10 Pipeline Risk Management
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Published:2010
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Managing assets equates to managing risk. To manage risk effectively, risk must first be assessed and then controlled as part of the integrity management plan for the pipeline system. The incorporation of risk management into pipeline integrity management planning is described in Role of Risk Assessment in Integrity Management Planning, and control and mitigation of risk is discussed in Types of Risk Assessment.
The methods described in these sections are generally found to effectively manage the vast majority of pipeline system assets by functioning principally as risk-based inspection (RBI) tools. However, in addition to its RBI function, risk management can be used as a general O&M tool for pipeline systems to identify areas where risk is above some predetermined threshold and should be reduced as a matter of prudence or of company policy. Risk management also provides a way of evaluating the cost and effectiveness of future maintenance programs and of rolling up pipeline system risk to corporate risk to be controlled as required at corporate level. At the department level, risk management techniques provide a rational basis for setting budgets — both totals and proportions of the O&M total allocated to various facility types (pipelines, compressor and pump station, meter stations, etc.), or simply to highlight segments of the pipeline needing particular O&M attention. In addition to addressing corporate risk, risk based planning can be used at the corporate level as powerful decision making tool — to project tariff changes and asset valuation for example.
This chapter considers pipeline risk management in a general sense that addresses all of the foregoing applications.