Letter to Exxon goes unanswered

Oil giant urged to remove pipeline near drinking water

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

More than six months after the Arkansas Health Department sent a letter urging Exxon Mobil to begin planning for removal of the Pegasus pipeline from 18 of the state’s drinking-water sources, the oil giant has not responded.

Dr. Nathaniel Smith, the department’s director, wrote in a June 3 letter, “The aging Pegasus that traverses vital drinking water source areas poses an unacceptable risk to the health and well being of a large number of Arkansans.”

Smith said the department had identified 18 drinking-water sources that serve about 750,000 Arkansans. Among them are Lake Maumelle, which serves about 400,000 central Arkansans; the Little Red River, used by Searcy; Lake Hamilton, used by Hot Springs; and Cadron Creek, one of the sources for Conway.

The two-page letter followed a March 29 accident in which the 850-mile-long pipeline, built in 1947-48, ruptured and spilled an estimated 210,000 gallons of heavy crude oil into a Mayflower neighborhood. The oil forced the long-term evacuation of 22 homes and reached Lake Conway’s Dawson Cove but not the main portion of the popular fishing lake, authorities have said. Three of the houses have been demolished.

Smith addressed his two page letter to Caroline Henderson, central north area manager for the pipeline company, and to Rodrick Seeley, director of the southwest region of the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, or PHMSA.

Health Department spokesman Ed Barham said that, to the agency’s knowledge, it did not get a response from Exxon Mobil.

“Exxon answers to PHMSA as the regulator and not to the [Arkansas Health Department]. It may have been more to our liking if Exxon had responded but we recognize that they are not legally required to respond to us,” Barham said in an email.

The governor’s office also weighed in on the matter.

Gov. Mike Beebe’s spokesman, Matt DeCample, said Monday, “Of course, the governor finds it troubling whenever anyone does not respond to a letter from our state agencies, but in this issue, especially when you’re talking about public health.

“It should be no surprise … he does feel the [Pegasus] line, if it ever should be restarted, should be moved away from water supplies, especially given the older technology it uses,” DeCample added.

Seeley replied to the Health Department in an undated letter in which he wrote that the federal agency would “only accept [Exxon Mobil’s] restart plan if we are confident that integrity and safety issues have been completely satisfied.”

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette obtained Smith’s letter recently under an Arkansas Freedom of Information Act request to Central Arkansas Water, the utility overseeing the Lake Maumelle watershed. Smith had sent a copy of his letter to an attorney for the utility.

In his letter, Smith asked the company to take several short-term safety measures followed by “medium term actions,” the latter after the safety administration approves a restart of the pipeline, which has been shut down since March 29.

He wrote: “ExxonMobil should undertake planning for the replacement and removal of this pipeline from critical drinking water source areas in Arkansas. ExxonMobil shall provide opportunity for comments from the [Health Department] concerning proposed relocation [routes] so that critical drinking water source areas are accurately identified. The planning of an alternate route will incorporate the goal of minimizing the number of Arkansans that could be put at risk from an oil spill near drinking water sources.

“ExxonMobil will relocate the portions of this pipeline that pose risks to drinking water sources utilizing a route that will minimize the number of spill-related hazards to potentially exposed Arkansans.”

Smith requested a response “within 30 days indicating a willingness to take these reasonable and prudent actions.”

Exxon Mobil spokesman Aaron Stryk, first asked about the letter on Friday, replied Monday afternoon with an email saying, “The issues described in the [Health Department] letter were addressed in our response to state officials sent July 26, in which we emphasized that ExxonMobil Pipeline Company remains under a Corrective Action Order for the pipeline, and is cooperating with PHMSA in matters related to the investigation.

“Since then, we have touched base with [Health Department] officials regarding their letter and they agreed that this issue was between us and PHMSA. They were not expecting a formal response.”

Stryk referred further queries to Barham, who said he didn’t know when Exxon touched base with the department. Asked if it was after a reporter raised the issue of the letter Friday, Barham said he had no “way to confirm” that information.

Short-term actions proposed by Smith included:

A thorough inspection of the pipeline in Arkansas with documentation provided to any water utilities that potentially would be affected by another oil spill. “All potential weaknesses in the pipeline located in their source water areas should be identified and corrected,” he wrote.

Installation of “an adequate number of remotely operated valves and monitoring systems in order to minimize the amount of oil that would be released in the event of a spill in” these areas. Central Arkansas Water officials have requested improved valve access in Lake Maumelle’s watershed, some of it in rugged terrain, but Smith’s letter did not limit his request to that water source.

Maintenance of the pipeline in Arkansas areas where soil erosion or other factors have “left the pipe unintentionally exposed and at greater vulnerability to damage.” Central Arkansas Water also has discovered exposed pipe segments and requested correction. Exxon Mobil plans to re-bury them, a utility spokesman said.

Installation of “isolation valves and protective encasement of the pipeline at all stream crossings in Arkansas.”

Pre-staging of “adequate resources such as equipment and supplies in order to promptly and thoroughly respond to any spill in these Arkansas areas.”

Providing “each affected drinking water utility with updated emergency response plans that clearly detail the efforts that would be taken … to prevent impairment of drinking water sources” if another spill happens.

Seeley, the pipeline administration’s southwest director, replied that Exxon Mobil must submit a restart plan as well as a remedial work plan that includes actions the company “will take to make sure the pipeline will operate safely in the future.”

The safety administration has given Exxon Mobil until Jan. 6 to submit that work plan, meaning the pipeline cannot be reopened until sometime next year.

Seeley’s letter did not address whether Exxon Mobil should move the pipeline away from drinking-water sources.

Rather, he wrote that the company’s work plan also must address specific issues that caused the Mayflower rupture. “As with the restart plan, PHMSA will comprehensively review the Work Plan to ensure that it addresses the integrity issues that led to the” Mayflower spill, he added.

In July, a laboratory hired by Exxon Mobil to examine the broken-pipe segment found manufacturing defects - cracking that the laboratory said likely occurred shortly after the pipe was made in 1947-48 and worsened over time. The type of pipe used in much of the Pegasus and some other pipelines is prone to such defects and no longer is made.

In November, the safety administration issued a notice of probable violation in which it alleged Exxon Mobil had violated federal safety regulations. The government agency proposed fines totaling more than $2.65 million. Last week, Exxon Mobil denied the allegations, objected to the proposed fines and requested a hearing.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 12/10/2013