Spectra Says PA Pipeline Explosion “Unacceptable,” Blames Pipe Tape
Last night representatives from Spectra Energy held a town hall meeting at the Congruity Presbyterian Church in Westmoreland County, PA to discuss the explosion of Spectra’s Texas Eastern Transmission’s (TETCO) “Delmont Line 27” which exploded in Westmoreland County, PA on April 29 (see Texas Eastern Pipeline Explodes near Pittsburgh, Antis Celebrate). Speaking and taking questions from the audience were Devin Hotzel, manager of stakeholder outreach, Tom Wooden, vice president of operations, Andy Drake, vice president of operations, and Randy Putt, local area manager. According to Spectra, they think a tape coating used on the welds of the pipeline is the culprit–having corroded over time. There may be other contributing factors, but right now they are concentrating on the tape coating which they say was only used for a short period of time–in the early 1980s when the pipeline was built. Here’s a report from the meeting…
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A Washington County, OH man is not happy with Blue Racer Midstream’s construction work on a new pipeline in the area. Heavy rain washed out gravel used as fill for the project. The man was on his way home (rural area) and ran into a ditch because, he says, the work was not done well and is “destroying” area roadways. Here’s the story of a man, a car, a ditch and a rainy night…
Please bow your head in a moment of silence for the 70,000 fallen. Who? More like what. In June 2014 crews were working to frack a Utica Shale well at a Statoil drill pad in Monroe County, OH when hydraulic tubing (not to be confused with fracking) from some of the equipment caught fire. The fire quickly spread to 20 trucks lined up at the pad, burning the trucks (some of them exploding) and creating thick, black smoke that billowed for hours (see 
A trucking company contracted to haul brine (i.e. naturally occurring water from the depths that comes out of a borehole long after drilling operations are completed) for Gulfport Energy crashed last Wednesday early in the morning and spilled 5,000 gallons of brine onto a field, which found its way into a creek, which emptied into a local reservoir serving Barnesville, OH residents (Belmont County). The trucking company is ECM Energy Services Inc. Barnesville was not drawing any water from the reservoir at the time (they have three local reservoirs from which to draw), so there was no threat to the local human population. Neither was there any impact on the local wildlife population. In fact, it was pretty much a non-event–except for the way it was inaccurately portrayed by media outlets like the Columbus Dispatch, whose reporter either intentionally misrepresented the facts, or was too obtuse to understand the facts…
There was a small fire at an Antero Resources well pad in Doddridge County, WV last Thursday. Antero immediately shut down the four producing natural gas wells and contacted local first responders who put the fire out. The important news is that (a) nobody was hurt, (b) the environment was not harmed, and (c) the wells are secure and there is no danger. What happened is this: When natural gas comes out of the borehole, more than just methane comes out. Along with methane comes other hydrocarbons and water. There is a separating unit on the pad to strip out the water and some of the other substances from the methane. That unit failed, allowing some methane to escape which then caught fire. The good new is that safety precautions worked and the fire did not spread. Below are the details…