything? Mr. KING. Pardon? - Senator GORTON. Does Mrs. King wish to add anything? Mrs. KING. No. Senator GORTON. Ms. Dalen, we'll go to you. STATEMENT OF KATHERINE DALEN Ms. DALEN. I’m a little nervous about squeals. The young man that was sitting next to me is not Mr. Williams who has been busy working with teachers down around the Seattle/Tacoma area today. This man is my son and Stephen's brother, just turned 18, so I hope you don’t mind. He's been kind of supportive. Senator GORTON. Fine. Fine. You go ahead. Ms. DALEN. I wish to thank Senator Gorton, Senator Murray and other distinguished members of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation for inviting me to speak today. My name is Katherine Dalen, and I am the parent of Stephen Tsiorvas, who at the age of 10 lost his life along with two other sons of this community in a devastating accident that was like so many others preventable. When I decided to come and speak with you today, I puzzled over what it was I most wanted to say. What of all the things I feel, believe and know were most important to relate to you. I wondered what words I could speak that would make the most impact, and inspire change so that this tragedy would never be repeated, so that other lives would be saved. The first thing always on my mind is the depth of my sorrow and grief over Stephen's death, and how much pain his loss has brought my family. I could go on about that for hours. I could tell you how sometimes the sadness tears our hearts apart and drowns our spir- its, but our grief is personal, as would be yours had you lost a child by any means. My sadness, my family's suffering can only serve to remind you how precious life is, how important it is that we love and protect our families and how easy it is to lose those we love. We need to take better care of our children, our loved ones and our neighbors. We need to commit ourselves again to making human safety a priority. Most folks in Bellingham, many in Washington and some throughout the Nation realized again on June 10th, 1999, how un- expectedly dangerous and deadly our neighborhoods can be. The price of one human life is too great a price to pay for such a re- minder. Safety measures can and must be taken. Taking a human life is not a business liability. It is murder. How many times over how many years must the greed and sloth of industry be allowed to play deadly games with human lives? Is that to be our future? Our children’s future? Our children’s children’s future? 21 I need not remind the distinguished Committee that our govern- ment was formed of the people, by the people, for the people. Our democracy was based on that principle with a vision of the future very much on the minds of those drafting the rules for a balanced government. However, it does seem to me that we tend to live rath- er selfishly. With our individual lives and our individual pocket books and mind rather than the lives of our neighbors, and the lives of those yet to be born, this selfishness seems especially evi- dent in those situations in which we allow the fat corporate wolf to manage the fat company wolves who then manage the hens in the hen house with the corporate agenda. While some wolves may be fine fellows indeed, a wolf is by nature a wolf. His agenda is based more on filling his stomach than on the welfare of the chick- €ſ].S. - Our environment, our habitat, our earth cannot continue to be raped, either by accident or by deliberate intent. If we are to sus- tain human life and animal life, if we erode our environment one Small bit at a time, the human race will die, if not today, tomorrow; if not by fire, by ice; if not suddenly, then slowly. - The pipeline that burst here in this small city has been in the ground for a long time. Others will testify to that, I’m sure. The quality of that pipe and other pipes in this nation carrying volatile fuels is in question, but the impact of yet another disaster, the im- pact of yet another death is not. Each accident wrecks havoc on the lives of residents, the lives of native animals, and the land itself. Each accident causes this na- tion, our neighbors, our families and our habitat irreparable dam- age. We know that toxic materials in our environment can poison us, leach into our food, pollute our drinking water and hover in our air, yet we continue to allow the wolves with the corporate agenda to ºnage not only the hens in the hen house but the hen house aS Well. The size and growing complexity of our nation’s needs does not abrogate our responsibilities as individuals, as a community or as a nation. Nor does a challenge demand that our complexity allow us to simplify our solution or grow lax in our diligence to monitor and enforce our regulations. Though the pipe is buried and out of our sight, the need for decisive action is abundantly clear. We can no longer hide from the fact that our behaviors and laissez-faire policies have direct detrimental effects on our future. By allowing inaction and by our own inaction, we become participants in the misdeeds of business. My baby died because of inaction. His death was preventable. As a people, for the people, we must, must protect those lives in our charge. The lives of those yet unborn and the land which sus- tains humanity only for so long as humanity cares for it. Thank you. [The prepared statement of Ms. Dalen follows:] 22 PREPARED STATEMENT OF KATHERINE DALEN I wish to thank Senator Gorton, Senator Murray, and the distinguished members of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation for inviting me to speak today. My name is Katherine Dalen, and I am the parent of Stephen Tsiorvas who, at the age of ten, gave up his life, along with two other sons of this community, in a devastating accident that was, like so many others, preventable. When I decided to come and speak with you today, I puzzled over what it is I most wanted to say, what of all the things I feel, believe, and know were most im- portant to relate to you. I wondered what words I could speak that would make the most impact and inspire change so that this tragedy would never be repeated, so that other lives would be saved. The first thing always on my mind is the depth of my sorrow and grief over Stephen's death and how much pain his loss has brought my family. I could go on about that for hours. I could tell you how some- times the sadness tears our hearts apart and drowns our spirits. But our grief is personal, as would be yours had you lost a child by any means. My sadness, my family's suffering can only serve to remind you how precious life is, how important it is that we love and protect our families, and how easy it is to lose those we love. Additionally, I think I must speak to two issues. One, we need to take better care of our children, our loved ones, and our neighbors. We need to commit ourselves again to making human safety a priority. Most folks in Bellingham, many in Wash- ington, and some throughout the nation realized again on June 10, 1999, how unex- pectedly dangerous and deadly our neighborhoods can be. The price of one human life is too great a price to pay for such a reminder. How many times over how many years must the greed and sloth of industry be allowed to play deadly games with human lives? Is that to be our future as well? Our children’s children’s future? I need not remind this distinguished committee that our government was formed of the people, by the people, for the people. Our democracy was based on that prin- ciple, with a vision of the future very much on the minds of those drafting the rules for a balanced government. However, it does seem to me that we tend to live rather selfishly, with our individual lives and our individual pocketbooks in mind rather than the lives of our neighbors and the lives of those yet to be born. This selfishness seems especially evident in those situations in which we allow the fat corporate wolf to manage the fat company wolves who then manage the hens in the hen house with a corporate agenda. While some wolves may be fine fellows indeed, a wolf is by na- ture a wolf: his agenda is based more on filling his stomach than on the welfare of the chickens. Two, our environment, our habitat, our earth cannot continue to be raped, either by accident or by deliberate intent, if we are to sustain human and animal life. If we erode our environment one small bit at a time, the human race will die. If not today, tomorrow. If not by fire, by ice. If not suddenly, then slowly. The pipeline that burst here, in this small city, has been in the ground for a long time; others will testify to that I’m sure. The quality of that pipe, and other pipes in this nation carrying volatile fuels, is in question, but the impact of yet another disaster is not. Each accident wreaks havoc on the lives of residents, the lives of native animals, and the land itself. Each accident causes this nation, our neighbors, our families, and our habitat irreparable damage. We know that toxic materials in our environ- ment can poison us, leach into our food, pollute our drinking water, and hover in our air. And yet we continue to allow the wolves with a corporate agenda to manage not only the hens in the hen house but the hen house as well. The size and growing complexity of our nation's needs does not abrogate our re- sponsibility as citizens or as a government. Nor does the challenge demanded by that complexity allow us to simplify our solutions or grow lax in our diligence to monitor and enforce our regulations. The need for stern decisive action is abun- dantly clear. We can no longer hide from the fact that our behaviors and laissez fair policies have direct, detrimental effects on our future, and all futures to come—on us, on our children, and on our children’s children. As a people, for the people, we must, MUST, protect those lives in our charge now, the lives of those yet unborn, and the land which sustains us only for so long as we care for it. It is time to act. We must not be deluded by false hopes or by denial; we are in danger; we must not allow the fact that we do not see the danger laying about in our front yard to make us unwary. If we do nothing we may lose our chance. And we must let our neighbors, throughout the nation, know of the danger that lurks three feet, two feet, one foot below the surface of our homes, our fields, our parks, and our schools. Senator GORTON. Thank you very much, Ms. Dalen. Mrs. Robinson? 23 STATEMENT OF MARLENE ROBINSON Mrs. ROBINSON. I want to thank you for coming to Bellingham and thank you for inviting us here to speak. On June 10th of last year, my 18-year old son, Liam, who had graduated from high school 5 days before, happened to be fly fish- ing in his favorite place, Whatcom Falls Park, a pristine piece of nature not 5 minutes from downtown. Just a week before, Liam had come home one evening from fishing the creek. While we ate dinner together, he told us about his excitement when he came upon a big otter swimming peacefully in one of the pools. He watched it for a long time. I’m sure that he looked for that otter on June 10th as he made his way down the creek. He was in a steep gorge with 230,000 gallons of gasoline spilled down the creek. The oxygen in the gorge was replaced by a 35-foot wall of hydro- carbon fumes. Liam was overcome within seconds. He fell into the foot-deep creek and drowned. A short time later, the gasoline and fumes exploded, sending the fire ball down the creek that killed Liam and Stephen and every other living thing in its path for a mile and a half. -- . We in Bellingham are now painfully aware of the danger that pipelines pose to every community in this nation. We have learned that what happened in Bellingham was not an isolated incident. The Federal Government has allowed the pipeline industry to be largely self-regulated. This has led to a pattern in the last 20 years of fuel transportation accidents. The pipeline industry will never have as its bottom line the health and safety of communities. It is up to communities, themselves, and therefore their public rep- ºntatives and government agencies to insure that pipelines are Salſe. The technology exists for pipelines to be safe. What we did not know before the pipeline ruptured in Bellingham but have learned at the price of our son’s life is that what is lacking is regulation and enforcement. The Federal Office of Pipeline Safety has woe- fully, and over a long period of time, failed in its mandate. The Federal Government has not responded to years of unsafe pipeline practices and has at the same time prohibited local and state gov- ernments from protecting their citizens. We in Bellingham are now working closely with many commu- nities across the Nation who, like us, are educating themselves about the dangers posed to their citizens as a result of the lack of responsiveness of the Office of Pipeline Safety. We know that had OPS addressed this issue adequately in the past, our town would not be still reeling from loss. We are working together to make sure that no other community has to suffer a similar loss. . I no longer have children to protect. Nothing I do or say about this issue can bring Liam back. I do, however, consider it my privi- lege and my obligation to do what I can to protect the children of this and other communities. I need to impress upon you that it is not enough to make minor changes in pipeline safety regulation and to once again hand over the reins to OPS. Before June 10th, none of us in Bellingham had any idea that we needed to be ex- perts in fuel transportation safety. We frankly didn’t even know that we had a gas line pipeline running through the very heart of Bellingham under streets, past houses, schools and parks. We 24 thought we had a Federal agency called the Office of Pipeline Safe- ty, and we had faith that that agency was doing its job. We no longer have that faith. I urge this committee to do what is necessary to protect the citi- zens of this nation from further avoidable and predictable tragedies caused by inadequate regulation, oversight and enforcement. My recent education has convinced me that we need two things. We need a Federal Office of Pipeline Safety that is staffed by com- mitted expert servants who have the health and safety of commu- nities as their bottom line. And we need a strong, well-funded citi- zens advisory council to insure that over time we do not return to business as usual. - Our