Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration Story Archives

Report: Mountain Valley Pipeline Testing Released Water Again

The June 4 rupture involved an 8-inch connecting hose. According to a report Equitrans filed to Virginia’s DEQ, the release lasted for 15 minutes until a valve was closed, shutting it off.

Updated on Thursday, June 27, 2024 at 4 p.m.

Testing equipment on the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) experienced a rupture in southwest Virginia this month, days before it asked for and received permission to begin carrying natural gas.

The June 4 rupture involved an 8-inch connecting hose. According to a report Equitrans filed to Virginia’s DEQ, the release lasted for 15 minutes until a valve was closed, shutting it off.

The rupture happened after hydrostatic testing of the pipeline, where water is pumped through it at high pressure to demonstrate its integrity. The hose was used to release water from the pipeline section under inspection, following the testing, when the hose failed.

Equitrans Midstream, the pipeline’s builder, reported the incident to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), the Virginia Department of Emergency Management and the Virginia Department of Health’s Office of Drinking Water.

Residents and community groups have been concerned about the project’s safety since a May 1 rupture released a large volume of water and badly damaged a section of the 42-inch main pipe.

They also have expressed anger that Equitrans Midstream didn’t let them know when the pressure testing took place or about the unintentional releases of water, which in some cases caused property damage. A landowner in Bent Mountain, Virginia, reported the May 1 incident.

The June 4 rupture, at Elliston, Virginia, took place 10 days before the pipeline began operating.

Neither the company nor its regulators have shared the details of a laboratory analysis of the pipe that was damaged on May 1. They also did not elaborate on what happened on June 4 and how much water was released.

The DEQ report categorizes the incident as an “unauthorized discharge of pollutant(s)” and identifies the pollutant as non-potable water.

The incident may have affected water quality in the Roanoke River, which supplies drinking water to three municipalities in the area.

The environmental compliance report noted “the South Fork Roanoke River was turbid upstream and downstream,” but added that the condition “was believed to be caused from overnight rain events within this area.”

Natalie Cox, a spokeswoman for Equitrans Midstream, said the 303-mile pipeline “has been safely flowing gas since June 14, 2024.”

Cox said all appropriate state and federal agencies were notified of the incident. It was also reported in a weekly environmental compliance report the company filed with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC).

That document appeared in FERC’s public docket on June 20. The DEQ investigation of the incident was closed the next day.

Cox said Tuesday all restoration activity related to the June 4 rupture had been completed.

Celeste Miller, a spokeswoman for FERC, said the commission was notified “shortly after the occurrence.” Miller referred safety questions to the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, which is part of the U.S. Department of Transportation.

FERC approved the pipeline to begin service on June 11, a day after Equitrans Midstream declared it “mechanically complete.” The commission published a summary of a phone call between officials at FERC and PHMSA, and FERC noted that PHMSA had no objections to granting the approval.

Since construction started on the pipeline in 2018, residents have complained about its impact on their groundwater and drinking water and the erosion due to the steepness of the slopes.

Equitrans Midstream has said it complied with every requirement to complete restoration.

**Editor’s Note: This story was updated to clarify that the failure was in an 8-inch hose, not the pipeline itself.

Safety, Health Doubts Linger Near Mountain Valley Pipeline’s Path

The Mountain Valley Pipeline could start moving natural gas anytime now, but the people who live near it still have questions about their safety and health.

On Tuesday, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved the pipeline to begin operating.

That’s despite a flood of comments on the commission’s public docket in recent weeks opposing or seeking to delay the decision.

Last month, the pipe burst during water pressure testing in Roanoke County, Virginia, and state and federal regulators haven’t shared much information about what happened.

Natalie Cox, a spokeswoman for Equitrans Midstream, which built the 303-mile pipeline, didn’t give a timeline for when gas would begin moving through it.

“Final preparations are underway to begin commercial operations,” she said in an email.

People in affected communities are now wondering what to expect, including Russell Chisholm, of Newport, Virginia, co-director of Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights.

“I think it’s weighing heavily on everybody up and down the 303 miles of the route,” he said in a call Wednesday with reporters.

Chisholm said there were likely to be problems with leaks that could affect residents’ health.

Autumn Crowe, interim executive director of the West Virginia Rivers Coalition, said safety remained a concern for communities near the pipeline.

“It’s important for the public to know, it’s important for emergency responders to know, it’s important for everyone along the route to know when and how much gas is going through the pipeline,” she said on the call.

Jessica Sims, Virginia field coordinator for Appalachian Voices, said regulators had not done enough to reassure the public of the pipeline’s integrity or share sufficient detail about the failed pressure test on May 1.

“The public is still in the dark about important safety and environmental considerations from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration and FERC,” she said.

The groups conceded they had few legal options remaining to challenge the pipeline, but said they would continue to monitor it.

