Did you see the video of the oil flowing through that neighborhood? What a mess!
The pipeline was old, built in 1940 and was probably not even built of steel. I’m told that it was probably cast iron, built with rivets, and nothing like newer pipelines. The pressure testing that the companies are required to do is nothing. It won’t show any problems until there is an emergency.
There was a pipeline explosion, here in Bellingham, WA in the ‘90s and some of the local politicians took credit for toughening the pipeline oversight, but in reality all they did was make sure that existing regulations were followed. It amounted to a big nothing, except a win for the pipeline companies.
The enviros work against themselves on the pipelines by making it so difficult to get permitting through even to replace old pipelines. We have deteriorating pipelines all over the country and can expect to see more incidents like this.
If they would just spend the money right at the start, lot’s of these things are preventable.
Pipelines were made with steel back then. I've worked on upgrades for a couple different ones made back then. Nothing was cast iron and with rivets in that time frame for longm major oil pipelines.
The pressure testing that the companies are required to do is nothing.
The pressure testing is no different for it than other pipelines built today. It might have been different back then, but the FERC regulations are quite clear and this pipeline went through a major expansion a few years back. It operates with the same safety margins. I likely operates a lower pressure since it wasn't built with the exotic alloys used today, but it was built with steel and likely quite thick.
The real concern should be how the maintenance is kept up, how often smart pigs are run through it and what corrosion allowance the company uses before making repairs.