children’s deaths were not trivial. They were not an “accept- able risk.” We easily have the capacity to protect our communities from just this so-called “accident.” What I need from you, what every community in this country needs from you is action that will finally guarantee us an Office of Pipeline Safety that truly protects the safety of citizens across the Nation, and that will include citi- zens in local and state governments as effective partners in the na- tional oversight of pipeline safety. [The prepared statement of Mrs. Robinson follows: PREPARED STATEMENT OF MARLENE ROBINSON On June 10th of last year, my 18-year-old son Liam, who had graduated from high school five days before, happened to be fly-fishing in his favorite place, Whatcom Falls Park; a pristine piece of nature not 5 minutes from downtown. Just a week before, Liam had come home one evening from fishing the creek. While we ate dinner together, he told us about his excitement when he'd come upon a big otter swimming peacefully in one of the pools. He watched it for a long time. I’m sure that he looked for that otter on June 10th as he made his way down the creek. He was in a steep gorge when the 230,000 gallons of gasoline spilled down the creek. The oxygen in the gorge was replaced by a 35-foot wall of hydrocarbon fumes. Liam was overcome within seconds. He fell into the foot-deep creek and drowned. A short time later, the gasoline and fumes exploded, sending the fireball down the creek that killed Wade and Steven and every other living thing in its path for a mile and a half. We in Bellingham are now painfully aware of the danger that pipelines pose to every community in this nation. We have learned that what happened in Bel- lingham was not an isolated incident. The federal government has allowed the pipe- line industry to be largely self-regulated. This has led to a pattern in the last twenty years of fuel transportation accidents. The pipeline industry will never have as its bottom line the health and safety of communities. It is up to communities them- selves and therefore their public representatives and government agencies to ensure that pipelines are safe. The technology exists for pipelines to be safe. What we did not know before the pipeline ruptured in Bellingham, but have learned at the price of our son’s life, is that what is lacking is regulation and enforcement. The federal Office of Pipeline Safety has woefully, and over a long period of time, failed in its mandate. The federal government has not responded to years of unsafe pipeline practices and has at the same time prohibited local and state governments from pro- tecting their citizens. We in Bellingham are now working closely with many communities across the na- tion who, like us, are educating themselves about the dangers posed to their citizens as a result of the lack of responsiveness of the federal government through the Of- fice of Pipeline Safety. We know that had OPS addressed this issue adequately in the past, our town would not still be reeling from loss. We are working to make sure that no other community has to suffer a similar loss. - I no longer have children to protect. Nothing I do or say about this issue can bring Liam back. I do, however, consider it my privilege and obligation to do what I can to protect the children of this and other communities. I need to impress upon you that it is not enough to make minor changes in pipeline safety regulation and to once again hand over the reins to OPS. Before June 10th, none of us in Bellingham 25 had any idea that we needed to be experts in fuel transportation safety. We frankly didn’t even know that we had a gasoline pipeline running through the very heart of Bellingham, under streets, past houses, schools, and parks. We thought we had a federal agency called the Office of Pipeline Safety, and we had faith that that agency was doing its job. We no longer have that faith. I urge this committee to do what is necessary to protect the citizens of this nation from further avoidable and predictable tragedies caused by inadequate regulation, oversight and enforcement. My recent education has convinced me that we need two things. We need a federal Office of Pipeline Safety that is staffed by committed, expert servants who have the health and safety of communities as their bottom line. And we need a strong, well-funded citizens ad- visory council to ensure that over time, we do not return to business as usual. Our children’s deaths were not trivial; they were not an “acceptable risk.” We eas- ily have the capacity to protect our communities from just this kind of “accident.” What I need from you; what every community in this country needs from you, is action that will finally guarantee us an Office of Pipeline Safety that truly protects the safety of citizens across the nation, and that will include citizens and local and state governments as effective partners in the national oversight of pipeline safety. STATEMENT OF BRUCE BRABEC Mr. BRABEC. I am Bruce Brabec and I’m Liam’s stepfather and I want to thank you for the opportunity to speak today and thank you for coming to Bellingham. Marlene and I, as all the families, have received amazing support from this Bellingham community, and it's, you know, kind of maybe helped us to go on from day to day is all of the support we’ve had from friends and from people that we don’t even know, and from people at large including the state. A lot of times in conversation with people who are being sup- portive to us, they’ll say to Marlene and I, I’m sure the others have heard it, too, people have said that they can’t imagine what this must be like, what it must be like for us, and I thought, well, I can give you some sense of what it is like, especially for those in the room who are parents, and give you just a little bit of what it's like on a day-to-day basis for us. First of all, just imagine that you’re going to go home tonight and your child isn’t home and never will be and then add to this each morning very early when the newspaper is delivered, it bumps on the front porch and you wake up because of that sound and you’re reminded of when the police stepped on your porch and awakened you, also, and they had come to tell you that your son was found dead in Whatcom Creek and then add to this the experience that each time you go to a gas station to get gas in your car and when you catch the smell of the gasoline as you’re filling it up, you imag- ine what it might have been like for your child as he was engulfed by a wall of gasoline vapor while fly fishing on Whatcom Creek, and then add to each time somebody tells you a story about your child, which we like to hear, but it also makes you think about what your child might be doing now if he or she were alive. Well, now you might have a little bit more information about what it is like for us and those are just a few of the things that happen to us on a daily basis. Last week Marlene and I decided to visit the site where Liam’s body was found. We'd been there a few days after his death and we weren't sure we could find it again and at that time we'd seen how badly damaged the creek was and we wanted to go back and Some friends in the police department who knew where the site 26 was offered to take us back and we wanted to go back because we wanted to have a good bearing on the site in the future, so we could visit it on our own. I planned to stand there and imagine Liam fishing in this one beautiful canyon, and I imagined that in the future not even at that point it would be a site where I would be able to reflect joy- fully about Liam, because I knew how much he loved fishing in that canyon. How often I’d come home, and there'd be a note that he had gone fishing, and I knew which creek he was fishing on. Well, the experience of going to the creek last week was quite the opposite. I saw a burned out canyon, which as much as I expected it, it was very difficult to see again, the burned trees, the bare banks, the cracked rocks from the heat of the explosion, and the downed trees in the water, and worst of all, I saw Liam floating face down in the creek and I saw the part of his body that was out of the creek that was charred by the blast, because I know that that's how they found him. - Now, I’m not bringing this up to upset people, but really I bring it up to make a plea that Liam’s death not be in vain and to plead that other families not have to be condemned as we are to this kind of experience and to these memories. The loss of our son—because of the loss of our son we are certainly biased about the importance of stricter regulation and accountability, but we believe that every- body should be similarly biased by our experience. I would like to bring another voice into the room and that’s a voice that’s missing today and that's Liam's, Liam's voice. If I were Liam, and I hadn’t been fishing that day, and I was alive, I would hope that I was invited to speak today, because I would tell you how often I had walked that creek from the mouth all the way up to its source. If I were Liam I would tell you how many of my thoughts had been scoured from that canyon by the blast, thoughts I shared with the creek as I fished, thoughts about school, thoughts about my parents, about girlfriends, about my place in the uni- verse. If I were Liam I'd tell you how many fish I’d caught and re- leased, and I would recount with pretty good sound effects and vis- ualizations my attempts and success at landing fish, and if I were Liam, I would be telling you today that much more needs to be done regarding pipeline regulation, to not only prevent damage, in- jury or death, but also to support the living, to protect our places of refuge, to protect our neighborhoods, to protect our homes, to protect our families. If I were Liam, I would most strongly ask that you tighten the accountability of the Office of Pipeline Safety, that you support it with the funds to do its job, but that you consider cleaning house to get staff who are dedicated to be watch dogs of public safety, not just supporters of pipelines and oil companies. If I were Liam, I would most strongly urge you to allow states and especially Washington State to regulate pipelines in addition to Federal regulation, and if I were Liam, I would urge you to support a well-funded citizen advisory group to provide regional oversight to improve safety and to prevent oil spills, and if I were Liam, and I would be not standing up and moving over you at my over six feet height, and I would be volunteering to be the first one on that advisory committee for this region, because I would know how im- portant it is, and I’d want to do what I could to be helpful. 27 Marlene and I again want to thank you for the opportunity to present our thoughts, our feelings today. We appreciate your seri- ous intentions. Let's join ours and that is to take steps to prevent similar accidents from occurring in the future. [The prepared statement of Mr. Brabec follows:] PREPARED STATEMENT OF BRUCE BRABEC I am Bruce Brabec. I am Liam’s step father. - - Marlene and I have received amazing support from the Bellingham community. #. in conversations many people tell us that they can’t imagine what it must be ike for us. - Well, to give you some sense of what it is like, especially for the parents in the I'OCII] . . . • Imagine going home tonight and your child isn’t home . . . and never will be. • Add to this—each morning, very early, when the newspaper being delivered thumps on the front porch, you wake up and are reminded of when you were awakened by the police stepping on your porch—who came to tell you that your son was found dead on Whatcom Creek. . • Then—add the experience of each time you go to a gas station to get gas for your vehicle, and you catch a smell of gasoline—you imagine what it might have been like for your child as he was engulfed by a wall of gasoline vapor while flyfishing on Whatcom Creek. • Then add that each time someone tells you a story about their child, you think about what your child might be doing now—if he were alive. Now you might have a bit more information about what it is like for us. Last week, Marlene and I decided to visit the site where Liam’s body was found. We had been there once, a few days after his death, and weren’t sure we could find it again. We had seen then how badly damaged the creek was. This time, we were accompanied by some friends in the police department who knew the site. We thought it would be good to get a better bearing on the site so that we could visit it later on our own. I planned to stand there and imagine Liam fishing in this once beautiful canyon—I imagined it as a site where I would be able to reflect joyfully about Liam as I knew how much he loved fishing in that canyon . . . Well, the ex- perience was quite the opposite. I saw the burned out canyon, the burned trees, the bare banks, the rocks cracked by the heat generated during the explosion, the downed trees in the water. And I saw Liam floating face down in the creek and the part of his body out of the water charred by the blast. I am not bringing all this up to upset people, but to make a plea that Liam’s death not be in vain, to plead that other families not have to be condemned as we are to these kind of experiences and memories. Because of the loss of our son, we are certainly biased about the importance of stricter regulation and accountability, but we believe everyone should be similarly biased by our experience. I would like to bring another voice to the room a voice that is missing . . . Liam's VOICe. If I were Liam . . . and I hadn't been fishing that day . . . and I was alive . . . I would hope I was invited to speak today. I would tell you of how often I walked that creek from the mouth all the way up to its source. If I were Liam, I would tell you how many of my thoughts had been scoured from that canyon by the blast— thoughts I shared with the creek as I fished—thoughts about school, about my par- ents, about girlfriends . . . thoughts about my place in the universe. If I were Liam, I would tell you about the many fish I caught, and released, in that canyon. And I could recount with good sound effects and visualizations my attempts and success at landing a fish. If I were Liam, I would be telling you today that much more needs to be done regarding pipeline regulation to not only prevent damage, or injury, or death, but to also support the living, to protect our places of refuge, to protect our neighborhoods, to protect our homes. If I were Liam, I would most strongly ask that you tighten the accountability of the Office of Pipeline Safety—that you support it with the funds to do its job, but that you consider cleaning house to get .