Gas utility assessments cover pipeline inspections, but is funding enough to protect the public?
KEVIN MINGORA, THE MORNING CALL
Fatal gas pipeline explosions in Allentown and Philadelphia this year are casting light on whether the nation's pipeline-inspection system, funded by state and federal assessments on gas utilities, is adequate to keep the public safe.
Pipeline safety became an increasing federal responsibility in recent years, after a deadly 1999 blast in Bellingham, Wash. Since then, Congress created a new federal agency to oversee pipeline safety and Washington has promised more money to states.
But as Washington shouldered more of the cost, assessing more fees on utilities to cover safety inspections, Pennsylvania cut back on its financial demands on utilities. So even as federal funding for safety inspections in Pennsylvania doubled between 2006 and 2010, the state cut its share by 30 percent.
Despite that cut, and thanks to the federal government's bolstering of safety-inspection funding, the total budget for inspections in Pennsylvania has grown about 4 percent a year since 2006.
SOURCE: The Morning Call
