While TransCanada PipeLines Ltd. acknowledges that significant failures have occurred in its natural gas pipelines, the company maintains that its safety record is among the best in the industry and its proposed Coastal GasLink pipeline through Northern British Columbia does not represent a threat to residents or the environment.
Shela Shapiro, TransCanada's senior communications specialist for the Coastal GasLink project, said in a recent interview that the company takes safety seriously and can respond promptly to any incident.
"We invest hundreds of millions of dollars each year to maintain the integrity of our system," she stated. "We monitor our pipeline system through a centralized high-tech control centre 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. We use satellite technology that sends data every five seconds to our monitoring centre. If a drop in pressure is detected, we can isolate any section of our pipeline by remotely closing valves on the system within seconds."
She added that TransCanada has an Emergency Preparedness and Response team that oversees all emergency response activities, and employees who look after the company's pipeline infrastructure on a daily basis are adequately trained to provide initial emergency assistance.
"The model that works best for a linear piece of instructructure such as a pipeline is to ensure that each and every one of our technicians working along our route are trained first responders," she explained. "We also work regularly and do exercises with first responders in the various communities in which we operate so that we can respond quickly in the unlikely event of an emergency. After initial response, TransCanada will assess the situation to determine if additional resources are required."
If the Coastal GasLink pipeline is built, TransCanada will have emergency response plans in place to address incidents that might occur along the route. Shapiro said that it's too early in the project to discuss specifics.
"As we get closer to operation of the pipeline, emergency response plans that include locations of personnel are required by law. As Coastal GasLink is still going through regulatory review, those plans won't be fully developed until closer to operation, as there may still be route changes and active personnel changes. In the unlikelihood of an emergency incident, our Regional Emergency Operations Center (REOC) -- (the body) that would provide initial response coordination and communications with the regulator and community authorities -- would be located in our Prince George office."
Shapiro couldn't comment on how long it would take for one of the company's emergency response teams to reach the site of a rupture. "We respond immediately upon detection/notification of an emergency event," she indicated. "We meet all regulatory requirements as it relates to response time."
Despite TransCanada's preparations and focus on safety, several sections of its pipeline network have failed.
Since 1991, the Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB) has investigated at least eight incidents involving natural gas pipelines owned by TransCanada. The board, however, is only responsible for investigating incidents on federally-regulated pipelines, and the proposed Coastal GasLink pipeline will be provincially-regulated.
Shapiro acknowledges that serious accidents have occurred along TransCanada's national and international network of natural gas pipelines. She takes exception, however, to statements by pipeline critics that the company’s safety and inspection procedures are inadequate.
“We strongly disagree (with critics), and have the information to prove it,” Shapiro stated. “Our construction standards are among the highest in the industry, and we have an industry-leading safety record to prove it. The standard benchmark for pipeline safety in Canada is incidents per thousand kilometres of pipeline per year. At 0.114 incidents per thousand kilometres of pipeline, our gas pipeline incident rate is lower than the Canadian and European averages.
“Liberty International Underwriters just awarded TransCanada a Gold Safety Award for achieving a lost days of work rate that is 1,000 times better than the rest of the industry group they represent,” she added.
Most of TransCanada’s natural gas pipeline failures have occurred in older lines, and were attributed by the TSB to either Stress Corrosion Cracking (SCC) or Microbiologically Induced Corrosion (MIC) that resulted from a deterioration of the anti-corrosion coatings used on pipelines. SCC occurs when stress creates cracks (often microscopic) in an alloy, thus opening the material to corrosion, while MIC results from microbiological organisms and can affect both metallic and nonmetallic substances. Both are often difficult to detect, and can lead to sudden, catastrophic failures.
Shapiro said the company has learned from these and other incidents, and has improved its pipeline construction, monitoring, and maintenance techniques. New coatings, such as Fusion Bond Epoxy (FBE), have proved effective in mitigating the risk of pipeline corrosion.
“We’ve improved the way we build and operate pipelines,” she said. “TransCanada safely operates over 68,000 km of natural gas pipelines, many dating back to the 1940s and 1950s. Statistically, failures are very rare, but if they occur, we always learn and incorporate improvements. These failures have driven advancements in inspection and repair technologies that now benefit all pipelines. The safest and most cost-effective way to mitigate these failures is to put many layers of quality into the materials and construction during original construction in the first place, which we are doing.
“We employ 900 professional engineers and technologists that manage all aspects of integrity and maintenance of our pipelines. In 2015, we will do 150 proactive in-line inspections of our pipelines -- a rate that far exceeds others in the industry. We invested more than $90 million over the last five years on research and development related to pipeline safety technologies, and $38 million in 2014 alone... (and) an average of $900 million per year over the last three years on pipeline integrity and preventative maintenance programs.”
Shapiro stressed that the company’s proposed Coastal GasLink pipeline will be constructed to the highest standards. It will, she added, be monitored and maintained using state-of-the-art technologies.
“No one has a stronger interest than TransCanada in making sure that our pipelines are designed, constructed, and operated safely and reliably,” she said. “The public and our shareholders expect it, because it not only makes good business sense, it is just common sense. Safety and reliability is key to ensuring TransCanada is able to continue operating and building the energy infrastructure North Americans need for years to come.”
TransCanada PipeLines Ltd., through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Coastal GasLink Pipeline Ltd., proposes to build a 670-km natural gas pipeline linking Northeastern BC with the LNG Canada’s planned Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) plant near Kitimat. If the company receives a positive investment decision, construction of the 48-inch-diameter line could begin in 2016.
A section of the line will be constructed south of Burns Lake.