U. S. Department of Transportation Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration www.dot.gov

Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration Restoring Trust In Pipeline Safety Conference November 2006 Kimbra Davis Community Assistance/Technical Services Program Manager

Distribution Integrity Management Program (DIMP) Excavation Damage Prevention Team: Included stakeholders from – PHMSA Distribution utilities State pipeline safety representatives Contractors Common Ground Alliance DOT/PHMSA: DeWitt Burdeaux Public: Bob Kipp, Common Ground Alliance, Vic Weston: Associated General Contractors State: Mike McGrath (MN), Bruno Carrara (NM), Massoud Tahamtani (VA) -- Chair Industry: Rick Lonn (AGL), Bruce Paskett (NW Natural), Michael Jones (PGW), Jenny Brito (ConEd

DIMP Excavation Damage Prevention Task Group Focus What current actions, approaches or practices exist that can be applied broadly to reduce excavation damage Emphasis on comparing damage prevention in states with comprehensive damage prevention programs and effective enforcement

DIMP Excavation Damage Prevention Task Group Approach Reviewed/analyzed data from Available state-level 3rd party and other excavation damage to distribution pipe Damage date for states with vs. without effective damage prevention programs One-call ticket volumes DOT incidents

DIMP Excavation Damage Prevention Task Group Approach Also looked at Damage prevention processes CGA Best Practices Incentives to reduce damage Effective enforcement Public education, including 811 Damage prevention performance metrics Cost/benefit analysis

Findings Total excavation damage numbers are declining but excavation damage still presents the greatest threat to distribution pipeline safety. Excavation damage prevention poses the greatest opportunity for safety improvements. Distribution pipeline safety and excavation damage prevention are intrinsically linked. Excavation damage prevention must be addressed to improve pipeline safety.

Findings States with comprehensive damage prevention programs that include effective enforcement have a substantially lower risk of excavation damage to pipeline facilities and related consequences. Federal legislation is needed to help develop and implement comprehensive damage prevention programs at the state level Requires a partnership of all stakeholders Reducing excavation damage requires affecting the behavior of persons not subject to the jurisdiction of pipeline safety authorities (e.g., excavators working for other than pipeline facility owners/operators). Some states have implemented effective comprehensive damage prevention programs that have resulted in significant reductions in the frequency of damage from excavation. I’ll discuss a bit more on the elements of an effective damage prevention program in a few slides Not all states have implemented such programs. Federal legislation is likely needed to support the development and implementation of such programs by all states. Work on this legislation can begin immediately. This represents the greatest single opportunity for distribution pipeline safety improvements.

Virginia (Effective Enforcement Program) Gas Distribution Excavation Damages per 1000 Tickets

Minnesota (Effective Enforcement Program) Gas Distribution Excavation Damages per 1000 Tickets

Comprehensive vs. Limited

Elements of Effective Excavation Damage Prevention Enhanced communications between operators and excavators Fostering support & partnership of all stakeholders Operator’s use of performance measures Partnership in employee training This should be an exchange of accurate and timely information between the excavator, 1-call center, operator, and locator. The CGA best practices address many of the elements of this communication process and how it can be improved. A pilot project currently under consideration by PHMSA is to research, develop and implement technologies that appear to have great potential to enhance the communication of accurate information between excavators and operators. An example is outreach programs between operators and excavators working around the operators’ facilities. This has resulted in the excavator seeking help with locating or other operator related issues by contacting the operator for help at the “eleventh hour” instead of taking a risk excavating and possibly causing damage, injury or death. Operators must have a quality assurance program in place to monitor and ensure that the locating and marking of their facilities are properly performed. If locating services contracts are used, the contract should include performance measures with incentives and penalties to encourage the contract locator to provide accurate and timely marking of the facilities. CGA Best Practices for Locating and Marking of Facilities, detail the components of an operators’ audit of locators work. Operators also contract with utility contractors to construct pipeline facilities. A quality assurance program with performance measures tied to incentives and penalties must also be in place for these contractors to help reduce damage to the operators’ facilities by these contractors. Effective training of those involved with excavation, the locating of facilities, and the one-call process is imperative in reducing damage to underground facilities. The operators, the one-call center, the enforcing agency and the excavators should partner to design and implement training for operator’s, excavator’s and locators’ employees.

Elements of Effective Excavation Damage Prevention Partnership in public education Dispute resolution process Fair and consistent enforcement of the law Use of technology to improve process Analysis of data to continually evaluate/improve program effectiveness CGA promotes a number of best practices for public education. Partnership by all stakeholders greatly contributes to the effectiveness of a damage prevention public education program. An active damage prevention program brings about many different issues that must be resolved in a timely manner. The enforcing agency is best suited to bring the stakeholders together and facilitate productive discussions to resolve the issues. In this process, the agency must be a partner and ensure fairness for all stakeholders. Although many state damage prevention laws contain enforcement provisions, they may not be effective. Fair and consistent enforcement is the key to establishing credibility for the enforcement of the program. Excavators, 1-call centers, operators and locators should use existing and new technologies to improve the communication of accurate and complete information from the excavators to the one-call centers. 1-call center should employ the best technologies available to accurately depict the information received from excavators on the center’s maps and notify member-operators involved. The center must also be able to efficiently receive the operator’s responses to the excavator’s notices and make available these responses to the excavators. The operators must employ technologies to make available accurate facility maps to their locators. Locators must use the best available technologies to mark the facilities and communicate the marking status to the center. In order to evaluate a damage prevention program, certain data must be collected and analyzed on a regular basis. The results should be used to improve program areas where necessary. For example, consistent reporting and complete analyses of damage data could show root causes of damage, parties responsible for the damages, and other useful trends. Such analyses can be used to justify amending laws, rules, regulations, procedures. The data can also be used to properly allocate limited educational dollars where they are needed.

Legislation H.R. 5782 as amended by T&I H.R. 5782 as amended by E&C Three Pipeline Safety Reauthorization Proposals: H.R. 5782 as amended by T&I H.R. 5782 as amended by E&C S. 3961 Enforcement Notification of in emergency Nine components of effective program

Common Elements Focus on excavation damage prevention Increased enforcement/penalties for those that do not use one-call systems,disregard location markings or fail to take responsible steps to prevent excavation damage. State pipeline safety grants increased from 50% to 80%, contingent on the effectiveness of the state’s damage prevention program Continued funding for CGA Continued funding for One-Call Grants All focus on the need to improve excavation damage prevention The legislation would provide funding incentives for a state to implement an effective damage prevention program through a combination of measures consisting of nine elements. This proposal is supported by both House committees and by industry – not just AGA – i.e. excavators, CGA and the liquids and gas trade associations. The original intent of the DIMP group was that this legislative incentive would add federal funding above and separate from the current funding of state programs, so that current programs today would not be affected in by this added requirement. Current proposals tie the 9 elements of an effective program to the state matching grants, which would grow to a max of 80%.

U. S. Department of Transportation Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration www.dot.gov