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Track: Pipelines

Kenneth Spitze
Morrison Knudsen Environmental Services
1700 Lincoln Street Suite 4800
Denver, CO 80211


Telephone: 303-860-8621
Fax: 303-837-1537
E-mail: ken_spitze@mk.com



Bonnie Freeman, Michael Macrander

Identification of Unusually Sensitive Areas (USAs) for Liquid Petroleum Pipelines

The Pipeline Safety Act requires the Secretary of Transportation to prescribe regulations that establish criteria for identifying unusually sensitive areas (USAs) potentially affecting all hazardous liquid pipeline facility and gathering lines. The American Petroleum Institute (API) and Department of Transportation (DOT) have recently begun a cooperative effort with other federal agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, to develop recommendations for USA criteria to be used in a subsequent rule making process. The results of this effort may not only affect where special maintenance is required on current petroleum liquid pipelines, but may also impact placement of future pipelines. Seven test areas will be discussed as examples of the steps taken to assist in developing the USA identification process including not only data elements but also rules that will determine location of USAs. This paper will discuss how, through an iterative model approach, key data elements from a wide set of environmental databases were identified and rules governing the application of those data formed. A discussion of the unique ArcInfo approach required to reflect the data and their rule definitions, along with current status of this effort, will be presented.



Copyright 1997 Environmental Systems Research Institute