A number of gas pipeline explosions over the past several years have highlighted concerns about the safety and performance of the U.S. natural gas pipeline network. While the dangers associated with the transport of natural gas via pipeline includes fatalities, injuries, and significant property damage, pipelines are often the only economically viable means of transporting natural gas. Given the important role that natural gas plays in the current administration’s energy program and increasingly may play in U.S. foreign policy as well, safe transport of natural gas is an extremely salient issue that is unlikely to go away in the near future.

The Office of Pipeline Safety (OPS) within the Department of Transportation oversee the operation of pipelines and as well as their environmental and safety performance. OPS is a relatively small agency as the majority of pipeline safety inspections are conducted by approximately regulators who work for state agencies. States typically inspect and enforce all intrastate pipelines, while federal regulators inspect interstate pipelines. However, in some states OPS has authorized the state regulatory agency to act as its agent and inspect interstate pipelines in addition to interstate pipelines.  Thus overall states are responsible for inspecting approximately 90 percent of total pipeline infrastructure.

To date there has been very little analysis of the effect of enforcement on pipeline performance. This paper seeks to fill the gap in the literature by increasing our understanding of the role that states play in regulating natural gas pipeline safety. The paper first examines the factors that drive states to take assume primacy for implementing the federal pipeline regulations. The paper next explores why some states adopt additional pipeline safety regulations above those required by the federal regulations.  Finally, the paper examines the effectiveness of the various state pipeline requirements and programs with respect to increasing natural gas pipeline performance.