U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy announced that the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) will be encouraging all regulated pipeline owners and operators to voluntarily adopt new safety management systems (SMS). The utilization of SMS will enhance pipeline safety and is supported by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).
“We are committed to carrying out President Trump’s agenda to unleash American energy in all ways — big and small,” Duffy said in a statement announcing the proposal. “Here at the Department of Transportation, that mission includes ensuring our natural resources can efficiently and securely reach consumers. Enhancing pipeline safety through innovative management systems is just one way we can boost our energy security and lower costs for the American people.”
A safety management system (SMS) is an organization-wide approach to managing safety risk through systematic procedures, practices, and policies. In the pipeline community, SMS is described as a “systematic approach to managing safety, including the structures, policies, and procedures an organization uses to direct and control its activities.”
PHMSA published an Advisory Bulletin in the Federal Register that advocates for the voluntary adoption of pipeline SMS by all regulated pipeline owners and operators.
“Safety Management Systems bring about a much-needed evolution of internal pipeline safety management structures, policies, and procedures that will ultimately lead us to achieve our goal of zero incidents,” said PHMSA Acting Administrator Ben Kochman. “We encourage all regulated pipeline owners and operators to fully embrace the continuous improvement and enhanced safety benefits that come with implementing a pipeline SMS.”
PSMS exists to provide a proactive and systematic approach to risk management of complex processes across the pipeline organization to operate safely and to improve safety performance. PSMS also provides a scalable framework for pipeline operators of varying size, scope, and level of PSMS implementation maturity. PHMSA encourages pipeline operators to develop and to implement PSMS programs, using a framework such as the one detailed in American Petroleum Institute (API) Recommended Practice (RP) 1173: “Pipeline Safety Management Systems” (API RP 1173). The framework should define the elements for identifying, managing, and reducing risks throughout the pipeline life cycle.
Issuance of the advisory bulletin is consistent with section 205 of the Protecting our Infrastructure of Pipelines and Enhancing Safety (PIPES) Act of 2020 (Pub. L. 116-260), which directs the secretary of transportation to “promote” the implementation of pipeline safety management systems by pipeline operators. It also addresses the National Transportation Safety Board's (NTSB) Safety Recommendation P-24-002. Pipeline SMSes offer an organization-wide framework for evaluating, managing, and responding to the safety risks associated with various complex pipeline operational processes. The NTSB has long encouraged pipeline SMS implementation. It first recommended that the American Petroleum Institute facilitate the development of a pipeline SMS following the July 2010 release of more than 20,000 bbls. of crude oil into the Kalamazoo River near Marshall, Mich.
Pipeline owners and operators have implemented pipeline SMSes on approximately 86% of the 2.3-million-miles of the U.S. gas distribution pipeline network. Despite this, many individual operators — mostly smaller entities servicing less than 25,000 customers — have not yet begun implementing a pipeline SMS based on RP 1173 or other similar programs.
The Advisory Bulletin is issued in accordance with NTSB Safety Recommendation P-24-002, which advises PHMSA to issue an advisory bulletin to promote the benefits of pipeline SMS. That recommendation was issued in response to a pipeline release that occurred on Oct. 1, 2021, in San Pedro Bay in California. Additionally, Section 205 of the Protecting our Infrastructure of Pipelines and Enhancing Safety Act of 2020 mandated PHMSA and state authorities to promote and to assess pipeline safety management system frameworks developed by operators of natural gas distribution systems.
