Operations
LOOP, Phillips 66 Win 2020 Distinguished Pipeline Safety Awards
The American Petroleum Institute announced LOOP LLC and Phillips 66 Pipeline LLC are the winners of the 2020 Distinguished Pipeline Safety Awards, which recognize operators who have distinguished themselves as champions of industry innovation and operational excellence.
Project Canary to Measure Greenhouse Gases from Rio Grande LNG Facility
NextDecade Corporation and Project Canary announced the formation of a joint pilot project for monitoring, reporting, and measurement of the greenhouse gas intensity of LNG to be sold from NextDecade’s Rio Grande LNG export facility in Brownsville, Texas.
Pipeline Company Recognizes April as National Safe Digging Month
Georgia’s Colonial Pipeline is reminding homeowners and contractors that safe digging must remain a priority to protect people and prevent damage to critical utility services.
Failed Fitting Led to 1,200 Barrel Oil Leak from Trans Mountain Pipeline
The Transportation Safety Board of Canada completed its investigation into a June 2020 release of crude oil at the Trans Mountain Sumas pump station in British Columbia, determining a 1-inch pipeline fitting was the source of the leak.
Tank Car Impact Tests Take Aim at Safety Concerns
Tank cars transport roughly 2 million shipments of hazardous materials (hazmat), carrying goods that are essential to North America’s economy, public health and quality of life. Railroad safety is the key to making it all work. Rail is recognized as the safest mode of transportation for moving bulk shipments of hazardous materials.
New Analysis Tool Can Help Solve Gas and Steam Transient Problems in Pipelines
Applied Flow Technology (AFT) says its new AFT xStream analysis software tool can help engineers rigorously evaluate and solve gas and steam transient engineering problems they have only been able to guess at in the past.
Evaluation of Metal Loss Corrosion with RSTRENG
Corrosion metal loss assessment is a method for evaluating the strength of corroded pipelines that includes criteria from ASME/ANSI B31G, which is a guide for the evaluation of the remaining strength of corroded pipe.
CASE STUDY: Free Span Assessment of Subsea Pipelines
Free spanning of subsea pipelines is a concern during both the installation and operational phase of the pipeline life and needs to be monitored to ensure the integrity of the pipeline.
Diagnostic in Bidirectional Prover - An Innovative Approach
It is important to accurately measure hydrocarbon commodities transferred through pipelines or marine terminals to maximize revenue generation at the point where the ownership of the commodity is transferred.
Edge Computing Optimizes Pipeline Management
For midstream oil and gas companies, edge-computing platforms create opportunities that resolve long-standing problems and effectively enable real-time data in asset management and decision-making,
New PHMSA Rules Ease Burdens, Maintains Safety
The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) re-examination of the Federal Pipeline Safety Regulations should ease regulatory burdens on the construction, maintenance and operation of gas transmission, distribution and gathering pipeline systems, according to the final rule in the Federal Register.
NTSB Looks to Improve Pipeline Leak Detection and Mitigation
The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board named improving pipeline leak detection and mitigation as an item on its “Most Wanted List of Transportation Safety Improvements” for 2021-2022, the agency announced.
Improving Natural Gas Distribution Systems to Ease Pressure Risks
This article examines redundant overpressure protection (OPP) requirements at the city gates in the U.S. and how several operators are at risk of noncompliance as states begin to enforce redundant OPP requirements specifically at the city gates.
ABB Leak Detection, Greenhouse Gas Measuring System Can Help Satisfy PIPES Act
HoverGuard can help operators of USA’s three million miles of pipeline infrastructure increase their safety and environmental capabilities in line with the USA 2020 PIPES Act, the company announced.
GateHouse Maritime to Monitor Gas Pipeline in the Baltic Sea
Poland’s GAZ-SYSTEMS awarded offshore surveillance, maritime analytics and data company GateHouse Maritime a 5-year contract to monitor a new gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea, the companies announced.
Application of Distributed Fiber-optic Sensing for Pipeline Integrity and Security
Distributed fiber-optic sensing (DFOS) describes several technologies that can be utilized to convert a fiber-optic cable into an array of distributed sensors by connecting it to an optical interrogator unit (IU).