# who are dedicated to being watchdogs of public safety, not just supporters of pipeline and oil companies. I were Liam, I would most strongly urge you to allow states and especially Washington State to regulate pipelines in addition to the federal regulations. If I were Liam, I would urge you to support a well funded citizen advisory group to provide regional oversight to improve safety and prevent oil spills. 28 And, if I were Liam, I would volunteer to be on that first advisory committee for this region. - Thank you for the opportunity to present our thoughts today. We appreciate your serious intentions which join with ours—to take steps to prevent similar accidents from occurring in the future. Senator GORTON. Well, we thank each of you who have gone through great difficulty and who are here today, you know, under a great deal of stress for the kind of insight into these challenges that only each of us can know. I’ve only one or two brief questions, and I think Mrs. Robinson has already mostly answered the question. How many of you before this accident even knew there was a pipeline through the park with these hazardous materials going through it? You said you were not, Mrs. Robinson? Mrs. ROBINSON. No. Senator GORTON. Mr. King, did you know it was there? Mr. KING. I knew the pipeline was there. I really, I never paid any attention as to what went through it, because I felt that, you know, they were taking care of it. Senator GORTON. What do you think— Mr. WILLIAMS. Senator? Senator GORTON. I’m sorry. Do you want to answer the question? Mr. WILLIAMS. Yeah, I lived in the community for 10 years. Senator GORTON. Uh-huh. Mr. WILLIAMS. And I knew the pipeline was there, also, but I couldn’t find it, and when I would ask neighbors what was in it, nobody knew. Ms. DALEN. No. Mr. WILLIAMS. Nobody knew what was being transported. Senator GORTON. Did you know precisely where it was? Ms. Dalen You can see it. Mr. WILLIAMS. You can see where the right-of-way is in some of the areas, but once again, no one knew what was being transported in that pipeline. - Ms. DALEN. And it is literally out of the ground and goes across that black pipe. It goes across from one side of the creek in the lit- tle gully that the creek has made to the other. You can see it. So you assume it’s water or something. Mr. KING. My oldest son, Jason, fished like Liam Wood every inch of that creek for 15 years. We’ve lived there for 22 years. He's probably stood on the pipe and fished off the pipe as a little boy. He said it was—there was a greater chance of him being killed back in there than Wade. Senator GORTON. You’ve already, I think, each of you in your tes- timony told us what you think we ought to do, but one question in that connection, what’s the best way to see to it that people in the future here in the State of Washington or anywhere else who live in the vicinity of these pipelines are made aware of the dangers they pose and can participate before something happens in seeing to § that they’re safe? Do any of you have a thought on that sub- jectſ: , - Part of Senator Murray's bill, of course, is public information and public knowledge. Would that be important to you? Mr. KING. I think that the most important thing that needs to come out of this is the pipeline industry has no intention of doing 29 any preventative maintenance on the pipelines at all. Are we going to eliminate spills? Probably not, but if we have a zero tolerance, and we did get to zero spills, wow, wouldn’t that be something? The world isn't perfect, but does that mean that we don’t strive for per- fection? Mrs. KING. It wouldn’t have mattered that day if, what we knew. After it had happened and the oil had spilled, it wouldn’t have mattered who knew, who we called, what we did. It was going to happen. This shouldn’t happen. I sit here and I listen to all of this and I get angrier and angrier and angrier. If this is properly main- tained, regulated, whatever you want to call it, this won’t happen again. We won’t have to have numbers to call. We won’t have to be looking out. This isn’t up to the citizens. This is our government that should be doing this, and I don’t care about an 800 number to call if I detect a gas leak. If this is properly handled in the fu- ture, it can’t be anything but better. Anything is going to be better than what’s gone on in the past, which is nothing. - Mr. KING. Hyman Rickover who is an admiral in the Navy had a zero tolerance for nuclear accidents. There aren’t very many acci- dents in the navy concerning nuclear power, because he had a zero tolerance. Ms. DALEN. I also the wanted to say something. I believe that there are several avenues that we can take to inform the public. One of the things that I’ve been very concerned about is the lack of information. Well, there has been some information, but through the news media making sure that the country understands that these things are not just out in the farmland which is bad enough, not out, just out in the ranges which is bad enough, but within feet of public schools, in the middle of parks, down the back side of peo- ple's yards. They need to know where it's at. So I ask the media and the government to demand that the pipeline companies let us know where their pipes go, No. 1. I recognize near the beginning of this tragedy it was very dif- ficult for us to get Olympic to be forthcoming with their maps. It seemed that they didn’t exactly know where their own pipes were going. Well, maybe that might be a little off. Maybe they were try- ing to put us off, but nevertheless, they need to be forthcoming. We need to have that information available, and it can be printed. Peo- ple all over the country in every type of newspaper from the New York Times down to the, you know, Pullman Herald can find out in their newspapers using the Internet and making these things available for people who want to take an active role, be actively in- volved in it, making sure that every owner, every property owner knows that there's, if there's a pipeline going through or by their property, and every time those homes are bought or sold, every apartment bought or sold, every parking lot bought or sold, every business bought or sold that goes near a pipeline, make that abso- lutely a part of the deal. They need to know. Speaking of the nuclear industry, I happen to be under the im- pression that they have pipes, and they have Smart pigs that are a heck of a lot smarter than the pigs they’re using to chase down our pipe leaks in our pipes, and I think we ought to start using them. I don’t care if they cost a little bit more. Excuse me. I’m pay- ing enough for gas right now. I’m willing to pay an extra few bucks 78-574 D-2 30 to save my neighbor's children. I’m willing. I’m willing, and I think we ought to start making use of multiple industrial safety meas- ures and asking other people how they keep their pipes safe. Senator GORTON. Thank you. Senator Murray? - Senator MURRAY. Mr. Chairman, I don’t have any additional questions. I just want to thank this panel for being so courageous and for coming and sharing your stories with us. I know how dif- ficult it is. I know how much each of you have helped to educate all of us, and I hope we can take your courage back to the other Washington to convince senators and legislators from across the country that what happened in Bellingham last year could happen in their community today unless we toughen many of these laws º go through with many of the recommendations you’ve talked about. So just personally, thank you very much for coming here and sharing your stories. - Mr. Chairman: Thank you all. Mr. KING. May I make one Senator GORTON. Sure, of course you can. Mr. KING.. I asked this back in Congress, why is Olympic Pipe Line still operating south of Bayview station with their eight em- ployees still at the switch pleading the Fifth Amendment? Why? Senator GORTON. That we hope we learn from people who are going to testify here later on in the day. Mr. KING. Well, the problem is there is no logical reason why they’re still operating, and everybody I ask that question, they get stumped. Nobody wants to, nobody wants to address it. Can you go back to Congress and ask among your other Senators why are these people still operating south of Bayview station? All we're asking for is to make the pipeline industry and particularly Olympic Pipe Line accountable, accountable for what they did. Senator MURRAY. Thank you. Senator GORTON. Thank you all very much. Governor Locke is here. We’ve given him the difficult assignment to testify next, but Governor, we're honored to hear from you. Governor Locke. STATEMENT OF HON. GARY LOCKE, GOVERNOR, - STATE OF WASHINGTON Governor LOCKE. Thank you very much, Senator Gorton and Senator Murray. Thank you, Senator, for holding this field hearing to allow the people of the State of Washington to express their con- cerns about the safety of pipelines that as parents so courageously testified just a few minutes ago, are in our parks, are in our yards, are next to our schools, in the midst of our own communities. On June 10th, 1999, Liam Wood, recent high school graduate, Wade King, Stephen Tsiorvas, they died in a tragedy that never should have happened. There can be no more children dying, not in Washington State, not anywhere in America. We owe it to them to make sure that a similar tragedy never occurs again throughout the United States of America. - Since that horrible tragedy on June 10th, we’ve all become so aware of the risk surrounding these vital pathways so central to 31 the distribution of fuel. We realize we need pipelines to carry the natural gas and the petroleum products that fuel and power our cars and our trucks, that warm our homes and keep our factories humming, but for virtually all of us, the risk posed by the pipelines were out of sight, out of mind. Immediately after this tragic event, I formed a task force to evaluate our pipeline regulatory system and our response capa- bility, and that team worked incredibly hard for 5 months, and Mayor Asmundson of Bellingham was part of that team, and they spent their time analyzing the existing regulatory system and re- sponse capability and preparing recommendations. One of the first things they and the people of the State of Wash- ington learned was that our state has virtually no control, no con- trol over the pipeline that leaked the gasoline that exploded. This interstate pipeline as well as six other interstate petroleum and natural gas pipelines is solely under the authority of the Federal Office of Pipeline Safety, and until Senator Murray succeeded in obtaining an Office of Pipeline Safety position for our state, the en- tire western region of the United States had only 13 inspectors, three located in Alaska, 10 others for the entire western United States. That is simply inadequate and is a recipe for disaster. When the task force finished its work, they issued a report that included 30 strong and solid recommendations for improving pipe- line safety, not just in our state but all across America. I have en- dorsed these recommendations and working with our state legisla- ture and other Governors and the members of our congressional delegation, we’re trying to turn them into reality, but I want to thank State Senator Harriet Spanel to my right, and State Rep- resentative Kelli Linville for prime sponsoring the legislation in Olympia that just a few days ago our legislature passed: the Wash- ington State Pipeline Safety Act which will truly strengthen the monitoring and the prevention of accidents in our state. The bill will also initiate studies by the State Fire Marshal of the training and the equipment needs facing communities that lie along these pipelines, but we need more than anything else to have the Federal Office of Pipeline Safety set tougher standards and to have more stringent inspections of all pipelines, natural gas and volatile fuels. We simply must have the Federal Pipeline Safety Act amended to allow states to adopt and enforce standards stricter than Federal standards when doing so would not interfere with interstate commerce. The Office of Pipeline Safety is woefully understaffed and has not kept abreast with the latest developments to ensure pipeline safe- ty. Therefore, the Congress must step in and insist on a tougher regulatory stance by the Federal agency, and in fact, allow the states to go even farther to protect our own citizens from such trag- edies. Even before that occurs, the Office of Pipeline Safety must grant authority to the states for interstate pipeline oversight using current or future Federal standards as it has done with four other states. Four states now have been delegated the authority by the Federal Office of Pipeline Safety to be in essence an arm of the Federal Government given the fact the Federal Government has been so lax. Washington has been asking for this delegation of au- thority as have many other states including Virginia and Arizona. 32 We want the ability to help the Federal inspectors do their job, but it should not take deaths before the Federal Government says yes. Just today we received a letter from the Federal Office of Pipe- line Safety indicating that it is willing to delegate authority to the State of Washington. Senator GORTON. Do you have a copy of that letter Governor LOCKE. Yes. . Senator GORTON.