Is Pipeline Safety Improving?

Abstract The analysis of historical gas transmission pipeline failure trends in North America shows an improvement over the last twenty years. Many factors are driving the improvement in pipeline safety performance; the introduction of Integrity Management in pipeline regulations, such as the US Code of Federal Regulations, has set forward minimum requirements and brought consistency across pipeline operators for the minimum level of care. This paper addresses the question, is integrity management having an impact on safety performance? Many pipeline operators have extended the application of minimum requirements beyond high consequence areas. Operators have applied and developed advanced internal inspection technologies, threat analytics and integrity planning strategies. In addition, Operators are adopting reliability and risk management frameworks, not only to prioritized assessments in a baseline program, but to perform risk-informed integrity decision-making on an ongoing basis throughout the asset life-cycle. This paper uses publicly available pipeline incident data sets to trend failures and incidents using technically-sound analysis techniques routinely used in high reliability industries to show evidence that pipeline safety continues to improve and that the current levels of safety and reliability are aligned with the expectations of the industry, the regulations, and the public. The paper focuses on pipelines rupture incidents classified by root cause threats, location classes, and health, safety and environmental consequences. A societal risk assessment is used to estimate pipeline residual risks and provide recommendations for integrity management frameworks to advance the standard of care through continual improvement.