Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration May 2007 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

In compliance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA), this notice announces that PHMSA forwarded an Information Collection Request to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for an extension of the currently approved collection for National Pipeline Mapping System (NPMS) data reporting. On March 23, 2007, PHMSA published a Federal Register notice soliciting comments on this information collection. No comments were received. The purpose of this notice is to allow the public an additional 30 days to submit comments.

Recently, five (5) 33-pound propane cylinders authorized under DOT Special Permit (DOT-SP 13957) ruptured during storage at a facility in Miami, Florida. The purpose of this notice is to alert owners and users of certain cylinders manufactured under this special permit to potential safety problems and to advise them to remove the cylinders from service as outlined in this notice. Also, PHMSA requests information on any other failures or leakage of lading, involving all cylinders made under DOT-SP 13957, which include 10-pound, 20-pound, and 33-pound cylinders, that may not have been previously reported to the agency.

In accordance with the procedures governing the application for, and the processing of, special permits from the Department of Transportation's Hazardous Material Regulations (49 CFR part 107, subpart B), notice is hereby given that the Office of Hazardous Materials Safety has received the application described herein. Each mode of transportation for which a particular special permit is requested is indicated by a number in the ``Nature of Application'' portion of the table below as follows: 1Motor vehicle, 2Rail freight, 3Cargo vessel, 4Cargo aircraft only, 5Passenger-carrying aircraft.

In this supplemental notice of proposed rulemaking (SNPRM) PHMSA is modifying its pending proposal for regulating rural low-stress hazardous liquid pipelines within a prescribed buffer of an ``unusually sensitive area'' (USA). This modification addresses new requirements in the Pipeline Inspection, Protection, Enforcement, and Safety Act of 2006 (PIPES Act). We propose to apply all Federal hazardous liquid pipeline safety regulations to these pipelines instead of the narrower, threat-focused set of requirements we originally proposed to apply to these pipelines. This action will help protect USAs from the potential adverse impacts of releases from low-stress hazardous liquid pipelines in rural areas.

As part of PHMSA's efforts to review bulk loading and unloading of hazardous materials and to develop risk reduction strategies, the agency invites interested persons to participate in a public workshop that will examine industry data, identify industry best practices and standards, discuss the role of recommended practices for loading and unloading, and consider industry actions that have the potential to reduce risk during loading and unloading. PHMSA seeks the broadest participation of industry, federal agencies, state and local government, standards organizations, the emergency response community, employee groups, environmental and public interest organizations, and the public. PHMSA seeks individuals and organizations willing to speak at the public workshop. Interested persons are invited to submit papers on related topics.

In this final rule, PHMSA is amending the Hazardous Materials Regulations to revise and consolidate the requirements applicable to the use of the International Civil Aviation Organization's Technical Instructions for the Safe Transport of Dangerous Goods by Air, the International Maritime Dangerous Goods Code, Transport Canada's Transportation of Dangerous Goods Regulations, and the International Atomic Energy Agency's Safety Standards Series: Regulations for the Safe Transport of Radioactive Material. The revisions and reformatting provide a user-friendly format to promote understanding of the conditions and limitations on the use of international standards and regulations. In addition, PHMSA is authorizing the use in domestic transportation of portable tanks, cargo tank motor vehicles, and rail tank cars manufactured in accordance with Transport Canada's Transportation of Dangerous Goods Regulations. The amendments adopted in this final rule maintain the high transportation safety standard established under the Hazardous Materials Regulations.