Pipeline repaired, awaiting start OK

MAYFLOWER - Exxon Mobil has replaced the damaged portion of a pipeline that ruptured on Good Friday, spilling tens of thousands of gallons of crude oil into a neighborhood, even as the company awaits federal approval of plans to repair and restart the line that spans about 850 miles from Illinois to Texas.

Officials from Exxon Mobil Corp., the affiliated Exxon Mobil Pipeline Co. and state, federal and local agencies announced Thursday that a new section of the Pegasus pipeline was installed a day earlier, almost three weeks after a 22-foot portion of the aging line broke open in a yard between two houses in the Northwoods subdivision.

On Monday, workers had removed a 52-foot segment of the pipeline, which they cut into two segments, then hauled them to an independent laboratory for metal-related testing.

Also Thursday, Karen Tyrone, vice president of operations for the pipeline company, confirmed that an in-line inspection took place in February in the area of the Faulkner County site where the failure took place March 29. But Tyrone said that inspection was not prompted by any specific concern or problem. Rather, she said, the company is “constantly looking at what we are doing” along its pipelines.

Data from that inspection are not available, she said. Inspections such asthat one would have checked for potential problems with the pipe’s metal not with the pressure, she said.

Authorities also are awaiting laboratory information on the cause of the rupture. Tyrone said she could not estimate when the laboratory analysis will be available. She called it “critical” but said, “It does take some time.”

The February inspection involved tools carried along the pipeline by the flow of the fluids inside it, said David Eglinton, an Exxon Mobil Corp. spokesman.

“The tools contain devices that measure and record the thickness of the steel and identify features to consider for further review (e.g. dents),” he said in an e-mail. “The recorded data is downloaded from the tool when it is taken out of the pipeline. … Workers do not need to be present along the pipeline as the tool gathers data, but may be at various sites to monitor the tool movement.”

The pipeline section that was subject to this inspection ran from Conway, which is near Mayflower, to Corsicana, Texas, he said.

The rupture spilled an estimated 5,000 barrels, or 210,000 gallons, of oil into the neighborhood, two drainage ditches and a Lake Conway backwater, or cove, where much of the cleanup is now focused. Authorities said water sampling has confirmed that the main portion of the 6,700-acre fishing lake remains oil-free. After the accident, workers built a series of barriers to prevent the oil from flowing into the lake.

Built in 1947 and 1948, the pipeline, which was shut down after the accident, “contains both seamless pipe and low frequency electric resistance welded pipe,” according to an April 2 corrective order by the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, which is part of the U.S. Department of Transportation.

For 17 consecutive days, air monitors in Mayflower have shown that hazardous chemicals are at levels either nondetectable or below action levels established by the Arkansas Department of Health, according to a news release issued Thursday by company and government officials.

“As work progresses, there have been reports of an odor at times in some areas that may cause concern,” the release added.

But Faulkner County Judge Allen Dodson told reporters, “You can smell the stuff, and it would still be safe for you.”

Even so, not a single resident has chosen to move back into any of the 22 homes that have been evacuated since the rupture. Authorities have said residents could safely return to 10 of those homes. The all-clear sign has not been given for the remaining 12 homes, inpart because of heavy equipment in the area.

“It may be a significant amount of time before they do enter permanently,” said Bill Rhotenberry, the onscene coordinator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Exxon Mobil Corp. has provided a compensation plan to residents in the Northwoods subdivision in which, among other things, the corporation has offered to buy the 11 houses where oil got onto the property. Tyrone declined to say how many, if any, residents have accepted that offer.

Tyrone said she realized that the spill also has affected some residents outside the subdivision. Company officials are working to address those issues, she said.

Exxon Mobile has said the pipeline was carrying Wabasca heavy crude oil bought from producers in Canada and not “tar sand oil” as others, including some environmental groups, have described it. An energy consultant has previously said that Wabasca heavy crude oil, though, is “effectively” the same type of oil as the tar-sand variety.

In an April 10 letter to the EPA obtained under the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act, Richard Byrne, an attorney for Exxon Mobil Corp., replied to a question asking whether the oil could accurately “be described as tar sand oil, or a type of diluted bitumen.”

Byrne said those terms “are subject to colloquial uses and varying understandings” and reiterated that Exxon considers it to be “conventionally produced Wabasca Heavy crude.” But he added, “ExxonMobil was advised today by the Government of Alberta’s Energy Resources Conservation Board that the oil’s Canadian producers report their production of Wabasca Heavy as bitumen.”

Further, he wrote, the producers “add condensate as a diluent to the Wabasca Heavy crude in order to meet pipeline specifications.”

During the cleanup, workers have been removing oil-soaked dirt, grass and other vegetation, including that in the worst-hit yard, which resembled thick black mud for a time.

Ryan Benefield, deputy director of the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality, said Thursday that the dirt was “oil-contaminated” but had tested non-hazardous after samples were taken. As a result, he said, the dirt will be sent to a municipal landfill.

“It’s not uncommon for oil-contaminated material” to be found nonhazardous, Benefield said..

A waste disposal plan signed April 6 had called for disposal of non-hazardous solid waste at a Tennessee landfill, ADEQ spokesman Katherine Benenati said in an e-mail. An April 12 revision called for disposal at a Saline County landfill.

The oil spill was among the issues raised Thursday during a State Department public hearing in Grand Island, Neb., on the proposed Keystone XL pipeline. It would carry crude oil from Canada to Gulf Coast refineries at a rate of more than 800,000 barrels a day.

Among those testifying was Glen Hooks, a Little Rock resident who is a senior campaign representative for the Sierra Club.

“What I saw in Mayflower, it should never happen in Arkansas,” said Hooks, who as a child visited his grandparents in Mayflower. “It’s heartbreaking to see oil-soaked birds in Mayflower. This should never happen in America.”

An organization called the All Risk, No Reward Coalition, which opposes Keystone XL, released Hooks’ comments.

Northwest Arkansas, Pages 9 on 04/19/2013

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