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statutory monitoring authority that was abolished in May
2012. Its revival has stalled in the Australian Senate.
›
Chevron Australia managing director Roy Krzywosinski
told Mr Massola that his company, which is lead operator
in the A$54 billion Gorgon LNG project and A$29 billion
Wheatstone LNG projects in Western Australia, wants
structural changes to industrial relations laws.
“All of us – industry, government, buyers, sellers and
unions – have a shared mutual interest [in reform],” he told
Mr Massola. “We need bipartisan support now to address
Australia’s high-cost environment to secure its next wave of
LNG investment.”
›
The APPEA has estimated the cost to Australian
companies of delivering LNG to Japan – their biggest
market – at up to 30 per cent higher than for rival producers in
Canada and Mozambique.
When natural gas leaking from
New York’s complex and corroded
infrastructure finds an ignition
source, results can be deadly
“It is a danger hidden beneath the streets of New York City,
unseen and rarely noticed: 6,302 miles of pipes transporting
natural gas.” (“Beneath Cities, a Decaying Tangle of Gas
Pipes,” the
New York Times
, 23 March)
Manhattan-based Consolidated Edison, one of the largest
investor-owned energy companies in the US, owns the pipes
that serviced two buildings in East Harlem levelled by an
explosion in March, killing eight people. A
Times
analysis of records collected by the
federal Department of Transportation for
2012 shows that Con Ed had the highest
rate of leaks in the country among natural
gas operators whose networks totalled at
least 100 miles.
According to the
Times
reporters Patrick
McGeehan, Russ Buettner and David
W Chen, leaks like the one believed to
have led to the explosion in East Harlem
are “startlingly common.” Federal records
show that they number in the thousands
every year. The chief culprit, say experts,
is the perilous state of New York City’s
underground network, one of the oldest in
the country.
The
Times
team detailed “a glaring
example
of
America’s
crumbling
infrastructure.” In 2012 alone, Con Edison
and National Grid, the other distributor of
natural gas in New York, reported 9,906
leaks in their combined systems, which
serve the city and suburban Westchester
County. More than half were considered
hazardous, federal records show.
‘V
intage
’
pipes
of
iron
or
bare
steel
There are more than 1.2 million miles of gas main pipes in the
United States. Last year, gas distributors nationwide reported
an average of 12 leaks per 100 miles of those pipes.
As reported in the
Times
, communities across the country
have been struggling to replace thousands of miles of these
old, metal pipes with pipes made of plastic or specially coated
steel that are less prone to leakage.
New York City presents an especially daunting challenge.
Nearly half of the gas mains operated by Con Edison and
National Grid were installed before 1940, according to federal
records consulted by the
Times
. More than half of these
are made of cast iron, wrought iron or unprotected steel
– materials that are vulnerable to corrosion and cracking,
especially in cold weather.
Con Edison estimates that replacement of all of the old
mains in its network right now would cost as much as
$10 billion. Despite the high cost and logistical hurdles,
alarmed regulators at the state’s Public Service Commission
have ordered the company to significantly step up its
replacement schedule, from 50 miles of pipe a year to 70
by 2016, in the city and in Westchester. Even at that rate,
according to the
Times
analysis it would still take nearly three
decades for the utility to finish swapping out what regulators
have identified as the most leak-prone pipes.
Federal records show the New York City utilities have been
able to cut into their leak numbers as they have replaced
mains. National Grid, in particular, has made improvements.
Its rate of leaks per 100 miles of gas mains still ranks among
the highest in the country, but it is significantly better than
Con Edison’s.
New York has experienced problems with its aging underground pipe system