Building Confidence in Pipeline Safety

The intent of this white paper is to provide INGAA members with a framework of recommendations for the next evolution of integrity management based on the management system elements in ASME B31.8, B31.8S and current regulations. The recommendations included in this paper are flexible by design and draw upon the experience of industries that have a risk profile that includes high consequence, low probability events. Operators that have a basic management system built around the B31.8S elements will be able to use this white paper to chart a course to move to the next level, recognizing that any management system must be fit for purpose and fit for the company’s culture.

Programs related to Integrity Management (IMP), Health Safety and Environment (HSE) (including Emergency Management/Incident Mitigation Management), Control Room Management, and Quality Management (QMS) form barriers; layers of defense to incidents. Research indicates that organizational accidents rarely occur due to the breakdown of a single program; usually, it is the alignment of weaknesses across multiple programs that enables compound conditions to result in a high consequence event. Work to make these programs more effective, comprehensive, systematic and integrated is work to reduce the risk of organizational accidents.

This paper includes a brief background on management systems, the principles of making them work, a framework for measurement and the concept of a maturity model intended to allow operators to identify where they are in the evolution of the management system approach and to make choices where they want to go over the next several years.