December 2019 Issue
In This Issue
Advisory Committee Meetings
PHMSA held a joint public meeting of the Gas Pipeline Advisory Committee (GPAC) and the Liquid Pipeline Advisory Committee (LPAC) on November 14, 2019. The committees discussed a variety of topics to update committee members on both gas and liquid pipeline applicable safety program and policy issues, including:
- Pipeline safety public awareness,
- reauthorization of the pipeline safety program,
- a regulatory agenda update,
- a discussion of safety management systems within the pipeline industry,
- an update on the Voluntary Information Sharing Working Group, and
- an update on pipeline safety’s research and development program.
Presentations from that meeting can be downloaded here.
Pipeline Safety Trust Conference
The Pipeline Safety Trust held its annual conference on November 7-8 in New Orleans, LA. The conference was well attended with representatives from the public, the pipeline industry, regulatory agencies, and government officials. Attendees heard from PHMSA Administrator Howard “Skip” Elliott, Dan Rivera, Mayor of Lawrence, MA, and Don Gilliam, Director, Lincoln County Kentucky Emergency Management. Several pipeline inspection companies participated and brought inspection tools for a show and tell session. Presentations from the conference can be found here.
Next year’s conference will be held in Kalamazoo, MI, on July 24-25, 2020. We hope to see you there.
BTW – The PST is still looking for a Deputy Director.
Shawn Lyon Earns 2019 Pipeline Leadership Award
Congratulations to Shawn Lyon, the president of Marathon Pipe Line LLC, who received the 2019 Pipeline Leadership Award at the Pipeline Leadership Conference, November 6-7, in Houston.
Immediately following American Petroleum Institute’s publication of the Pipeline Safety Management Systems Recommended Practice (RP) 1173 in 2015, Lyon agreed to chair a liquid pipeline industry team to encourage and assist operators in developing pipeline safety management systems. Based on his leadership and advocacy on SMS and implementing API RP 1173, Lyon was also asked to represent the liquids industry on the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration’s (PHMSA) Pipeline Advisory Committee group focused on SMS, created in 2016.
Lyon serves on the Technical Hazardous Liquid Pipeline Safety Standards Committee, an advisory body to the U.S. Department of Transportation that evaluates proposed pipeline safety and environmental protection standards and informs policy initiatives. He also serves on the board of directors of the Association of Oil Pipe Lines (AOPL), is vice chairman of API’s pipeline subcommittee steering group, serves on the API-AOPL pipeline safety excellence steering committee and is on the AOPL Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Policy Committee. Lastly, Lyon serves on the board of the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port (LOOP) and as an owner representative for Marathon Petroleum’s interest in Capline, both of which are significant entities for U.S. crude oil infrastructure. Previously, Lyon served on the Michigan Pipeline Safety Advisory Board, by appointment of Gov. Rick Snyder, from 2017 to 2018.
Shawn is widely considered a champion for safety management systems (SMS) in the pipeline industry and a proponent of building safety culture. “We have a responsibility to protect the public,” Lyon says. “We have to be safe today, tomorrow and in the future. There are families that are counting on us.”
What can TaskOp™ do for you? Webinar
february 17, 2020
New Regulations have you Stressed Out…Don’t Panic…TaskOp™ has your back
This webinar will demonstrate how TaskOp™ can be used to track all of the complex activities associated with the new gas transmission and hazardous liquid regulations.
- Manage inventory of all segments with non-TVC records through the lifespan of MAOP reconfirmation and material verification efforts.
- This is done with easy-to-use dashboards to:
- Track reconfirmation mileage progress.
- Track all your scheduled projects to get your newly regulated pipelines in step with regulations.
- Manage workloads across your compliance team.
- Track implementation progress of new regulatory requirements, including procedure updates, material verification digs, data analysis, assignments of responsibility.
- Utilize the calendar for upcoming agency audits and internal field training / audits:
- Keep up to date with what is coming up and be better prepared for any type of audit.
- Keeps track of all your audit details, findings, follow up records, etc.
- Manage your audit findings by assigning them to personnel, track their progress, and keep track of documentation.
- After everything is in order, you can manage your new workflow tasks for all the newly regulated pipelines within TaskOp™.
- Track inspections, maintenance, and other tasks related to your pipelines.
- Keep everything traceable, verifiable, and complete all in one system.
Click here to register for our What can TaskOp™ do for you? webinar.
TaskOp now has the ability to track inventory and work with barcodes.
We’re taking TaskOp to the next level with barcoding. Let TaskOp track your warehouse inventory of spare valves, meters, parts, etc. and track when they are pulled for projects in the field. Know when you need to reorder items, where items are used and track invoices for accounting purposes. Barcode scanning allows users to quickly scan a barcode to find the part. If you are just starting a warehouse, or barcoding assets, TaskOp can generate those barcodes to print and stick to your inventory – the data required to find records quickly, via scanning the barcode, will already be in TaskOp.
As an added bonus, use barcodes to quickly pull up the latest field tasks without having to search the system. If your assets have barcodes on them and that information is in the asset data in the system, you can scan the barcode and the latest active tasks for that asset will appear in a report, greatly reducing the time needed to find those tasks that a field technician will be doing.
Visit www.rcp.com or contact Jessica Foley for more information.
Season’s Greetings from RCP!
RCP would like to thank our valued clients for a wonderful year. We appreciate the opportunities you have given us to serve as your Professional Engineers, Regulatory Experts, and Trusted Partners. We look forward to working with you on even more projects in the years ahead. Best wishes for the holiday season and the New Year, from your friends at RCP.
We would welcome the opportunity to discuss our services with you.
Sincerely,
W. R. (Bill) Byrd, PE
President
RCP Inc.