—that we can put in the record? Governor LOCKE. Yes, I do—but they’re saying yes to our re- quest, because we’ve had three deaths. What about all the other states that are looking for similar authority where there have been massive spills and leaks, but without a death? The Office of Pipe- line Safety should not have to wait for more deaths in other parts of American before granting similar authority. I have sponsored and the National Governors Association has adopted a resolution supporting stronger Federal pipeline safety as well as increased state involvement. We’ve been working with Sen- ator Murray and Representative Metcalf and Representative Inslee to promote their bills that will No. 1, push the Office of Pipeline Safety to adopt stronger standards it should have enacted years ago, and that will two, authorize states to go beyond the Federal standards on issues like training, certification, leak monitoring, and accident preparedness, and I want to thank you, Senator Gor- ton, for cosponsoring Senator Murray's bill. We appreciate the time that you’re spending to give the people of the State of Washington the opportunity to indicate their concerns about these tens of thou- Sands of miles of pipeline running through their communities. We’ve been pushing hard to get the Federal Government to give us that authority. They’re now beginning to respond, but we’re going to have to continue to push, today, tomorrow, every day. We need to make sure that the legacy of Liam Wood, Wade King, and Stephen Tsiorvas will be one of protection for all the people all across America. Thank you very much. f |. prepared statement of Governor Locke and letter referred to ollow:] PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. GARY LOCKE, GOVERNOR, STATE OF WASHINGTON I want to express my appreciation to Senator Gorton and Senator Murray for holding this field hearing to allow the people of Washington to express our concerns about the safety of the pipelines that lie below our towns and cities. Since the terrible tragedy on June 10, 1999, we have become all too aware of the risks surrounding these vital pathways so central to our fuel distribution network. We realize we need pipelines to carry the natural gas and petroleum products that power our cars and trucks, warm our homes, and keep factories humming and air- planes flying. But we also know that for virtually all of us, the risks posed by the pºlines were “out of sight, out of mind” before the explosion in Whatcom Falls a TK. - Immediately after this tragic event, I formed a task force to research our pipeline regulatory system and our response capability. That team worked incredibly hard for 5 months, analyzing the existing regulatory system and response capacity and preparing recommendations for improvement. They consulted with experts from the federal government—including the National Transportation Safety Board and the Office of Pipeline Safety—from other states, including Minnesota and California that operate their own interstate pipeline safety oversight programs—and from a variety of interest groups. - One of the first things they—and the people of Washington—learned was that our state exercises almost no control over the pipeline that leaked the gasoline that ex- ploded. This interstate pipeline—as well as 6 other interstate petroleum and natural 33 gas lines—is solely under the authority of the federal Office of Pipeline Safety. And until Senator Murray succeeded in obtaining an OPS position for our state, the en- tire Western Region had only 13 inspectors. When the task force's work was done, they issued a report that included over 30 strong and solid recommendations for improving pipeline safety. I endorsed those recommendations and have been working with our state legislature, with other Gov- ernors, and with members of Washington’s congressional delegation to turn them into reality. I would like to acknowledge the hard work done by the legislature on this subject, especially Representative Linville and Senator Spanel. Since December: • The Legislature adopted the Washington State Pipeline Safety Act, which will strengthen our “Call-Before-You-Dig" program to reduce third-party damage to pipelines and will promote comprehensive mapping of pipeline locations to in- form local governments who must make building permit decisions and prepare for pipeline accident response. The bill will also initiate studies by the State Fire Marshal of the training and equipment needs facing communities that lie along pipelines. • The Legislature also adopted a Joint Memorial to Congress and the President that cited the work of the task force and urged you to amend the federal pipe- line safety act to allow states to adopt and enforce standards stricter than fed- eral standards when doing so would not interfere with interstate commerce. Even before that occurs, the Memorial asks the President to direct the Office of Pipeline Safety to use existing law to grant authority to states for interstate pipeline oversight. • I sponsored, and the National Governors Association adopted, a resolution promoting stronger pipeline safety and committing the NGA to work with Con- gress on legislation to achieve that objective. This parallels a similar resolution * several Washington cities successfully promoted to the National League of ities. • I have been working with Senator Murray and Representative Metcalf to pro- mote their bills that will push the Office of Pipeline Safety to adopt the stronger standards it should have enacted years ago and that will authorize willing states to go beyond federal standards on issues like operator training and cer- tification, leak detection, and accident preparedness. • Senator Gorton, I want to thank you for co-sponsoring Senator Murray's bill. I appreciate your recognition that pipeline safety is of paramount importance to the people in our state and I want to do everything in my power to work with you to ensure safe lines. I am confident that with the concerted effort of my Administration and our entire congressional delegation we can change the federal law and institute a substantially stronger program here in Washington. That will enable us to give our citizens the peace of mind they deserve that the pipelines beneath our state are operated and maintained to protect public safety and our environment. This will be the legacy of Liam Wood, Wade King and Steven Tsiorvas. Thank you very much. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION, RESEARCH AND SPECIAL PROGRAMS ADMINISTRATION Washington, DC. Hon. GARY LOCKE, Governor of Washington, Olympia, WA. Dear Governor Locke: I am writing to transmit to you two draft Interstate Pipeline Transportation Agreements: one for hazardous liquids and one for gas. Since our meeting in Washington, DC, in late February, my staff and I have been working to find a way to authorize the state to serve as our agent in conducting interstate pipeline oversight. Based on our assessment, we have developed these draft agreements. I must convey to you our perspective on implementation of these agreements, should you choose to accept them. The Office of Pipeline Safety has significant con- cerns about having the State of Washington's pipeline safety program housed in more than one agency. This concern arises for two main reasons: 34 • With a single pipeline safety agency, the critical mass of expertise can be es- - tablished to contribute to activities effecting both liquid and gas pipelines, for example, metallurgical sciences, computer operations management, mapping, etc. • While I understand that Washington is prepared to provide adequate funding, it is inevitable that additional resources will be required to duplicate expertise in two locations. As I remarked when we met, I am concerned about the state's ability to meet the resource needs associated with interstate agent status and do not want that problem exacerbated by unnecessary inefficiency. As you know, we have had an effective working relationship with the Utilities and Transportation Commission. Over the years we have worked with them on their cer- tified intrastate liquid and gas programs. This agency has consistently achieved the highest level of funding we could make available as a reflection of their successful performance of their responsibilities. We would be concerned about any lapse in this performance during a transition to a second agency. Having reviewed the bill adopted by your Legislature, I must note that we would have some concern if there were any legal uncertainty surrounding the agency re- sponsible for interstate liquid pipeline oversight. I would hope that a means can be found to avoid this problem. . I thank you for your strong interest in promoting pipeline safety and look forward to working with you to achieve that objective. Sincerely, KELLEY S. COYNER, ENCLOSURES Senator GORTON. Thank you, Governor. You have two distinguished members of the legislature with you, and in light of the letter that you’ve just received from OPS, is the legislation that they’ve sponsored and that I take it that you're about to sign, is that adequate to meet what you consider the re- sponsibilities of the state to be? Governor LOCKE. The legislation that was sponsored by Senator Spanel and Representative Linville does enact most of the rec- ommendations of the task force that I formed several months ago. The Office of Pipeline Safety, however, has expressed a few con- cerns that are more technical issues dealing with whether or not the duties that the state would assume with the delegation of au- thority that’s being proposed by the Federal Government might be diluted if it were in several agencies, and so a letter from Ms. Kelly Coyner is strongly suggesting that the oversight be continued to be housed in the current Utilities and Transportation Commission. The Office of Pipeline Safety is concerned that in our legislation, it’s being bifurcated into two different agencies, but I think that this can be solved. So I see no reason why the delegation of author- ity can’t proceed, so that the state can just help enforce the Federal standards, using the same Federal standards or whatever the Fed- eral standards might be, and hopefully those Federal standards will be toughened up, but we’re ready to do it. We’re willing to use our own state resources to do it and to bring our people into the task, and so I think with these two legislators here, if there are any further technical amendments or corrections that need to be made we can address those in a special session now under way in Olympia. Senator GORTON. You’ve anticipated my next question. While Senator Murray's bill that has my support calls for Federal assist- ance to the states, that’s not a certainty by any stretch of the imagination. You feel that you can secure adequate resources to deal with this delegation here? 35 Governor LOCKE. Yes, we believe that we’ll be able to find the dollars because this is of such utmost importance for safety in com- ºtes throughout the State of Washington, we will make it WOICK. Senator GORTON. Do you think that Senator Murray's bill dele- gates the state and local governments an appropriate amount of authority? Governor LOCKE. Yes, I do, and I very much support Senator Murray's bill and also Representative Metcalf's bill. No. 1, it would require the Federal Government to set even tougher standards, and No. 2, it enables or clearly indicates to the Federal agencies that they must enlist the support of the states, and those states that are willing to do it, like the State of Washington should not be thwart- ed in their effort. We should not have to wait until there’s a death before the Office of Pipeline Safety is willing to consider that dele- gation and sharing of responsibilities with the state. The Federal Government, excuse me, the Office of Pipeline Safe- ty, has been woefully negligent in this area. There are many states ready and willing to step up to the effort to help out using our own nickel, our own resources and the Federal agency should not be re- luctant to engage in that partnership with the states. Senator GORTON. We have at least heard the rumor that the Ad- ministration may want to take back that right to delegate power to the states even in the limited amounts that it already has. I know neither of us is going to approve of anything like that, and you feel that the states have a potentially a far greater scope, not a lesser scope than the present statute allows? Governor LOCKE.. I firmly believe that it's thoroughly proper for the Federal Government to set minimum standards, and that the states should have the latitude to set tougher regulations on top of that to really protect our citizens just like in the area of tanker safety through our straits and so forth. The Federal Government should help set a minimum floor, but the states should not be pre- cluded from enacting tougher regulations to deal with any par- ticular circumstances in their communities, and clearly, given our environment and the fact that these pipelines are going right through the heart of communities, we should be able to ensure our citizens that we’re doing everything we can, especially since the Federal Government or the Federal agency has been woefully inad- equate in this area. - Senator GORTON. Thank you. Senator Murray? Senator MURRAY. First of all, Governor and Harriet Spanel and Kelli Linville, thank you for the tremendous amount of work you did in working this through this legislative session, and I am de- lighted to hear that you’ve received a letter from Kelly Coyner on a state delegation of authority. I’m glad that they have responded to you. I have a couple of questions. They have agreed to delegate the authority. It sounds to me like you need to deal with the concern of the split delegations or split regulations. You will be able to deal with that in special session so that that concern can be addressed? Governor LOCKE.. I believe we can address that, whether admin- istratively or through legislation in Olympia, if necessary. What 36 Ms. Coyner has indicated is they’re sending us some draft agree- ments and our lawyers are working on it, and our administration people are working on it. This comes about after I came back to Washington, D.C., about 2 weeks ago and I had a very long meet- ing with Ms. Coyner and Secretary of Transportation, Rodney Slater, and impressed upon them that in seeking this delegation, we were not seeking Federal funds, that we were not using this as a pretense for greater Federal funds, that we’re prepared to do this on our own nickel, using our own resources, our own people, be- cause this is so incredibly important. Senator MURRAY. I want to make it clear, what they’re able to delegate to you is to regulate current Federal standards, and un- less we raise the Federal standards to higher training and certifi- cation standards and inspection standards, you don’t have much more authority than is currently out there, and we need to do that as part of the next step in this process. Governor LOCKE. That is correct. Again, this delegation would be basically letting the states be almost an extension of the Federal agency, but we all know that the Federal standards are too lax. They need to be tightened up, and so we welcome your legislation to insure that the Office of Pipeline Safety is enacting and promul- gating the most stringent requirements with respect to integrity of the pipes, inspection, enforcement, and monitoring, but then states should also have the latitude to go even farther than the Federal Office of Pipeline Safety rules and regulations. - Senator MURRAY. Which is what we do in our legislation. Governor LOCKE. That’s right. Senator MURRAY. You indicated or responded to the question about resources which is absolutely a critical one. This is obviously a very hotly discussed topic here in the State of Washington right now. Five years down the road from now, it may not be if we all do our jobs correctly, and we all hope we do. How do we know that 5 years from now, 10 years from now when leadership changes and other people are in place that they will continue to commit those same resources and follow the same standards that we are all so adamant about today? Governor LOCKE. Well, I can’t guarantee the caliber of the people at the Federal agency or the number of inspectors throughout the states, throughout the western United States, and that’s why I think it’s important that each state be granted the authority if they so choose to be an extension of the Federal Government, and that's why it’s important that states also have the latitude to enact tougher standards knowing that their citizens, their children and their civic leaders will be demanding greater scrutiny. Basically, you know, we're closer to the people here, and if we at the state level are not doing the proper job, those citizens will have greater success in making sure that the job is done as opposed to trying to lobby or convince the Federal Office of Pipeline Safety. Senator MURRAY. My concern is just that when budgets get tight and issues become more difficult, will resources remain there for the state to be able to oversee that and that will be the responsi- bility of all legislatures at the time, I assume, and Harriet, you wanted to add something? 