The Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board on 27th August 2021 has published the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (Integrity Management System for Petroleum and Petroleum Products Pipelines) Regulations, 2021 which shall be applicable to all the entities engaged in laying, building, operating or expanding, maintaining and decommissioning Petroleum and Petroleum Products Pipelines.
The regulation outline the basic features and requirements for developing and implementing an effective and efficient Integrity Management Plan (IMP) for Petroleum and Petroleum Products Pipeline system.
The objective of Pipeline Integrity Management System (PIMS) is to maintain integrity of Petroleum and Petroleum Products Pipelines at all times to ensure public safety, protect environment and ensure availability of pipeline to transport petroleum and petroleum product without interruptions and to minimize risks associated with accidents and losses.
The availability of the Integrity Management System shall allow personnel engaged in integrity tasks to have clearly established work aims and targets in the short, medium and long term, which undoubtedly will enhance their efficiency and satisfaction to attain them.
All operators of existing and new petroleum and petroleum product pipelines shall develop an integrity management program comprising the necessary plans, implementation schedule and assessment of its effectiveness in order to ensure safe and reliable operation of the pipelines. For operators implementing an integrity management program in the absence of base line and performance data, it may become imperative to adopt a prescriptive integrity management program initially.
