Progressive Pipeline Management

PROGRESS I VE P I PEL INE MANAGEMENT strong, hard, and brittle. So, the weak link is the joints. Over time they leak and because the large diameter cast iron is very expensive to replace, we like to renew it using liners. We’re able to maintain and actually increase the capacity of the pipe because by making the pipe smoother on the inside, we get better flow. Many times we’ll line pipes where access is very difficult; you can’t be poking around digging trenches at the base of the Brooklyn Bridge. Most lining work also involves mains that are difficult to access and/or where capacity is an issue.” Wickersham: “The oldest cast iron project that PPM has done was an 1890’s vintage cast iron pipe at the base of the Brooklyn Bridge on the NY City side. The pipe still looked great but the joints were leaking. The gas industry has spent over $15 million testing the Starline liner, culminating three years ago in a test with Cornell University and the pipeline hazardous materials group of the U.S. DOT, where we took previously lined gas pipe out of the ground that had been operating a minimum of ten years and put it through a barrage of tests. We’ve always said it had test life of 50 years and we exceeded over 100 years and the liner still did not fail. The regulators like the testing, the bang for the buck, and that’s what’s driving our growth pattern.” BVM: What is ahead for the future of the industry and PPM? Ragula: “From the gas industry perspective, by virtue of the nature of the product we carry, we’re a very conservative industry. That explains the extensive independent third-party testing we’ve done on liners. Our focus from a utility world, continues to be safety and reliability and performing activities that support those pillars in a cost-effective manner. Lining gives us an opportunity to do that in the right applications on a project specific basis. Wickersham: “As far as expansion for PPM, I predict we’ll have a facility in Boston in the