37 Senator SPANEL. In the bill we have the ability to look at funding in the form of fees from the users. Senator MURRAY. Kelli, did you have any comments? Representative LINVILLE. We also had anticipated a potential problem with the division of the two departments and hopefully had signalled our willingness to revise the legislation for the fact that caused a problem with the delegation, and I did bring a copy of our legislation and a copy of the summary and was very happy to hear both of your comments. I think we included a lot of your interests in how you would change the Federal law in our state law, and be very grateful and speaking on the fact of, on behalf of the people in the community if in fact these recommendations that we’ve worked so hard to put together would get included in some Federal legislation that ups the standards, because as you said if we get the delegation, the delegation we get now is only to inspect to the Federal standards. I believe we can still do a better job in Washington State with the Federal standards than the Office of Pipeline Safety has been doing, but I would implore you to develop greater standards. I think the citizens of this community are de- manding prevention not response, and stricter standards are going to be what takes care of that. Senator SPANEL. I would just add—in listening to testimony on the bills in Olympia, it's more than just Bellingham at this point. It is all up and down the I-5 corridor, and I think this is a bill that shows that a lot of people really supported it. It passed unani- mously out of the senate demanding exactly the things that Gov- ernor Locke has stated: that we want tougher rules on the Federal level, want to be able to make tougher rules on the state level, and we do want the authority to enforce them. I understand your ques- tion on funding, and that is why we do know there has to be an- other source, but I, for one, would never turn down Federal dollars in the future. Senator MURRAY. Well, thank you very much to all three of you for the tremendous amount of work you’ve done. You’ve done a good job. We now have a responsibility to do ours. Thank you very much. Senator GORTON. Governor, thank you. I do appreciate, you’ve now become a national spokesperson and a national leader on this subject, and your words are being heard in Washington, D.C., and Senator Spanel, Representative Linville, congratulations. You work faster than we do. Senator SPANEL. We have shorter sessions. Governor LOCKE. Thank you. Senator GORTON. The next panel is a group of local officials along that I-5 corridor, Mayor Asmundson, Mayor Tanner, Deputy Mayor Marshall and City Manager, Joe Hoggard. Mayor Asmundson, I share the compliments that Senator Mur- ray began this hearing with and would also like to thank you for #ing this facility available for a hearing. We really filled up city all. Mayor ASMUNDSON. Yes, indeed, you have filled up city hall. Senator GORTON. And we are, since you’re our host, you will start this panel group testimony. 38 STATEMENT OF MARK ASMUNDSON, MAYOR, BELLINGHAM, WASHINGTON Mayor ASMUNDSON. Thank you very much, Senator Gorton, and also to Chairman McCain and to other members of the Commerce Committee conducting the field hearing today. I appreciate the op- portunity to testify before the Committee, and I’m very grateful to see Senator Murray with us, also, so thank you. The City of Bellingham, its citizens and I think the other mayors and representatives of citizens up and down the I-5 corridor appre- ciate the opportunity to discuss pipeline safety. I’m going to try and not repeat much of what you’ve heard today, and much of what I’ve spoken with you both about in the past, but I will try to focus on some issues that I think just do not leave me in the course of my learning about pipelines and interstate pipelines in this country. The Olympic pipeline which travels through Bellingham goes through 21 cities in Washington, cities with a combined population of nearly 800,000. It also goes through very many environmentally sensitive areas, lakes, aquifers, salmon bearing streams and crit- ical wetlands habitats. Following our June 10th disaster, I began a period of intense in- volvement in learning to understand the fuel pipeline industry, its regulatory regime, and the circumstances that might have led up to the horrible event that occurred here in Bellingham, and I dis- covered that this event was not unique. As Senator Murray said earlier, this is not a unique occurrence. Based on the history of the pipeline industry in the United States, I concluded that this event could have been expected. In fact, given the current state of affairs involving interstate fuel pipelines in America, the issue is not will pipelines leak, the question is when will they leak, where will they leak, and how bad will the harm be. Over the course of the last two decades, there's been a long his- tory of disaster after disaster. Sometimes there's serious injury. Sometimes there's death. There's always serious environmental damage. While these continuing occurrences cause alarm, what * even more alarm, I think, is the answer to the question wny. The Federal Government has preempted the regulation of pipe- line safety. The Office of Pipeline Safety in the Department of Transportation has the responsibility of carrying out the Federal Government's protection of the public from the hazards of inter- state fuel pipelines, but the Office of Pipeline Safety has done a re- markably poor job over the years, remarkably poor job. In part, this is because of limited resources. However, my observations of the record indicate to me that the fundamental problem with the Office of Pipeline Safety is a lack of will on the part of the Office of Pipe- line Safety. The OPS does not aggressively and effectively pursue public safety. It seems intent on making certain that it takes no action that will be unacceptable to the industry they’re charged with regulating. So much so that the Office of Pipeline Safety fails to comply with the explicit mandates of Congress as you pointed out earlier. The rules under which the pipeline industry operates simply must change. Clearly the Federal Government must establish min- imum levels of safety that must be followed by this industry 39 throughout the country. However, the Federal Government’s legiti- mate concern and need to protect interstate commerce does not pre- clude states having a meaningful role. A partnership can and should be established between the Federal Government and states whereby states can protect their citizens without interfering in interstate commerce. Interestingly, if the Office of Pipeline Safety were doing its job, we wouldn’t have a debate, because we wouldn’t be asking for dele- gation of authority to the states to protect our citizens, because it would have been done, but it has clearly not been done. It’s not even come close to having been done, and it is for this reason that I personally and with the enthusiastic support of the community of Bellingham support Senate Bill 2004, prepared by Senator Murray and cosponsored by you, Senator Gorton. I believe that this bill together with similar efforts that the house of representatives set forth in House Bill 3558 by Represent- ative Metcalf will accomplish changes that are necessary to ensure that not only will we have a strong, viable fuel distribution system in America, but we can have a strong, viable fuel distribution in America that does not endanger our environment, does not kill our children and allows our citizens living near pipelines to go to sleep at night without anxiety about their personal safety. Now, I’d like to talk a little bit about pipeline safety from the perspective of what it means in practical human terms as a life- time resident and citizen of Bellingham, and as a person who hap- pens to be the mayor right now. Fundamentally pipeline safety is not about legislation. It’s not about Federal bureaucracy. It’s not about concepts. It’s about people, and it’s about the environment. When a pipeline rupture occurs, it doesn’t happen in a committee hearing. It doesn’t happen in an agency office. It happens in a neighborhood or in a park or a wetland, farm or over a stream. The effects of the rupture are not theoretical. They’re not abstract. They’re very real, and in Bellingham's case it meant attending the funerals of three wonderful boys in 1 week along with a community of thousands of mourners. It meant the disruption of our water supply for a quarter of our citizens while alternate facilities were being developed. It meant the indefinite delay in the restoration of a salmon habitat restoration project. It meant children were afraid that their neighborhoods might blow up. It meant anguish, ques- tioning, grieving and in most cases a totally unsatisfied search for rational answers to the question why. In Bellingham's case it means great frustration on the part of lo- cally elected officials like myself when asked by citizens, “What will you do to make sure that we are safe?” The answer, “I will do the best I can, but my hands are tied by Federal law,” is not very satis- factory. The disaster in Bellingham was not unique. As Senator Murray pointed out, they occur all over the country regularly. In one way though, Bellingham was unique, because Olympic Pipe Line Com- pany had failed to keep its franchise current, and as a consequence of that, the City of Bellingham had the opportunity as a controller of property to enter into an agreement with Olympic which re- quired it to do very specific things, very specific things that will en- sure the safety and the protection of the people of Bellingham, 40 things like hydrostatically testing its pipeline, a thorough review of its computer monitoring system, a review of the placement, location and operation of all the valves, a provision for a leak detection sys- tem, provision for a thorough and adequate staffing and training program, and comprehensive analysis of the entire Olympic system to ensure that all aspects of its operation including management, training and operating procedures are sufficient to ensure that it will operate in a safe fashion. We were able to do this simply, be- cause they failed to renew their franchise a few years ago. Senator GORTON. How long is the franchise period? Mayor ASMUNDSON. The franchise period was 30 years, and it had expired. The franchise was entered into in 1965, and it expired in 1995 and just through lack of continuity, it was not renewed. So we had this window of opportunity to engage in very sophisticated safety protection for the people of Bellingham. Ironically, we did that in 3 months. We achieved for the people of Bellingham what I think is a blueprint for the other commu- nities in Washington and should be a model for pipeline safety for this country. But the ironic question I have to ask is, with no back- ground or history in dealing with fuel pipeline operations, the City of Bellingham in 3 months was able to develop a comprehensive pipeline safety program that truly meets the needs of our commu- nity both now and into the future—why is it that after receiving millions upon millions of dollars in Federal funds, having an expert staff and decades to accomplish this, the Federal Office of Pipeline Safety has been unable to do so? In 3 months we came up with a package that will protect citizens. The Office of Pipeline Safety in response to this accident has been very attentive. It has adopted many, many of the things that we achieved through our pipeline safety agreement with Olympic Pipe Line Company, but I think what the citizens demand is not a Federal agency that is very capable of coming up with corrective action orders after an injury, after a death, or after an environ- mental disaster, but rather an agency that is oriented toward pre- vention and looks to the future. The Office of Pipeline Safety must be made accountable. The state legislature has taken the steps it needs to take in order for the State of Washington to be a strong partner in protecting our citizens, but the effectiveness of that legislation does not lie with the Governor as to whether he'll sign it or not. The effectiveness lies with the Federal Government and whether or not adequate au- thority will be given to the states to make a meaningful difference