On February 7-8, PHMSA held a joint government/industry research and development forum in New Orleans. The event included approximately 250 representatives from Federal, State and international government agencies, public representatives, research funding organizations, standards organizations, and pipeline operators from the U.S. and overseas. The main purpose of the forum was to develop a consensus agenda of technical gaps and challenges for future R&D and to identify both short and long-term research objectives for liquid/gas transmission and gas distribution pipelines. INGAA was represented by Terry Boss, who spoke on Integrity Management Considerations at the Defect Detection/Characterization Technical Track Session.