To meet the demand for reliable energy service, it's crucial that we stay committed to giving our systems the care they need to run safely. At NiSource, our teams of specialists are always on the job, analyzing and monitoring our natural gas and electric assets, including transmission and distribution pipelines, to spot and reduce any potential risks.
Safety Management System (SMS) framework and maturity
NiSource’s SMS serves as our operating framework designed to identify and reduce risks and cultivate both a robust safety culture and a culture of continuous improvement. NiSource’s SMS comes to life through following our Core 4 responsibilities:
- Following our processes and procedures
- Identifying and reporting risks
- Identifying and proactively taking action to prevent things that can go wrong
- Continually improving processes and procedures to protect one another, our customers, and communities
By design, our SMS conforms with the American Petroleum Institute Recommended Practice 1173 (API RP 1173) for Pipeline Management Systems. NiSource is one of only two utilities in the world with the API RP 1173 conformance certification.
We continue to mature our overall SMS through modernization efforts including geographic information system (GIS) mapping, artificial intelligence (AI) technologies and risk mitigation efforts using assessment modeling and incident investigations.
The beauty of NiSource’s SMS is that it is on an ever-evolving journey, one that encourages knowledge sharing; accountability for operational excellence, identification and execution of continuous improvement opportunities; and being champions of safety.
Understanding and managing risk
Risk management and continuous improvement play key roles within NiSource’s SMS culture. In recent years, NiSource began leveraging probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) models to drive risk-informed decision-making across the company’s service territories. Currently, NiSource uses innovative PRA models for gas transmission, gas distribution, gas measurement and regulation, cross-bore, and damage prevention. In addition, we can pull data from several asset management sources and obtain a picture of NiSource’s risk profile for all gas-carrying assets to assess probabilities and consequences.
Using PRA results across NiSource maximized risk reduction per dollar spend in several distribution capital replacement projects. The transmission PRA is being used to identify the highest-priority pipelines for in-line inspection (ILI) retrofits. Sensitivity analyses are underway to identify data improvement opportunities to ensure all data collection efforts are focused on the highest-impact activities. The latest model, measurement and regulation (M&R) is working with the M&R modernization program to prioritize best-in-class station replacements and drive NiSource’s decision-making process for installing additional overpressure protection devices.
NIPSCO electric operating company also uses a risk-based prioritization approach as a guide for long-term system modernization planning. With this approach, NIPSCO can target the highest-risk assets within its total transmission and distribution portfolio, maximizing risk reduction for each dollar spent. All major electric transmission and distribution assets (substation transformers, substation breakers and circuits) are included in the model. NIPSCO is also advancing asset health assessments to maximize the life of core assets. This risk scoring is also used to prioritize other areas outside of major replacements such as maintenance, inspection, and modernization.