to protect our citizens in our community and our environment. I really must thank Senator Murray and Senator Gorton. I must thank you both for the incredible hard work that you have done. I need to thank Jean for her hard work. I need to thank Dale and the rest of your staff for the hard work that they’ve done on this. The people of Bellingham and Washington State deserve to know how hard you have worked on this issue and how important that is to us, and I personally thank you for your commitment to mak- ing a difference, to seizing this opportunity to truly make a dif- ference and change the status quo. Stephen Tsiorvas, Wade King and Liam Wood did not deserve to die on June 10th, 1999. You know that, and it’s my hope that the 41 memory of these wonderful boys and their needless sacrifice will encourage you and all the members of the senate and Congress to ensure that no other parents, no other elected officials, no other friends must sit before another committee of the U.S. Senate at . time in the future and repeat the tales that you’ve heard today. Thank you for the opportunity to be here. [The prepared statement of Mayor Asmundson follows: PREPARED STATEMENT OF MARK ASMUNDSON, MAYOR, BELLINGHAM, WASHINGTON My thanks to you, Senator Gorton, and to Chairman McCain and other members of the Committee for conducting the field hearing today. I appreciate the oppor- tunity to testify before this Committee. I, and the citizens of Bellingham appreciate the opportunity to discuss the important subject of pipeline safety and to highlight the inadequacies of the current methods of oversight of the safety of the interstate fuel pipeline network in the United States. - In Bellingham, we have experienced, in a dramatic, tragic, and profound way, the failure of the current system of ensuring pipeline safety in America. As you know, on June 10, 1999, the Olympic pipeline, which passes through Bel- lingham, ruptured, spilling one quarter of a million gallons of gasoline into a park and creek in the middle of our city. The gasoline vapors ignited and two boys and a young man were killed as a result. The city park was severely impacted and the salmon-bearing stream was effectively sterilized for one and one-half miles of its length. But for the inadvertent ignition by two of the boys, the gasoline would un- doubtedly have proceeded into and through downtown Bellingham into Bellingham Bay, the result of which would have been even further devastation to our commu- nity. - It goes without saying that the people of Bellingham are concerned about the safe- ty of the Olympic pipeline and the safety of pipelines throughout our country. The Olympic pipeline travels through twenty-one cities in the State of Washington. The combined population of these cities is nearly 800,000 people. A significant portion of this pipeline passes through highly urbanized areas, as well as environmentally sensitive areas including lakes, salmon-bearing streams, aquifers and critical wet- land habitats. In Bellingham, the Olympic pipeline travels through many neighborhoods, near Schools, across city parks, and traverses three salmon-bearing streams. Following the disaster, I began a period of intense involvement in understanding the fuel pipeline industry, the regulatory regime, and the circumstances that could have led up to the kind of event that occurred in Bellingham on June 10, 1999. I discovered that the Bellingham event was not unique. Based on the history of the pipeline industry and the spills that have occurred over recent years, I have con- cluded that this event could have been expected. Given the current state of affairs involving interstate fuel pipelines in America, the issue is not will pipelines leak, but when will they leak, where will the leaks occur, and what kind of harm, great or small, will result from the leak or rupture? Over the course of the last two decades, there is a history of disaster after disaster involving interstate pipelines. Many of these have resulted in serious injuries or death. All of them have resulted in serious environmental damage. (Attachment “A.” highlights several significant leaks.) Having looked at the history of pipeline accidents in America and finding that the track record of safety for pipelines is truly alarming, the question I had to ask my- self is: Why? How can this continue to happen? While the ongoing occurrence of accidents such as the one that occurred in Bel- lingham causes alarm, the answer to the question of why these continue to occur is even more alarming. The federal government has preempted regulation of pipeline safety. It is clearly within the power and purview of the federal government to do so. The alarming fact is that while the federal government has prevented states and localities from engag- ing in safety and environmental protection-oriented regulation of pipelines, it has not come remotely close to ensuring that pipelines will be operated in a safe fashion. In fact, in reviewing the many recent comments of Mr. Hall, the chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, it is apparent that the OPS has consistently failed to take steps reasonably calculated to result in safer pipelines in our commu- nities. - 42 Why is it that the OPS has done a poor job of making pipeline operations safe? In part, it is because of limited resources. It is true that the OPS has not been ade- quately funded, particularly until the most recent past. However, as a result of my observations and review of the record, I have concluded that the fundamental prob- lem is a lack of will on the part of the OPS. Rather than aggressively and effectively pursuing public safety, the OPS seems intent on ensuring that it takes no action º the agreement and concurrence of the industry it is charged with regu- ating. I have also discovered that the OPS has failed to comply with the explicit man- dates of Congress with regard to safety and environmental protection. For example, Congress has mandated that the OPS adopt regulations for unusually sensitive areas and adopt regulations regarding use of internal inspection devices. The dead- lines for completing these actions passed years ago. The OPS has simply failed to accomplish these mandates. That is not to say that the OPS did not undertake these mandates, but it is curious to note that whenever agreement with the industry could not be achieved, the regulatory process effectively ground to a halt. Even as you hear this testimony today, and witness for yourselves our tragedy, the regulatory process has not produced the safety regulations required by Act of Congress. As I stated earlier, the Bellingham incident is not unique. Other communities have experienced similar tragedies, and as a consequence, like Bellingham, and like the State of Washington, these communities have been awakened to the inadequa- cies of the federal regulatory environment. Other states have sought to improve the safety of their citizens through establishing comprehensive programs of pipeline safety within their states. The full effectiveness of these efforts, however, has never been realized, and the safety potential that could have resulted from these proactive actions by states has never been achieved because of the unwillingness of the fed- eral government to release its stranglehold on regulatory authority over the pipeline industry even when that federal regulatory authority stands unused and .#. Consequently, states like Minnesota and California, which have established very thorough programs for pipeline safety, have never been able to achieve their full po- tential because of the unwillingness of the federal government to allow states to have a meaningful role in ensuring the safety of their own citizens and the desire of the OPS to maintain complete control over every aspect of the industry. This de- sire for complete control by the OPS is demonstrated by its determination to with- draw from the agency arrangements that it has in place with four states authorized in the past to inspect, but not regulate federal interstate pipelines within their boundaries. The City of Bellingham, with many other cities and counties in the state, has been working for passage of state legislation authorizing much more extensive pro- tection of our citizens related to pipeline safety. The question as to whether or not this effort will be successful is not, however, in the hands of the state legislature or the governor, but in the hands of the federal government. Unless Congress is willing to allow states to have a meaningful role in ensuring the protection of their citizens through an active program of regulation of interstate pipelines, this effort, like the efforts in California and Minnesota, simply will not accomplish needed safe- ty and environmental protection. - The rules under which this industry operates simply must change. In order for that to occur, changes are required by the federal government. Since the federal gov- ernment has shown its unwillingness to regulate effectively this industry and pro- vide the protection that our citizens and environment need, deserve and demand, it is the responsibility of the federal government to allow states to protect their citi- zens. This is not to say that the federal government should abandon the regulation of pipelines. I would be the last to argue for such a step. Clearly, the federal govern- ment must establish a minimum level of safety that must be followed by any inter- state pipeline operator. However, the federal government’s legitimate concern about interference with interstate commerce need not prevent states from providing for the safety of their citizens. A partnership can be established between the federal government and states whereby states can protect their citizens without interfering with interstate commerce, particularly in cases where the states have expertise or where the federal government could have acted, but the federal regulatory agency has chosen not to act. - It is for this reason that I heartily support Senate Bill 2004 offered by Senator Murray and cosponsored by Senator Gorton. I believe that this bill, together with the similar effort in the House of Representatives, as set forth in HB 3558, intro- duced by Representative Metcalf, will accomplish the changes necessary to ensure that not only do we have a strong, viable fuel distribution system in America, but we have a strong, viable fuel distribution in America that can and will be operated in such a fashion that it does not endanger our environment; does not kill our chil- 43 dren; and allows our citizens living near pipelines to go to sleep at night without anxiety about their personal safety. My testimony thus far consists of an overview of the results of my quite extensive examination of pipeline safety in America, the Federal OPS, and the attempts by certain states to improve the safety of their citizens. I would now like to discuss what pipeline safety means in real, practical, human terms. Fundamentally, pipeline safety is not about legislation, and it is not about federal bureaucracies. Pipeline safety is about people and the environment. When a pipeline ruptures, it doesn’t rupture in a committee hearing, and it doesn’t rupture in an agency office; it ruptures in a neighborhood, or a park, or a wetland, or over a stream, or in a farmer's field. The effects of the rupture are not abstract or theoretical, they are real. They are practical. In Bellingham's case, it meant attending the funerals of three wonderful boys in one week, along with a community of thousands of mourners. It meant the disruption of the water supply to one-quarter of the citizens of our community, and restrictions on water use, while alternate facilities were being developed to provide an adequate water supply. It meant the indefinite delay of salmon restoration projects on a salmon-bearing urban stream. It meant the devastation of one and one-half miles of wildlife habitat along a stream corridor in the midst of one of the older and best-established parks in our community. It meant children afraid that their neighborhoods may blow up. It meant anguish, questioning, grieving, and, in Some cases, a totally unsatisfying search for rational answers to the question, why? In Bellingham’s case, it means great frustration on the part of local elected offi- cials like myself. When asked by citizens, “what will you do to make sure that we are safe?” the answer, “I will do the best I can, but my hands are tied by federal law” does not satisfy. In addition to the mayors here today, I wish it were possible for there to be sitting at the table with me, Mayor George Spadoro of Edison, NJ, City Councilman Robert Mann of North Blenheim, NY, and Mayor Bill Greenup of Fredericksburg, VA. They are just a few of the mayors and other local elected offi- cials we have reached out to who could tell you about the enormity of the disaster visited on their communities by pipeline accidents over the years. I believe they would echo my comments. While the pipeline disaster in Bellingham was not unique, in a very important way, the Bellingham situation is unique. For reasons unknown, in 1995, the Olym- pic Pipe Line Company (“Olympic”) allowed its franchise (its right to cross city prop- erty), to expire. As a consequence, the City of Bellingham was in a strong bar- gaining position to require that very explicit safety measures be taken by Olympic as a condition for permission to utilize our property. As a result of this quirk, we have been able to take steps that we believe will ensure the protection of Bel- lingham’s citizens. These steps included requiring: Hydrostatic testing of the pipe- line; a thorough review of the computer monitoring system; a review of the place- ment, location, and operation of all valves; the provision of adequate leak detection systems; provision for thorough and adequate staffing and training; and a com- prehensive analysis of the entire Olympic pipeline system to ensure that all aspects of the system, including its management and operating procedures, are sufficient to ensure that it will operate in a safe fashion. Remember, though, we were able to do this because of Olympic's failure to renew its franchise a few years before this tragic accident. The question, however, is “why is it necessary for a community to rely on a glitch, a happenstance, a mistake by the pipeline company in the maintenance of its fran- chise, for us