Showing posts with label pipelines. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pipelines. Show all posts

February 01, 2017

Healthy Kids Hero 2017 Audrey Schulman, Cambridge MA


For Release February 2, 2017
Contact: Ellie Goldberg, ellie.goldberg@healthy-kids.info
Blog: ​LESSONS OF THE 1937 TX SCHOOL EXPLOSION​ 

Every year, to mark the anniversary of the March 18, 1937 Texas School Explosion, I salute a hero for inspirational leadership and a commitment to the safety of children and their communities.

The Hero Award was created as an annual opportunity to remember the 1937 tragedy — a gas explosion that killed more than 300 people, mostly students, in their new state-of-the-art public school where no expense had been spared except when it came to safety.

One lesson the 1937 tragedy is that a safe quality environment depends on champions with an extraordinary sense of responsibility. We can't take it for granted that elected officials make community safety or health a priority.


Audrey Schulman is the 2017 Hero because of her strategic advocacy and creative leadership confronting the threat of Climate Change. She is raising awareness of methane leaks from old pipelines, engaging ever widening circles of allies and partners, and achieving major advances in utility company cooperation and infrastructure best practices.
​The federal government won’t take action 
on a clean energy future, but we can.“

​Creating a Culture of Responsibility. 
Schulman is a master at connecting the dots from data to public policy. Policy makers, advocates and utility companies who share her sense of urgency about reducing methane emissions rely on Schulman for accurate data, beautifully designed resources, and trusted relationships.

“Audrey took the results from our 2013 Boston gas study to the next level by meticulously mapping leaks from hard-to-access records in over 200 cities and towns in the Commonwealth. Along the way she has engaged and activated communities to create a groundswell of public support to save ratepayer money, our urban trees, air quality and our climate. Audrey is a hero for all these reasons but most of all for our children's health and their future.” — Boston University Professor Nathan Phillips

"Audrey Schulman has diligently worked to reduce energy bills in houses of worship, plug holes in leaking gas lines and make our state's government work better. She's incredibly thorough, creative, persistent and a great contributor to the environmental movement.” — Joel Wool, Advocate for Energy and Environment at Clean Water Action/MA

​... Schulman's efforts will have implications for the efficient and quality management of gas pipelines nationwide and for shaping legislation for regulating utilities. The results will save municipalities, utilities and ratepayers the huge cost of lost gas, avoid disruptive and duplicative road work, lower the health and life-threatening safety risks of neighborhood gas leaks, and reduce the threat of climate change.

Contact: Ellie Goldberg, ellie.goldberg@healthy-kids.info

April 21, 2015

'Pipelines blow up and people die'

After a series of deadly accidents, Congress created an office to oversee the nation’s oil and gas pipelines. A decade later, it’s become the can’t-do agency. By Elana Schor and Andrew Restuccia 4/21/15, http://www.politico.com/
Great graphics online. Read more and see more: http://www.politico.com/story/2015/04/the-little-pipeline-agency-that-couldnt-117147.html#ixzz3XxMadzXw

A Lesson of the 1937 Texas School Disaster: Visualize the Danger. People with responsibility may not have the knowledge or care about precaution.
The official Court of Inquiry acknowledged a series of design, building and operations problems, and unheeded warnings, yet named no one responsible. They concluded that school officials were just "average individuals, ignorant or indifferent to the need for precautionary measures, where they cannot, in their lack of knowledge, visualize a danger or a hazard." (Court of Inquiry, 1937.)

January 08, 2015


Pipeline Association for Public Awareness (PAPA) Video http://vimeo.com/114175332 Not just a training video for excavators, this video includes lots of useful information for schools and communities about energy pipelines, gas and other pipeline hazards, pipeline markers, and the DigSafe 811 hotline. There is  graphic video of pipeline accidents.  More PIPA videos: PIPA: www.pipelineawareness.info

School Pipeline Safety Partnership Introduction Video http://vimeo.com/96512706  This short video shows how to find your school's custom pipeline safety webpage at schoolpipelinesafety.org. Only schools that are enrolled in the program will have a custom webpage on the site. For more information, please email info@schoolpipelinesafety.org.markerillustrations

Find Pipelines Near Your School to help you quickly respond to a pipeline problem and protect students, staff and facilities. 

