GAO Review of the Department of Transportation's Pipeline Safety Program

Testimony was given concerning a GAO review of the Department of Transportion's (DOT) program to regulate and enforce pipeline safety. DOT is responsible for establishing and enforcing safety standards for both interstate and intrastate pipelines; however, states may assume responsibility for enforcing the safety standards for intrastate pipelines within their borders and some have been inspecting interstate pipelines. Participating States can obtain federal reimbursements for up to 50 percent of the costs incurred in program operation. GAO found that DOT has not provided adequate inspection coverage of the interstate and intrastate pipeline operators for which it is responsible. In addition, its inspection coverage may be reduced further because some states are considering discontinuing a portion of their inspection activities. Furthermore, DOT does not have a viable means for requiring states to correct deficiencies in their programs or assume responsibility for additional intrastate pipeline systems. Therefore, GAO believes that there is a need to align DOT program responsibilities with the authority and resources needed to effectively carry out those responsibilities. GAO also noted that DOT monitoring of state programs needs improvement, and possible future increases in the DOT inspection workload may cause further deterioration in its already limited inspection coverage. Proposed legislation would require periodic testing of pipelines by their owners no less frequently than every 5 years. However, GAO believes that implementation of such a requirement at this time might be premature because of: a lack a tests and testing equipment, test costs, and a lack of resources within DOT to oversee the operator tests.