to have the ability to protect our citizens?” It shouldn’t be. With virtually no background or history in dealing with fuel pipeline operations, the City of Bellingham, in a period of approximately three months, was able to de- velop a comprehensive pipeline safety program that meets the needs of our commu- nity. Why is it after receiving millions upon millions in federal funds, having an expert staff and decades to accomplish the same, the OPS has not been able to do so? Hon- orable members of the Committee, the reason that this has not occurred is because the will to do so has not been present. We have, through our actions, provided for the safety of our citizens. We are con- fident that Olympic's pipeline, should it restart, will be safe because of the actions we have taken in our pipeline safety plan. What we have achieved in such a short time is something that the citizens of every community in this state and the citizens throughout this country, are entitled to receive. They will not receive this level of protection unless action is taken to change the status quo. The OPS has not ade- quately served the public interest. Congress needs to take steps to protect our citi- zens and our environment. The OPS must be made accountable. It must be required 44 to fulfill its mandate. Senator Murray's legislation creates an environment which will result in an accountable agency and a responsive system of pipeline safety. Steven Tsiorvas, Wade King, and Liam Wood did not deserve to die on June 10, 1999. May the memory of these wonderful boys and this needless sacrifice encourage you to take steps that will ensure that no other parents must sit before another Committee of the United States Senate at some time in the future and repeat the tales that you have heard today. - ATTACHMENT “A” Examples of Major Pipeline Accidents (1980–1999) Accidents (1) Fredericksburg, VA 1980 (and again in 1989) 330,000 gallons of aviation fuel entered the city water supply, and the Rappahan- nock River, shut down the water treatment plant, a state of emergency was de- clared, and businesses and residents hauled water for a week. Causes: Pipe damage upon installation, subsequent undetected corrosion, operator error, insufficient valve placement. (2) Moundsview, MN 7/8/86 An 8-inch gasoline pipeline burst, gasoline flowed along neighborhood streets until it was ignited, killing 2 people who burned to death and injuring 7. Causes: Failure to correct known defects, inadequate pipe specifications, inad- equate operator training including delay in responding. (3) Flathead Indian Reservation, MT 1986–1993 Seventy-one leaks and three major spills of gasoline, aircraft fuel, and diesel (in- cluding 163,000 gallons into a creek) over this period resulted in the Flatheads re- fusing to renew Yellowstone's franchise and move the line off of the reservation. Causes: Inattention and failure to correct defects. (4) North Blenheim, NY 3/13/90 A liquid natural gas pipeline burst sending 100,000 gallons of product flowing down into the town—enough to engulf the entire town. Residents noticed a “heavy fog” on their windshields, until one called and notified a company employee. Two people were killed and seven injured. Causes: Negligent maintenance procedures resulting in cracks in the pipe which yº. undetected; operator error; insufficient remotely operated valves and check Val VeS. (5) Reston (Herndon), VA 3/28/93 - Pipe burst sending a geyser of diesel fuel (407,000 gallons) into the storm sewer and eventually into a tributary of the Potomac River. (Could have been gasoline or jet fuel.) Significant environmental damage ($1 million clean-up). ºftes: Third-party damage causing corrosion which went undetected for a long period. (6) Edison, NJ 3/23/94 Natural gas transmission line burst and exploded. 1500 residents evacuated and $25 million damage. Injuries included minor burns and cuts from broken glass. Causes: Line hadn’t been “pigged” since 1986, but it had deteriorated; no remote automatic valves; pipe manufacturing standards lax; no extra measures for highly populated areas. (7) Allentown, PA 6/9/94 Natural gas pipe burst and product flowed underground into the basement of an 8-story retirement home, where it migrated through vents into other floors and was eventually ignited. One death and 55 injuries. Causes: Company employee (backhoe operator) error; no excess flow valves which had been recommended by NTSB since 1972; insufficient public awareness. (8) Reedy River, SC 6/26/96 Fuel oil pipeline crossing the river burst resulting in a $20 million clean-up effort. Causes: Pipeline corrosion not responded to soon enough; computer malfunction;. employee error; inadequate leak detection. (9) Lively, TX 8/8/96 Liquid natural gas pipeline burst, killing two men who accidentally ignited it. Causes: Inadequate corrosion protection. 45 (10) Murphreesboro, TN 11/5/96 84,000 gallons of diesel fuel (could have been gasoline) and $5.7 million damage. Causes: Corrosion; operator error—3%2 hours before detection. (11) San Juan, PR 11/21/96 Thirty-three people killed when a liquid natural gas line exploded. º Employee negligence in responding to a leak which had been ongoing for a Week. (12) Bellingham, WA 6/10/99 Notes None of these accidents were the result of “third party damage” with the exception of the Reston incident. All of them could have been prevented—if safety recommendations had been acted upon. The common causes of pipeline accidents are: • anomalies in the pipe not detected or not acted upon • operator inattention or error • computer system malfunction - • shut-off capability insufficient or improperly deployed • leak detection insufficient On average 6 million gallons spilled each year; 8 million last year. Since 1996, 54 accidents investigated by NTSB, resulting in 209 recommenda- tions. Since 1986, 39 deaths/189 injuries (natural gas); 35 deaths/247 injuries (liquid products). Pipeline companies involved: Colonial, Yellowstone, Koch, Olympic, Williams, Texas Eastern, and others. Koch just fined $30 million for 300 separate spills of 3 million gallons in six states º 1990 and 1997; leak detection system: wait until it breaks. (See attached article.*) Further resource: Battelle Labs’ “Causes of Pipeline Incidents, Effect of the Aging Infrastructure on Incidents and Areas of Technology Development,” Robert J. Eiber (1994), delivered at an OPS summit on pipeline safety. Senator GORTON. Thank you, Mayor. Mayor Tanner? STATEMENT OF JESSE TANNER, MAYOR, RENTON, WASHINGTON Mayor TANNER. Senator Gorton, Senator Murray, thank you for the opportunity to testify on the petroleum pipeline safety, and the provisions we feel are necessary in pipeline safety reauthorization legislation. - Renton serves as the headquarters for the Olympic Pipe Line Company and many miles of petroleum pipeline run through Renton. There have been two major Olympic Pipe Line production leaks in Renton. In 1986 a leak at a blocked valve in the Maple- wood residential neighborhood resulted in 80,000 gallons of gaso- line entering the ground water, seeping into the Cedar River which is home to the largest sockeye salmon run in the lower 48 states, and causing explosive levels of fumes in five homes. These homes where evacuated for a week. Remnants of petroleum contamination still exist within a 1,500 foot long ground water plume. The only reason that ground water plume has not leached into our aquifer, our drinking water aquifer, is there's an aquitard layer that pre- vents it. It’s still there, and the possibility still exists that will in- vade our aquifer. *The information referred to was not available at the time this hearing went to press. 46 In August 1999, 3,500 gallons of petroleum product from a bro- ken pump at Olympic Pipe Line's Lind Avenue control center es- caped to the ground. Internal smart pig testing of the pipelines in 1996 through 1997 revealed over 270 pipeline flaws, 15 of which are in Renton, and they’re shown on that large map there. There's a small map at- tached to the material which I provided to the committee. Even though Renton's franchise contract with Olympic Pipe Line requires that such information be submitted to Renton, this data was not received until October 1999. In fact, Renton encountered a great deal of difficulty in obtaining this data. After the Bellingham incident, Olympic Pipe Line refused to pro- vide the data on legal grounds. When Renton cited the franchise requirements, Olympic Pipe Line continued to delay until Renton issued an ultimatum that the information be provided within 30 dates or else the franchise agreement would be terminated, and Renton would request the pipelines to be removed from the city. I don’t know how effective that would have been, but anyway, that’s what happened. On the 30th day Olympic provided the smart pig testing data, but it was in a format that could only be under- stood by Olympic Pipe Line employees. The stationing data for the links along the pipeline were not provided. Finally enough information was provided to produce the attached map showing the pipeline flaws in Renton. The map that has been submitted to you shows the location of these pipeline flaws, and of the 15 pipeline flaws in Renton, three involve pipeline metal loss of 50 percent. One of these major pipeline flaws is within 300 feet of Talbot Hill Elementary School, and the other two are located over Renton's sole source drinking water aquifer. The Olympic Pipe Line Company has not repaired or even in- spected these flaws. They feel that they are not required to by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers pipeline regulations which they use, which allows pipelines to be operated with up to 80 percent metal loss under certain circumstances. Renton disagrees with the Olympic Pipe Line's reading of the ASME requirements. These standards call for pipeline sections with gouges and grooves deeper than 12 and a half percent of the pipeline wall thickness to be removed or repaired. Pipeline oper- ation with wall metal loss with up to 80 percent is only allowed if metal loss is due to corrosion pitting, and even then the corroded area must be recoated. Since the Olympic Pipe Line company did not visually inspect the pipeline flaws in Renton, they cannot be sure of what caused the flaws, corrosion pitting or external damage. They have not met the requirement of either provision nor has the Office of Pipeline Safety required them to do so. Olympic Pipe Line Company objects to hydrostatic pressure test- ing the whole pipeline because of concerns about the test damaging the pipeline. We’re not aware of any empiric data that supports this concern. If the company is worried about pressurized water damaging the pipelines, why do we not see a corresponding worry about transient pipe pressure surges damaging the pipeline when it is filled with gasoline? . 47 Congressman Jay Inslee has obtained information indicating that even high frequency electric resistance welded pipe has a history of pipeline seam failure. The Office of Pipeline Safety has required hydrostatic pressure testing only for low frequency electric resist- ance welded pipe. This information from our Representative Inslee indicates that no distinction should be made. The entire line should be hydrostatically pressure tested. Renton is concerned about leak detection. As shown by the 1986 Maplewood leak which was 80,000 gallons occurring over perhaps months of time, smaller but extremely dangerous leaks cannot be detected by Olympic Pipe Line Company’s pressure sensors. Fed- eral regulations should require improved leak detection technology to be implemented particularly in population centers and sensitive aI'éâS. - We also believe that states should be allowed to require use of improved technology that would enable leaks to be quickly detected and located. Renton strongly supports S. 2004 and H.R. 3558 currently before Congress, and we think that each one of those bills has some provi- sions that the other does not, so we would suggest that there is, that the provisions of both bills be combined. Renton is particularly supportive of requiring hydrostatic pres- sure testing every 5 years and the requirement for improved leak detection technology to be implemented. Renton also supports the other provisions of both bills. I would like to close by requesting congressional support in persuading the Office of Pipeline Safety to issue a corrective action notice to Olym- pic Pipe Line Company to require the entire 400 mile pipeline sys- tem to be hydrostatically pressure tested. This is a very necessary stop gap measure that will protect thousands of people exposed to the pipeline until more comprehensive safety regulations can be put into place. Thank you. [The prepared statement of Mayor Tanner follows: PREPARED STATEMENT OF JESSE TANNER, MAYOR, RENTON, WASHINGTON Thank you Senator Gorton for the opportunity to provide testimony before you today. The citizens of Renton, Washington, have a special interest in the safety of hazardous liquid pipelines in that Renton serves as the headquarters of the Olympic Pipe Line Company, and many miles of petroleum pipelines run through our city. I have been invited to speak to you about our recommendations on options the Congress could consider to improve the transportation of hazardous liquids through pipelines in the context of the Committee's pipeline safety reauthorization legisla- tion later this year. I am honored to do so, and I believe that our experience and history with this subject qualify us to present you with facts and perspectives that will be useful to you in your deliberations on the pipeline safety reauthorization leg- islation. Olympic Pipe Line Company and Renton In addition to having their headquarters in Renton, the Olympic Pipe Line Com- pany owns and operates a series of pipelines within the city. The parallel 16-inch and 20-inch lines that run north-south through the city were installed in 1965 and 1973 respectively. The joint capacity of these lines exceeds 14.7 million gallons of gasoline, diesel fuel and jet fuel per day. These large lines carry petroleum product to the Lind Avenue pump station in Renton, where fuel is pumped to Portland, Or- egon through a 14-inch line installed in 1965, and to Harbor Island, Seattle and 48 Sea-Tac Airport through two 12-inch lines installed around 1970. The attached map shows the routing of these pipelines in Renton.