[F]ederal regulators are investigating state oversight of the construction of a natural gas pipeline in Addison County.
Citizens and environmental groups filed a complaint against the Department of Public Service on October 15 with the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration for allowing Vermont Gas Systems to continue construction of the pipeline despite allegations that electrical safety standards were not met.
An official at the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration confirmed Friday that an investigation is underway.
A Vermont Gas spokesperson says the company “exceeded” safety precautions while the pipeline was under construction.
Outgoing Commissioner Chris Recchia said the pipeline safety administration recently notified the state that federal regulators would review the department’s records. Newly appointed Department of Public Service Commissioner June Tierney could not be immediately reached for comment late Friday afternoon.
Advocacy groups including 350 Vermont, Protect Geprags Park, Rutland Area Climate Coalition, Toxics Action Center, Just Power, Upper Valley Affinity Group, Central Vermont Climate Action, and Vermonters for a Clean Environment) and 113 individual citizens made a request that federal regulators review the department’s handling of electrical safety inspections for the pipeline.
Pipeline opponents allege Vermont Gas Systems was “allowed to continue construction through November without demonstrable proof they had addressed the safety violations,” according to pipeline opponents.
The investigation will show department officials acted appropriately, Recchia said.
“I have full confidence they’ll find that we did what we said we’d do, and [that we did] everything we should have for this program,” Recchia said.
The investigation appears to be primarily an analysis of the department’s inspection and oversight efforts in connection to the pipeline, he said. The department’s inspectors were present on pipeline construction sites every day that the pipeline was being built, Recchia said.
Beth Parent, a spokeswoman for Vermont Gas Systems, said the company has not received communications from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.
The company has worked closely with both state and federal regulators throughout the pipeline’s construction, “to make sure we meet or exceed all the regulations, and we take them very seriously,” Parent said.
Opponents of the pipeline have faulted the company for numerous alleged violations since construction began in 2014. The Department of Public Service last month reached an agreement with Vermont Gas in which the company paid a $95,000 civil penalty for safety violations involving pipeline sections staged for construction too close in proximity to power lines.
“We wrote PHMSA in October and said that DPS was not making sure this is constructed according to federal standards,” said Rachel Smolker, a member of the group Protect Geprags Park, one of the entities that requested an investigation. “We said, ‘Would you please, on an emergency basis, step in and handle this?’ We didn’t get a response until yesterday.”
The 41-mile pipeline is now nearly complete, Smolker said, and the incoming federal administration doesn’t appear likely to pursue regulatory violations having to do with fossil fuels.
The Department of Public Service oversees pipeline construction in Vermont through an agreement with the Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration, according to administration’s spokesman, Darius Kirkwood.
The Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration investigation was initiated in response to the complaint they received in October, and is being conducted according to the terms of the complaint’s request, Kirkwood said.
The complaint asks federal pipeline safety administrators “to launch an investigation into VT DPS’s handling of probable violations.”
The administration must investigate for possible safety violations when asked, Kirkwood said.
“If a citizen is concerned that a pipeline is not safe, for whatever reason, we’ll investigate,” he said. “We’re not going to say, ‘It’s not our jurisdiction.’ Safety is our No. 1 concern.”
The Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration does not estimate the length of time for investigations, Kirkwood said.
