Standards set to protect oil, gas pipelines
Last Updated: Wednesday, November 25, 2009 | 7:01 PM ET
The Canadian Press
A saboteur's bomb blast on Oct. 12, 2008, created a 1.8-metre-wide crater near an EnCana natural gas pipeline about 50 kilometres east of Dawson Creek in northern B.C. (RCMP) The Canadian Standards Association has published a blueprint to help oil and gas companies protect their pipelines from vandalism and sabotage — a need highlighted by recent bomb attacks on EnCana Corp.'s operations in northeastern British Columbia.
The association, in collaboration with the National Energy board, said in Calgary on Wednesday that it has developed standards that pipeline owners and operators can use to identify risks and tailor systems to reduce those threats.
"We've already got a good system and this is going to make it better," said Suzanne Kiraly, president of standards for the not-for-profit organization geared toward improving public safety and health. "It's about making communities, workers and the pipelines even safer than they currently are."
Besides pipelines, the new standards will apply to various storage and processing infrastructure used by the oil and gas industry.
"It can be anything from how your facilities are secured, how you monitor against vandalism, how you share information with neighbours to look for unusual activities — the kinds of pieces of the puzzle that you would put together to guard against risk," said Brenda Kenny, head of the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association.
The B.C. government issued new guidelines in September, but the Canadian Standards Association has developed a national standard.
Canadian companies already do a good job putting safety at the forefront, Kenny said. But instead of having a handful of engineers within a firm deal with the risk, the industry will now be able to draw on a wider pool of expertise, she said.
The new standards will be voluntary, but they could pave the way for regulators to enshrine the guidelines into law, Kenny said.
"They provide an excellent foundation for regulators, who then don't have to recreate the wheel."
The standards follow six bombings of EnCana pipelines in Western Canada over the past 13 months. No one was hurt in the attacks, which mainly targeted the company's natural gas pipelines in northeastern British Columbia. So far, the bombing cases haven't been solved.
Interested companies can buy the report on the standards or arrange for seminars.