Mountain Valley Pipeline Gets Approval For Service, Despite Concerns

The Federal Energy Commission’s Office of Energy Projects gave its approval late Tuesday, only a day after the pipeline’s builder, Equitrans Midstream, declared the project “mechanically complete.”

The federal government gave the Mountain Valley Pipeline permission to begin service Tuesday despite lingering public concerns about the safety of the long-delayed project.

Terry Turpin, the director of the Office of Energy Projects, told Equitrans that the 303-mile natural gas pipeline was in compliance with environmental and safety requirements.

Turpin cited recent construction status reports, agency compliance monitoring and a staff inspection conducted May 13-17.

He also cited communication with the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, part of the U.S. Department of Transportation. Turpin indicated that the associate administrator for pipeline safety, Alan Mayberry, said in a phone call earlier Tuesday that his agency had no objections to FERC giving the pipeline its approval.

In contrast, dozens of comments opposing the authorization entered into the FERC public case docket in recent weeks.

Landowners, environmental groups, state lawmakers and county commissioners based their opposition, in part, on a May 1 rupture of the pipeline during pressure testing in Bent Mountain, Virginia.

Neither regulators nor Equitrans have disclosed the cause of the rupture or whether they will share the results of a metallurgical analysis.

The rupture released an unknown volume of municipal water and sediment into adjacent properties.

The pipeline is intended to move as much as 2 billion cubic feet of gas a day from West Virginia to Virginia.

The nearly $8 billion pipeline’s foes have been raising alarms about it for a decade since it was first proposed. The 42-inch-diameter pipe crosses hundreds of rivers and streams and encounters some of the most remote and rugged terrain in Appalachia.

They had been successful in challenging it in court until a year ago, when Congress enacted the Fiscal Responsibility Act. It approved all remaining permits the pipeline needed for completion.

Jessica Sims, Virginia field coordinator for Appalachian Voices, said regulators ignored the local concerns presented to them for years.

“Community members and environmental watchdogs have pointed out the flaws in this project for years, and these fundamental problems with the pipeline remain,” she said in a statement. “By allowing MVP to advance despite all these serious hazards, the system meant to protect our communities, land and water has failed.”

The pipeline’s supporters applauded the decision but criticized the delays to the project.

“MVP’s road to completion was marred by frivolous lawsuits and bureaucratic red tape that ultimately required an act of Congress to finalize,” said Charlie Burd, executive director of the Gas and Oil Association of West Virginia. “For the good of our country, policymakers must do everything in their power to ensure the permitting delays MVP faced don’t become the norm.”

Mountain Valley Pipeline Builder Declares Construction Complete

In a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on Monday, Equitrans Midstream declared the project “mechanically complete” and in compliance with environmental and safety requirements.

The builder of the Mountain Valley Pipeline has asked federal regulators to give authorization for the natural gas pipeline to begin service on Tuesday.

In a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on Monday, Equitrans Midstream declared the project “mechanically complete” and in compliance with environmental and safety requirements.

The nearly $8 billion, 303-mile pipeline has been under construction since 2018.

Equitrans also told FERC it had completed water pressure testing on “all project facilities.”

A section of the pipeline burst during a pressure test on May 1 at Bent Mountain, Virginia.

It remains unclear whether FERC took the test failure into account. A pipeline safety watchdog asked FERC to give the project more scrutiny because of it.

The company has maintained that the incident warrants no safety concerns and demonstrates how the testing reveals problems that need to be corrected.

Residents, community groups, state lawmakers and county commissioners have asked FERC to deny the pipeline’s application for service.

Equitrans told FERC it had satisfied all aspects of a safety agreement it reached in October with the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

The company cited the demand for the product in requesting quick regulatory approval.

“Multiple shippers have executed agreements to commence transporting volumes using the project facilities beginning the day after the project declares in-service, which further heightens the need for prompt authorization to meet market demands,” its letter said.

Construction of the pipeline was slowed by court challenges until a congressional spending deal last summer removed the regulatory and legal barriers to its completion.

Jessica Sims, Virginia field coordinator for Appalachian Voices, one of the groups that opposes the pipeline, said the people who live near it have unanswered questions about the pipeline’s readiness to begin operating.

“The community is in the dark about important safety and environmental considerations from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration and FERC, while Mountain Valley Pipeline pressures FERC to prioritize the company’s sales schedule,” she said in an email.

Federal Pipeline Regulator Oversees 3 Million Miles, Including MVP

Curtis Tate spoke with Cynthia Quarterman, the former head of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration from 2009 to 2014.

The Mountain Valley Pipeline is under scrutiny from federal regulators after it failed a pressure test in Virginia last month.

