PUC rules differ from state to state, but the Pennsylvania PUC has fined at least one gas utility $175,000 for two incidences of faulty piping which resulted in explosions:

“In April 2003, after investigating the explosions, the PUC fined Dominion Peoples Gas $125,000.  In June 2007, following a separate investigation, the PUC again cited Dominion Peoples, this time for gas line safety violations. Investigators found unsafe conditions at 33 of 111 service line connections.

The company was fined $50,000.”  (As reported on The PittsburghChannel.com in an article “Broken Gas Line Blamed In Deadly Plum House Blast” on March 5, 2008)

So new questions emerge,

  • “Who bears the liability for faulty gas lines illegally installed?”
  • “Who bears the liability when a faulty gas line previously installed by the gas company has been illegally connected to a house and the house explodes?”

After a house explosion killed one person and badly injured a 4-year-old girl in the Plum, Pennsylvania,

“‘Post-accident bar hole testing identified significant amounts of gas in the ground in the vicinity of the pipelines,’ said the National Transportation Safety Board, which is joining the investigation because it has responsibility for the nation’s pipelines and because this case involves a fatality.”  Pittsburgh News March 5, 2008, http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/news/15503578/detail.html.

If the National Transportation Safety Board found “significant amounts of gas in the ground in the vicinity of the pipelines” after the explosion describe above, we believe it is highly likely that underground leaking illegal gas bypass lines pose significant safety hazards for communities.

Please tell us how the PUC in your state enforces faulty pipes, enforces other safety issues, and whether they issue any fines.  Who should be responsible?