TOPEKA The Keystone Pipeline was working inside the limits of its allow when it was it erupted and launched practically 13,000 barrels of oil in northern Kansasan organization govt stated on Tuesday.
Gary Salsman, vp of discipline operations for TC Power, which owns the Keystone pipeline, testified earlier than a joint assembly of two Kansas Home committees within the morning and earlier than the Senate Utilities Committee within the afternoon. He answered pointed questions from lawmakers about the reason for the spill, the cleanup, and their issues about TC Power’s transparency.
Salsman assured the committee that no spill is appropriate to the corporate and his response staff will stay on the web site of the spill, which has turned Mill Creek black.
These response efforts will proceed till we absolutely clear up the positioning, Salsman stated.
However about how lengthy the cleanup will take, why the spills on the Keystone pipeline are getting extra frequent and how lengthy a months-long no-fly zone for drones will forestall the media and different events from viewing the positioning, Salsman had little to share.
Canada-based TC Power remains to be investigating the basis explanation for the spill, which resulted in a weld defect that burst below the pressure of bending the pipe.
We perceive what occurred, Salsman stated. At this level we do not perceive why.
Salsman stated TC Power expects to listen to extra within the coming weeks.
The Keystone Pipeline runs 2,687 miles and carries crude oil from Canada to the US. It splits simply north of the Kansas-Nebraska border with a route by northeastern Kansas earlier than crossing into Missouri and Illinois. The one which exploded runs south by central Kansas and leads to Texas.
The spill was initially estimated at 14,000 barrels, or 588,000 gallons, however the firm revised that estimate to 12,937 barrels. It’s the largest spill up to now decade that the pipeline has been in operation.
Salsman stated the corporate recovered greater than 95% of the launched oil.
TC Power has paid simply over $300,000 in fines for greater than 20 prior spills. That is 0.2% of the greater than $111 million in property harm ensuing from these spills.
Transparency
Throughout his testimony, Salsman was lauded by some members of TC Power’s transparency committee following the spill. The corporate devoted an internet web page to supply updates.
Rep. Sandy Pickert, R-Wichita, thanked Salsman for the frequent updates the corporate posted within the first few days after the spill.
So the lesson could be if one thing like this occurs in my space, I can go surfing and discover out, she stated.
However Salsman didn’t reply to pointed questions from Rep. Lindsay Vaughn, D-Overland Park, and Rep. John Carmichael, D-Wichita.
Carmichael requested Salsman when he anticipated the job to be completed.
Salsman replied that TC Power could be on web site till the realm was absolutely cleared.
I perceive, Carmichael stated. My query is: when do you intend to finish this work?
Salsman stated it’s going to take a couple of months to finish the most important cleanup with one other month of effort afterward.
Carmichael continued to foyer Salsman, saying landowners and residents are involved about it.
When ought to we count on to complete? Carmichael requested once more.
Salsman replied: Consultant, sadly, isn’t fully inside our management.
Carmichael concluded, “The reply is, you do not know.”
Salsman stated the cleanup could be carried out in accordance with requirements set by the Environmental Safety Company and the Kansas Division of Well being and the Surroundings.
Once more, Carmichael stated: The reply is, you do not know.
Vaughn expressed concern in regards to the rising quantity and growing severity of spills alongside the Keystone pipeline, citing a Authorities Accountability Workplace Report 2021. He requested Salsman what the corporate thinks of this development and what it’s doing to keep away from future spills.
Salsman reiterated that no spill is appropriate to the corporate and he all the time goes out of his means to answer emergencies.
Vaughn pressed Salsman as to why the spills are getting extra frequent and worse.
Salsman stated once more that these incidents are unacceptable and that security is the corporate’s high precedence. However he stated the corporate can all the time do higher.
I have been with this firm for 25 years, he stated, and we all the time do the appropriate factor.
After the Home morning committee, Salsman and different TC Power executives scrambled out the door and refused to reply follow-up questions. They evaded reporters down three flooring of the Kansas Statehouse.
Reporters had been advised to direct follow-up questions on air and water high quality, web site entry and timing for cleanup to a multimedia electronic mail inbox. The corporate didn’t instantly reply to follow-up questions from Kansas Reflectors.
Requested that afternoon’s Senate committee listening to what number of spills had occurred alongside the Keystone pipeline, Salsman appeared to not know and, as an alternative, stated the pipeline had suffered “a sequence of accidents.”
TC Power nonetheless has a no-fly zone for drones masking the spill web site. It was first issued within the days following the December spill.
Senator Marci Francisco, D-Lawrence, expressed concern in regards to the media’s incapacity to entry the positioning or use drones to get an aerial view, and requested TC Power to discover a time to grant reporters entry to the positioning to extend transparency.
However Salsman stated staff on the bottom should have particular security coaching to entry the positioning.
“I believe our potential to handle entry to the positioning and ensure folks on the positioning may give attention to cleansing was a key think about enabling us to reply rapidly and get to the place we’re at the moment,” he stated.
Salsman additionally stated it was essential to guard the privateness of landowners whose properties TC Power is occupying throughout the cleanup.
He stated that “in some unspecified time in the future, when the essential part of the cleanup is over,” TC Power could grant entry to the positioning.
What prompted the spill?
TC Power introduced final month that he had accomplished a metallurgical evaluation which confirmed that the pipeline burst was brought on by a weld defect which, below the bending stress of the pipe, had burst.
However he is nonetheless in the midst of analyzing why these circumstances had been there.
Salsman stated the part of pipe that exploded was put in in 2011 and was initially from the pipeline.
Consultant Laura Williams, R-Lenexa, stated TC Power’s web site talks about its pipeline safety investments, together with danger assessments and menace identification and evaluation. She requested if there have been any warning indicators that the pipeline section that blew up posed such a menace.
So far as I do know, we had no indication that the issue existed at that individual location, he stated.
Pipelines in the US are restricted by federal rules by way of the strain they will exert to maneuver oil by pipelines. This regulation limits pipelines to function at 72% of the utmost strain the steel can deal with.
However, with particular permission, Keystone can function at 80% of most strain in response to the 2021 GAO report.
When the pipe burst, it was pushing the boundaries of that waiver, working at 1,153 kilos per sq. inch, Salsman stated. This equates to 80.07% of the 1,440 psi most. Salsman didn’t acknowledge this, however stated the pipeline was working nicely beneath most strain.
Salsman stated the pipeline is at the moment working at 923 psi.
TC Power has been conducting round the clock air monitoring on the web site, Salsman stated.
In his opening remarks, Salsman stated that TC Power acknowledges that it should function with environmental duty.
Whereas we try for zero operational or security incidents, our Keystone system has not achieved that aim, Salsman stated.
