Quote:
Originally Posted by fotze
I would think (hope) for these pipelines they would know where they are and there would be no strikes. I was annoyed with the "pipe flowed for 4 hours" before detection. Not sure if that is true or not though. I hope it is not.
The thing with pigging and maintenance is that it costs money, and the bigger the line the more it will cost in lost production, and the cost of the maintenance itself. Mind you it is a drop in the bucket compared to what it will cost now. The Vertilog business can be a bit of voodoo especially on massive lines like this. I am sure they do pig, it is in their own best interest to do so, its the frequency and type that may be debateable. Also pigs can get stuck and cause more problems.
I don't think you can ever stop leaks but you can reduce the impact greatly, to block pipe in imediately, containment, etc. Its like thinking that zero car accidents is an achievable or reasonable goal.
It just seems so wildly inefficient to drive oil to the refinery to become gasoline, when pipelines are a much more clean way to go.
Weird all this kerfuffle over a new line that will likely have awesome materials, state of the art containment and monitoring where these old corroded lines in use are already in the ground. Thats what needs the attention.
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Well that's the point. Even though I have my problems with the oilsands and a lot of the oil companies practices in general, pipelines seems like a no-brainer. I'm not sure how anyone could protest one. Seems like the cleanest and most efficient way to go.
Maybe there needs to be more regulations on scheduled maintenance etc.?
I know, I know, the evil R word.