Permanent Pipeline Markers Pipeline operators place permanent signs, called pipeline markers, along transmission, gathering and hazardous liquids pipeline routes, at roadway and railway crossings and at aboveground facilities to identify the general location of a pipeline. Lines maintained by your local gas company typically do not have permanent pipeline markers. Markers can vary in size, shape and color, but all markers include important information about the pipeline, including the product transported, the pipeline operator’s name and the operator’s emergency contact number.  Line markers do not indicate depth of the line, the number of lines in the area or the exact location of a pipeline. If you are planning an excavation or building project on your school property, even if you have identified a pipeline marker, you must call 811 or your local One-Call center to have pipelines located and marked before digging.  Depending on the specifics of your school’s project, the pipeline operator may elect to be on-site during excavation. Pipeline markers are important safety signs.  It is a federal crime to willfully deface, damage, remove or destroy a pipeline marker.  If you notice a damaged marker, please contact the pipeline operator. 
See examples of different marker shapes.  

School Pipeline Safety Map (available for participating schools) If your school participates in the School Pipeline Safety Partnership program, you can access an online aerial map of your school showing the general location of nearby pipelines by accessing your school’s pipeline safety information page. In addition to a map, school pipeline safety pages include the pipeline operator’s emergency contact number, information about the pipeline and what it transports, and non-emergency contact information for local pipeline and school personnel.  

National Pipeline Mapping System Maps (available for all schools) The federal government provides online maps to help you locate pipelines in your community through the National Pipeline Mapping System (NPMS).  Maps generated by NPMS show the approximate location of gas and hazardous liquids transmission pipelines in relation to specific addresses, major roads, zip codes, cities and counties.  NPMS also provides non-emergency contact information for transmission pipeline operators in your community. Learn more about the types of pipelines that make up our nation’s pipeline infrastructure.  

Aboveground Facilities In addition to underground pipelines, your school may be located near aboveground components of the pipeline system, including compressor and pumping stations, metering stations and storage facilities.  Pipeline markers are posted to identify aboveground facilities as well. Metering stations and compressor and pumping stations are located along gathering and transmission lines.  Metering stations measure flow of product in and out of the pipeline system, and compression and pumping stations push products through the pipeline.  Storage facilities store natural gas or other products.  If you have questions about an aboveground facility near your school, contact the operator listed on the pipeline marker for more information.

Also see: Gas Pipeline Safety Information for School Administrators and Safety Officials (SourceGas Brochure)

April 03, 2013

Safe Schools. Pipeline Preparedness  
Countdown to National Healthy Schools Day April 30
Approximately one in every 20 schools is located within a half-mile of a transmission pipeline or above ground pipeline facility. The Pipeline Association for Public Awareness helps schools improve safety planning and readiness by sponsoring the School Pipeline Safety Partnership. http://www.pipelineawareness.org/schools/
Learn more:
More activities: Bring the Lessons of the 1937 Texas School Explosion to Your School.

Inspiring Nominees
 Aimee Code and John Gann

February 15, 2013


DIG SAFE
Regardless of where you are, there may be pipelines and other utilities buried underground.  It is important to follow safe digging practices, whether you are a homeowner planting a tree or digging a fence post hole, or a professional excavator. Safe digging always starts with a prior call to 811 and someone will come out and mark underground utilities. Knowing what's below enables diggers to avoid underground utilities, and can prevent injury, death, environmental damage and loss of critical services. Learn more about staying safe around pipelines by visiting PHMSA's Pipeline Safety Update.
--  PHMSA has a new page of interest here, dealing with pictures of near misses from the field.
 

February 17, 2011

Getting smart about pipeline safety


Evaluate the need for new U.S. pipeline safety regulations. Older safety standards designed for conventional oil may not provide adequate protection for communities and ecosystems in the vicinity of a DilBit pipeline. The Department of Transportation (DOT) should analyze and address the potential risks associated with the transport of DilBit at the high temperatures and pressures at which those pipelines operate and put new regulations in place as necessary to address these risks. READ MORE www.pstrust.org


The entire report can be download by clicking here

October 05, 2010

Why is that we do not seem to learn lessons from incidents?

PROCESS SAFETY MANAGEMENT INDIA: The Human and Process Safety by Karthikeyan.B
"The San Bruno natural gas explosion has underscored a growing concern about the capabilities of utility employees who watch over the nation's pipelines and whose errors have been linked to a number of mishaps, some of them catastrophic ...