Inhibitor Development for Extreme Conditions in Deepwater
Deepwater exploration and production has seen a higher-than-average growth in the past 10 to 15 years when compared to other sectors in the industry, brought about by high and stable production and technological advances that have driven lifting costs down to all-time lows.
Many Benefits Occur Within Integration of the Control Room with SCADA
Implementing comprehensive control room management (CRM) with modern SCADA systems can offer utilities and pipeline operators myriad benefits, particularly when it comes to improving pipeline safety.
Spotlight on Utilities
Routine calls for utility workers led to lives being saved due to their proper training and quick thinking.
Life Extension of Pipelines with Crack Defects Using Composite Repairs
Composite repairs are being used widely to restore the integrity of pipelines impaired by wall thinning arising from corrosion anomalies.
Using Remote Monitoring to Evaluate Pipeline Lightning Immunity
While lightning itself does not cause corrosion, the damage it creates to a pipe’s walls, coatings and cathodic protection (CP) system can leave a pipeline vulnerable.
Duke Energy Begins Replacing Aging Gas Pipeline
Construction got underway on the 12-mile Central Corridor replacement pipeline designed to run though Hamilton County, Ohio, which is in the southeast corner of the state and contains the city of Cincinnati.
SBS Energy Sets Record in GOM Decommissioning Project
SBS Energy Services (SBS) completed a multiphase project to decommission 29,000 feet (8,839 meters) of 10-by-6-inch (254-by-152-mm) insulated pipeline in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) in partnership with Helix Energy Solutions, setting a new offshore snubbing unit/hydraulic workover world record.
Phillips 66 Selects Crux OCM for Pipeline Control Center Operations Pilot
Phillips 66 selected Crux OCM, a pioneer of robotic industrial process automation (RIPA) for oil and gas operations, for a pipeline control center operations pilot.
PART 2: Policy Implications for Satellite-Based Methane Detection
Access to publicly available satellite methane data from TROPOMI, and in future platforms such as those being planned by the ESA Copernicus missions, are animating interest from for-profit companies and not-for-profit advocacy groups interested in using methane data to advance these organizations’ missions.
Integrating Flow Assurance Engineering Domains Ensures Operations in Caspian Sea
Once the term “flow assurance” was coined in the 1990s, continued evolution in the offshore marketplace has demanded that the industry invest in advancing the design, strategies and principles that form the core of the field.
Why Investors Should Care about Challenges Mitigating Gas Flaring
Flaring has been a lightning rod for criticism of the upstream oil and gas sector due to the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions it creates, as well as the perceived wastefulness by the companies who flare. What some may not realize is that the alternative, known as “venting,” is even more damaging.
Managing Integrity for Subsea Pipelines Without Pigging
The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration estimates that 40% of the world’s pipelines are difficult to pig or are deemed “unpiggable,” which means they cannot be inspected via inline inspection, but their integrity still needs to be maintained.
Canada's Suncor Energy Reviewing Mining Safety After Three Workers Killed
The incidents follow accidents during construction of Trans Mountain Corp's oil pipeline expansion, causing it to halt work temporarily.
Corrosion Inhibitor Development for Extreme Conditions
This article discusses corrosion inhibitor development for ultra-deep-water systems that experience most of these extreme conditions, including downhole temperatures as high as 400° F (204° C) and pressures as high as 20,000 psi (1,379 bar).

- Kinder Morgan Proposes 290-Mile Gas Pipeline Expansion Spanning Three States
- Enbridge Plans 86-Mile Pipeline Expansion, Bringing 850 Workers to Northern B.C.
- Intensity, Rainbow Energy to Build 344-Mile Gas Pipeline Across North Dakota
- Tallgrass to Build New Permian-to-Rockies Pipeline, Targets 2028 Startup with 2.4 Bcf Capacity
- U.S. Moves to Block Enterprise Products’ Exports to China Over Security Risk
- U.S. Pipeline Expansion to Add 99 Bcf/d, Mostly for LNG Export, Report Finds
- A Systematic Approach To Ensuring Pipeline Integrity
- US Poised to Become Net Exporter of Crude Oil in 2023
- EIG’s MidOcean Energy Acquires 20% Stake in Peru LNG, Including 254-Mile Pipeline
- Enbridge Sells $511 Million Stake in Westcoast Pipeline to Indigenous Alliance