WBI ENERGY TRANSMISSION, INC. — Gas transmission and gathering — incident on 2016-07-31

Gas transmission and gathering incident in WILLISTON, WILLIAMS County, ND. Reported cause: EQUIPMENT FAILURE. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 0 injuries, 3880 NATURAL GAS released, $0 reported property damage. Operator-reported incident data submitted to PHMSA, generally within 30 days. Records may be supplemented or corrected and do not represent final agency causal findings.

Report number: 20180016.

Operator ID: 22655.

Reported incident date: 7/31/2016 14:51.

Location detail: 419+56

Cause detail: COMPRESSOR OR COMPRESSOR-RELATED EQUIPMENT

Cause detail: ON JULY 31, 2016 WBI ENERGY TRANSMISSION EXPERIENCED A POWER OUTAGE AT THE CHARBONNEAU COMPRESSOR STATION LOCATED IN A RURAL LOCATION APPROXIMATELY 5.5 MILES NORTHEAST OF CARTWRIGHT, ND. THE BACKUP GENERATOR FAILED TO START AND CAUSED ALL FOUR COMPRESSOR UNITS TO GO DOWN. THE COMPRESSORS BEING DOWN CAUSED PRESSURE TO BUILD UP ON THE PIPELINE BETWEEN THE CHARBONNEAU COMPRESSOR STATION AND THE WILLISTON COMPRESSOR STATION. THE LINE PRESSURE ULTIMATELY REACHED THE 700 PSI MAOP OF THE PIPELINE AND CAUSED THE RELIEF VALVE AT THE WILLISTON COMPRESSOR STATION TO OPEN AS DESIGNED AND VENT NATURAL GAS TO ATMOSPHERE. THE WILLISTON COMPRESSOR STATION IS LOCATED IN A RURAL LOCATION APPROXIMATELY 4 MILES NORTHEAST OF WILLISTON, ND. THE AMOUNT OF NATURAL GAS VENTED TO ATMOSPHERE WAS 3,880 MSCF. SINCE THE RELEASE OCCURRED, WBI ENERGY TRANSMISSION HAS HAD SEVERAL DISCUSSIONS WITH HANS SHIEH, PHMSA CENTRAL REGION, ABOUT THE REPORTING OF THIS RELEASE OF NATURAL GAS THROUGH A RELIEF VALVE AS AN INCIDENT. A LETTER WAS SENT TO MR. SHIEH ON AUGUST 30, 2016 STATING THE REASONING WHY WBI ENERGY TRANSMISSION BELIEVED THIS EVENT DID NOT MEET THE INCIDENT DEFINITION AS DEFINED IN 49CFR191.3. WBI ENERGY TRANSMISSION DOES NOT AGREE WITH PHMSA THAT THE RELEASE OF NATURAL GAS THROUGH AN APPURTENANCE DESIGNED TO RELEASE GAS SHOULD BE REPORTED AS AN INCIDENT, BUT HAVE DECIDED AT THIS TIME TO SUBMIT THE INCIDENT REPORT AND DECIDE AT A LATER DATE WHETHER OR NOT WBI ENERGY TRANSMISSION WILL FOLLOW UP WITH A FORMAL REQUEST FOR AN INTERPRETATION.

PHMSA trend classification: not significant, not serious.

PHMSA standardized cause: EQUIPMENT FAILURE — PUMP/COMPRESSOR OR PUMP/COMPRESSOR-RELATED EQUIPMENT.

PHMSA indexed costs: $11,592 reported total cost, $11,423.11 in 1984 dollars, $15,021.155 in current-year dollars.

PHMSA trend flags, standardized causes, and indexed costs are analytical fields added to operator-reported incident data. They do not represent final agency causal findings.