Curtis Tate spoke with Cynthia Quarterman, the former head of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration from 2009 to 2014, about the federal agency’s role in regulating 3 million miles of pipeline.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Tate: What role does PHMSA play in commissioning a pipeline? Is it involved in the testing process? Or mainly once the pipeline begins operation?

Quarterman: Ordinarily, I would say that it is more of the latter than the former. It’s involved after the pipeline gets into service much more than it is during construction. Now, that’s not to say that they are not involved. They do go out while pipelines are being put in and inspect them.

But the fact of the matter is, it’s so few inspectors and so many miles of pipeline that it’s difficult to get everywhere you want to be. Just looking at the record on this pipeline, it looks like the agency is saying they’ve been out 200 and something days, which sounds like quite a few times, although that’s been over many years. (The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission) is the one who decides that it is OK for them to proceed with building a new pipeline. And they are responsible for ensuring that the construction of the pipeline meets all the safety standards.

Tate: The MVP is under a consent decree with PHMSA over the integrity of the coating on the pipe that prevents corrosion. What is PHMSA looking for? How would they enforce it?

Quarterman: The MVP has to prove that they’ve met the terms of the consent decree. I haven’t seen the terms of consent decree in a great detail. So, I don’t know if they have required a third party that PHMSA chose to look at what MVP has done, but the coating and the pressure test are extremely unlikely to be related.

The issue of having pipeline around for a long time, especially if it’s already coated, is that the coating can disbond from the pipe. Crevices and cavities, where corrosion could then be created because of water seeping in under the coating and that one spot becoming a pit and becoming corroded. Unlikely to have the kind of effect in this time period to make the pressure test fail. I’m just shooting off the hip here. It’s probably related to some sort of a problem at the seams or the welds, and less likely to be corrosion. On to the point where it’s created a pit so big that it’ll cause the pipe to fail from the pressure test. This is something that is not necessarily required to be reported to the public, so we’ll see if PHMSA requires MVP to tell them what the cause was, and whether that gets communicated more broadly.

Tate: PHMSA is a relatively small agency overseeing a vast system of pipelines, right?

Quarterman: Yes, it is. And when I left, one of the things I was pushing for more inspectors and the numbers have grown substantially since then, but you’re still talking about a couple of hundred people who are overseeing 3 million miles of pipeline.

Tate: MVP crosses through some very rugged and remote terrain, with very steep slopes. Can it carry gas safely under high pressure?

Quarterman: It is certainly the safest way to carry oil and gas across the country. I have been out for inspections. I remember going out to some of the pipeline inspections where it looks like you’re going up a mountain. The pipeline is going up and coming down the other side. Obviously, there are pipelines under a great deal of the rivers and streams across the country. And for the most part, you have no idea they’re there, because they have been operating for so long without a problem, but there are occasions when horrible things happen, obviously.

Tate: The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission must soon decide whether to allow the MVP to begin operation. What should we expect?

Quarterman: I don’t know anybody over at FERC. I don’t have any inside knowledge. They’re pretty independent. So they’re going to make an independent decision about this. Hopefully, they will have a conversation with their sister agency PHMSA to talk about what is the current status of the consent decree, what they think about what happened with the pipeline. I’m hoping that they discuss with PHMSA what it means. I don’t know that they will. They tend to be pretty independent, meaning they don’t always, always reach out to speak to other people when they make their decision.

Tate: How persuasive is the public comment FERC receives?

Quarterman: I’m sure it’s considered. Now I’ve practiced before the rate hearings but I’ve never worked there. I don’t know who the current commissioners are, where their leanings are or anything like that. It’s going to depend upon the chairman of that commission and where they want it to go, whether they have the votes to either push it forward or delay it further.

Regulating The Mountain Valley Pipeline And High School Student Takes Up Band Director Role, This West Virginia Morning

On this West Virginia Morning, the Mountain Valley Pipeline is under scrutiny from federal regulators after it failed a pressure test in Virginia last month. Curtis Tate spoke with Cynthia Quarterman, the former head of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration from 2009 to 2014, about the federal agency’s role in regulating 3 million miles of pipeline.

On this West Virginia Morning, the Mountain Valley Pipeline is under scrutiny from federal regulators after it failed a pressure test in Virginia last month. Curtis Tate spoke with Cynthia Quarterman, the former head of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration from 2009 to 2014, about the federal agency’s role in regulating 3 million miles of pipeline.

Also, in this show, just before the start of the fall semester last year, the band director at Midland Trail High School left for another job. With no one else to take over, senior Carol Nottingham stepped in. We bring you this story from student reporter Kelsie Carte.

West Virginia Morning is a production of West Virginia Public Broadcasting which is solely responsible for its content.

Support for our news bureaus comes from Shepherd University.

Emily Rice produced this episode.

Listen to West Virginia Morning weekdays at 7:43 a.m. on WVPB Radio or subscribe to the podcast and never miss an episode. #WVMorning