* The 16-inch pipeline (which failed on June 10, 1999 in Bellingham) is made of .312-inch wall steel pipe, and the 20-inch line uses .25-inch pipe. These petroleum pipelines run through residential neighborhoods, past schools, and over Renton's drinking water supply aquifer along much of their length. Olympic Pipe Line's history in Renton is somewhat checkered. There have been two major fuel leaks. In early October 1986 an estimated 80,000 gallons of mixed gasoline, diesel and jet fuel were discovered to have leaked into the Maplewood resi- dential neighborhood. The fuel product was released gradually, perhaps over a pe- riod of weeks or months, at the location of a block valve. The leak was not detected by the Olympic Pipe Line Company, but rather by citizens who noticed an iridescent lume spreading into the nearby Cedar River. The Cedar River, incidentally, is ome to the largest sockeye salmon run in the lower 48 states. At about the same time, some residents of Maplewood noticed gasoline fumes in their basements, and the Renton Fire Department was called to the scene. Explosive levels of fuel vapors in basements caused five families to be evacuated from their homes for a week. In- vestigation determined that the fuel had contaminated a 1,500 foot-long plume eight to twenty-three feet underground. The presence of an impervious aquitard layer under the Cedar River caused the contaminant to be released into the Cedar River rather than percolating downward to contaminate Renton’s drinking water supply. Olympic Pipe Line Company provided an 18-month remediation program consisting of ground water pumping, floating petroleum recovery and soil vapor extraction. In 1998 the Washington State Health Department initiated a round of monitoring and testing at Maplewood which once more revealed elevated petroleum hydrocarbons in the ground water. These elevated readings turned out to be contaminants left over from the 1986 event rather than from a new leak. At that time the Olympic Pipe Line Company indicated the intent to leave the petroleum product in the ground, but after the application of significant pressure by Renton, determined to remove the product by use of the air sparging process. The second major fuel leak occurred on August 29, 1999. This spill took place at the Olympic Pipe Line Company’s Renton Lind Avenue headquarters as the result of a transfer pump that had broken leaking product onto the ground. Approximately 3,500 gallons of fuel escaped over an approximate 40-minute period before the leak was discovered by company employees. It was over an hour before the company con- tacted the Renton Fire Department. - In 1996–1997 the Olympic Pipe Line Company conducted an internal “smart pig" test throughout their pipelines to determine the condition of these aging lines. Over 270 “anomalies” or flaws were found at that time. Although at least 15 of these flaws are located in Renton, and in spite of the fact that the Olympic Pipe Line Company had entered into a legal agreement (franchise) to turn over all test results to the city, the City of Renton did not receive this information until October, 1999. Furthermore, the information was only received after repeated requests that in- cluded an ultimatum that we would terminate the franchise agreement and request that the pipelines be removed from Renton. Now that we have the test results, and have mapped the flaws, we have significant concerns about the safety of the pipe- lines. I will discuss these concerns later in this testimony. Renton’s Concerns We are very aware of, and nervous about, the tragedy that occurred in Bel- lingham on June 10, 1999. We think that it is possible that such an event could happen again. In fact the evidence, and lack of regulatory oversight, tends to make us think that it is likely that such an incident will happen again, if not in Renton, elsewhere along the pipeline. - What is this evidence? First, I will speak of the general considerations. These are aging pipelines—some sections are up to 35 years old. They are high pressure and high volume lines, with a maximum operating pressure up to 1,400 pounds per square inch. The pipelines are metallic, and are therefore subject to corrosion. The product being carried consists of highly incendiary, explosive grades of refined petro- leum. The pipelines run through residential neighborhoods and schoolyards, beneath environmentally sensitive areas, and across salmon-bearing streams. Oversight is provided by a severely understaffed and underfunded federal regulatory agency which, until recently, did not even have an inspector based in the state of Wash- ington. The current federal regulations call for little or no mandatory pipeline or system testing, and do not provide means for assuring safety of the operation. There appears to be no requirement for public disclosure, little oversight on operator train- *The information referred to has been retained in the Committee's files. 49 ing, and no requirement for cooperation, or even communication, with local emer- gency response agencies. State and local governments are preempted from involve- ment in the regulation of this industry, and regulation is only minimally provided by the federal government. Even without more specific information, these ingredi- ents seem to be a recipe for disaster. *- However, we do have more specific information, and that information is chilling. The attached map shows the route of these pipelines through the City of Renton. The blue and pink areas of the map depict Renton's drinking water aquifer protec- tion areas. These areas occur over the top of our sole source potable water supply, so that any petroleum leaks in these areas could have catastrophic consequences to our drinking water. The green lines on the map represent the Olympic Pipe Line petroleum pipes, the blue boxes are schools, and the 15 flaws are flagged out along the routes of the pipes. A key at the lower right hand corner of the map shows what the numeric information in the callouts means. Five of the pipeline flaw callout boxes are red—these indicate the more serious flaws (between 29% and 57% of metal loss in the pipeline wall!). Metal loss indicates the percentage of metal that is missing in the pipeline wall. The most serious pipeline flaw in the City, with 57% metal loss, is located within 300 feet of Talbot Hill Elementary School. Two pipeline flaws with roughly 50% metal loss are located over our drinking water supply. Most of these pipeline flaws are in heavily populated residential neighborhoods. Back in 1996–1997 when the Olympic Pipe Line Company acquired this informa- tion through “smart pigging,” they were not sufficiently concerned to perform any further investigation. They did not provide this information to local government, to school districts, or to residents. It remains the Olympic Pipe Line Company’s posi- tion today that no further action needs to be taken to address these pipeline flaws. They cite the governing standards, ASME B31.4, as allowing corrosion pitting of the pipeline wall up to 80% loss of wall thickness before replacement is required. How- ever, paragraph 451.6.2(a)(1) of this standard states that gouges and grooves having a depth greater than 12%% of the nominal wall thickness shall be removed or re- paired. How does Olympic Pipe Line Company know, without visual inspection, whether the areas of metal loss are due to corrosion or to gouges or grooves? And even if the metal loss were due to corrosion, the ASME B31 Supplemental Manual for Determining the Remaining Strength of Corroded Pipelines states, “in all cases where the corroded region is to be left in service, measures should be taken to arrest further corrosion. Such measures should include coating the corroded region and, if indicated, increasing the cathodic protection level.” To our knowledge, the Olympic Pipe Line Company has not ascertained the cause of the pipeline flaws in Renton, has not taken measures to arrest further corrosion, nor has the Office of Pipeline jº required that this information be ascertained or that any remedial measures e taken. There is only one way that we are aware of to assure that these aging, pitted pipelines can sustain the required test pressure without failing, and that is to hydrostatically pressure test the pipelines. The Olympic Pipe Line Company refuses to do this, and unaccountably, the Office of Pipeline Safety has declined to force them to do so through a Corrective Action Order. The Olympic Pipe Line Company proposes to undertake another “smart pig’’ internal inspection of the pipelines in- stead. Renton takes no issue with performing another round of internal testing. However, the results of such testing cannot be correlated to pipeline strength. Until a test is undertaken that can demonstrate the current strength of the pipeline, no one can say what pressure or operating conditions the pipeline will support. This can only be determined by a hydrostatic pressure test. One of the objections that the Olympic Pipe Line Company has raised regarding hydrostatic pressure testing of the pipelines is the potential that such testing could damage the pipelines. However, the company to our knowledge has not presented Scientific evidence to support this claim. Hydrostatic pressure testing of pipelines is a standard test procedure that has been in use for decades to demonstrate that pipe- lines are capable of sustaining their rated test pressures. If performed correctly, such testing should not result in damage to sound portions of the pipeline. It is true that weakened portions of the pipeline could fail, as was the case with the hydro- static testing in Bellingham. This is the very purpose of the test: to identify weak- ened, dangerous portions of the pipeline so that these sections can be replaced to prevent future catastrophes such as happened in Bellingham. Our question for the Olympic Pipe Line Company is: if you are so worried about test pressures damaging the pipelines when the pipe is carrying water, why do you not appear to be worried about transient surge pressures that also exceed the operating pressure causing damage when the pipe is carrying petroleum products? I would like to mention one other issue concerning strength of pipelines. The Of- fice of Pipeline Safety’s current Corrective Action Orders require hydrostatic testing 50 only for sections of the Olympic Pipe Line that are low frequency electric resistance welded (ERW) pipe. These sections occur mainly in Whatcom County, in the Bel- lingham area. However, Congressman Jay Inslee has investigated the failure history of high frequency and low frequency ERW pipe. He has found information from the Office of Pipeline Safety web site archives that compares the number of failures of electric-resistance longitudinal welded pipes manufactured by U.S. Steel Corpora- tion, and pipe manufactured by Lone Star Steel from 1970 to mid 1984 on gas pipe- lines. This information seems to contradict the assertion that U.S. Steel does not have a seam failure history for high-frequency ERW manufactured pipe. It is my understanding that the majority of the pipeline is made of U.S. Steel and other brands of high-frequency ERW manufactured pipe. A table showing Congressman Inslee’s findings is attached. This information calls into question the Office of Pipe- line Safety’s distinction between the reliability of Lonestar and U.S. Steel pipe, and supports the argument that the entire pipeline should be hydrostatically tested. Renton is also concerned about leak detection. Currently the Olympic Pipe Line Company detects leaks by internal pressure loss. As demonstrated by the Renton Maplewood leak, more gradual leaks, that can also be devastating to safety and the environment, cannot be detected by the Olympic Pipe Line Company’s current tech- nology. We feel that the Federal regulations should require improved leak detection technology, particularly in population centers and sensitive areas. Renton’s Recommendations The City of Renton supports both the Pipeline Safety Act of 2000 (S. 2004) and the Safe Pipelines Act of 2000 (H.R. 3558). We particularly support the provision of H.R. 3558 that requires hydrostatic testing of all facilities once every 5 years, and the provision of S. 2004 requiring the use of equipment to detect and locate leaks. We support improved certification and testing of operators, improved corrosion test- ing, better notification of spills (particularly of the local agencies which are charged with providing emergency response), and delegation of authority to states. Providing additional funding to the Office of Pipeline Safety also seems like a sound provision. This agency does not appear to us to be equipped to handle the challenges of regu- lating petroleum pipeline safety in the face of growing distribution systems and aging infrastructure. Providing additional funding to this agency would seem to be particularly essential if more regulatory authority is not delegated to the states. Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to make an appeal to you to take a step that would help the citizens of Renton and others living along the route of the pipelines sleep better at night. This appeal is to contact Kelly Coyner, Adminis- trator of the Office of Pipeline Safety, and request that a Corrective Action Order be issued to the Olympic Pipe Line Company requiring hydrostatic testing of the entire length of their pipelines. By influencing the Office of Pipeline Safety to do so, defective sections of the pipeline could be detected and repaired in the near term, * would significantly reduce the risk of catastrophic failure over the next sev- eral years. Once again, I wish to thank you for inviting me to participate in a process that could provide much needed protection to the citizens of Renton as well as to other residents throughout the country whose proximity to hazardous liquid pipelines ex- poses them to risks that are not currently sufficiently regulated. 51 U.S. Steel Corp and Lone Star Steel Searn Failures §ſº $373 Łóżºłºśńiºffº. Aftić 197 i OtºčíTUDiłłAš. Afti (3 MÁº gº!A. FAft_{j}ºg 1978 ŁOtºčff ſix}}{A} . \\{#_{} MAT&#A}. FAH 3.38: £i£CTRic-R&S$STAf{C& Yºgi Ogg 1973 i_{i}}\;&#Tijſłłłąt. §§ {} #A ſtºłat. FAtt.jpg: £££C'ſſº-RęSłSºct: Yºgi pºp 43%; i_{3}×{3}} {}{}{88; &#_{} #AºA., ºft_{jº: £i.£Cłº-RéSišºct: Wºłogt? - $37(? Łęgłºść; ; ; }{{{{{At º #AA tº Ai. 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