Pipelines Are Not Partisan, They're Critical

The Crude Life

00:00 / 15 Minutes

Summary written by The Crude Life Content Correspondent Genneca Houser

The Association of Oil Pipelines is an influential and important part of the United States gas liquids industry. Andy Black is the President of the Association, and he took some time to talk with The Crude Life about the AOPL, the trials of the previous year, and hopes for the future.

0:34 – Andy discusses the purpose of the Association of Oil Pipelines. The Association is representation of liquid pipelines across America, whether it be crude oil, gasoline, diesel, and other natural gas liquids.

1:22 – Next, we discuss how the AOPL takes a focus on safety. Andy discusses three different areas of focus when it comes to safety; advocating for responsible public policies, work on continuous safety for pipelines, and the third is public education.

“We really want people to be comfortable with the fact that we rely on pipeline everyday and they’re safe and getting safer.” – Andy Black (1:53)

2:07 – We begin to discuss just how many miles of pipelines (200,000 miles and growing!) across the United States that are being monitored for safety through AOPL as well as how the pipelines are monitored. Almost every pipe out there has constant attention through a control room run by operators. Andy spoke a little bit about some difficulties in keeping the control room operators working through the Covid, but said confidently that there were no pipelines shut down through the pandemic.

4:02 – Andy talks about the downturn in 2020 and the hardships that came of that, including logistics issues, safety issues, and business issues. He then goes on to say that gradually we are seeing the industry coming back, but that we will need to see the economy reopen and vaccines will need to be distributed before 100% recovery.

5:45 – Andy goes into greater depth regarding the business issues from this last year. He mentions the price war bringing tension, but Covid was still the most troublesome causing disruptions in supply and demand and setting many projects back. Andy says they’re really looking forward to getting many people back to work.

6:47 – As far as public health is concerned, Andy discussed how interesting the transition was from conducting business as normal, in person, and turning the process into an online event. Getting used to doing business online has taken time to get used to, but now everyone has gotten used to going about daily business online.

7:42 – Here we take a short look into one of the bigger priorities of this year; educating the public about the positive ways that pipelines impact life. That way everyone will be ready to move forward proactively together. The fact is, pipelines are simply the safest way to transport gas liquids, and it has the least amount of carbon emissions making this method of transportation the best way to get our gas liquids from one point to another.

“A pipeline coming in is a good thing. When it’s operating safely it can create jobs and tax revenue and make sure that we don’t have shortages of energy. So we shouldn’t let up on that explanation to the American public about why we need more pipelines and that they’re operating safely.” – Andy Black (8:23)

11:33 – We discuss the possibilities of change and potential opportunities with the new administration in the whitehouse. There may be good things on the horizon because pipeline safety is not a partisan issue. Andy talks about how they just had a success in Congress in December about a pipeline safety law that is supported by both the House, and Senate. They’re looking to ensure that pipeline permitting procedure is fair, balanced, and effective so that it can properly address concerns and get people to work.

“We feel confident that the more that is understood about the safety of pipelines or pipeline construction, the more we should be able to address concerns.“ – Andy Black (12:09)

13:14 – Andy talks with a little more detail about the new pipeline safety law. He says that it will create a few helpful opportunities including a new program to find the best ways to gather information meant to be used to find the best ways to maintain and monitor the safety of our pipelines. The goal is to have government regulations keep up with the advancements in technology being made.

14:43 – The “Smartpig” – a cool piece of tech that sits inside of a pipeline and is pressed through the pipeline and it gathers information. The aim is to find issues in the pipeline before it becomes a real problem; in other words, it’s good preventative maintenance. This is just one way that technology has helped to keep safety standards continuously improving.

“Our goal is zero incidents. Even if we’re at 99.999+%, we wanna be at 100 and the American people expects that, that the pipeline is always going to be able to retain the stuff that’s inside it.” – Andy Black (6:29)

17:10 – In closing, Andy talks about the need for the public to be educated and comfortable about pipelines so that we can all work together to make life better.