New York Codes, Rules and Regulations › Title 16 - DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SERVICE › Chapter III - GAS UTILITIES › Subchapter C - Safety › Part 255 - Transmission And Distribution Of Gas › General › Section 255.3 - Definitions

Current through Register Vol. 46, No. 28, July 10, 2024
(a) As
					 used in this Part:
(1) Approved means prior
					 approval must be granted by the department, except in emergency
					 situations.
(2) Building of public
					 assembly means any school, hospital, nursing home, institution licensed by New
					 York State for the care of children, or any factory which normally employs 75
					 or more persons; or any other building with a nominal capacity of 75 or more
					 persons to which the public is regularly admitted. Structures which are used
					 solely as office buildings or residential apartments and normally have no other
					 utilization in excess of the 75-person limit are excluded from this
					 definition.
(3) Distribution line
					 means a pipeline other than a gathering or transmission line.
(4) Field regulator means a pressure
					 regulating device with an outlet pressure in pounds per square inch serving two
					 through ten residential gas customers. This regulator is also known as a farm
					 tap regulator.
(5) Follow-up
					 inspection means an inspection performed after an outside leak repair procedure
					 has been completed in order to determine the effectiveness of the repair. It
					 includes retests of all positive inside leak indications and outside readings
					 from the original classification.
(6) Gas means natural gas or other fuel gas,
					 including liquefied petroleum gas distributed as a vapor.
(7) Gathering line means a pipeline that
					 transports gas from a current production facility to a transmission line, main,
					 or directly to an end user.
(8)
					 High pressure distribution system means a distribution system in which the gas
					 pressure in the main must be reduced before delivery to a customer.
(9) Hoop stress means the stress in a pipe
					 wall, acting circumferentially in a plane perpendicular to the longitudinal
					 axis of the pipe and produced by the pressure of the fluid in the
					 pipe.
(10) Hot tap means a branch
					 piping connection made to an operating pipeline or other facility while it is
					 under gas pressure.
(11) Leakage
					 investigation means a survey conducted for the purpose of determining the
					 extent of potential hazard and classifying a leak in accordance with section
					 255.807 
					 of this Part. It involves the driving or boring of holes at sufficient depth
					 and testing the atmosphere in these holes and other available openings with a
					 properly calibrated combustible gas indicator (CGI) or approved equivalent
					 device.
(12) Leakage survey means a
					 systematic survey made for the purpose of locating leaks in a gas piping system
					 using an approved instrument which continuously analyzes atmospheric samples
					 near ground level and is capable of detecting the presence of gas in parts per
					 million in air.
(13) Listed
					 specification means a specification set forth in section I of Appendix 14-B of
					 this Title.
(14) Long-term
					 hydrostatic strength means the estimated hoop stress in psi in a plastic pipe
					 wall that will cause failure of the pipe at an average 100,000 hours when
					 subjected to a constant hydrostatic pressure.
(15) Low-pressure distribution system means a
					 distribution system in which the gas pressure in the main is substantially the
					 same as the pressure provided to the typical customer.
(16) Main means a distribution line that
					 serves as a common source of supply for more than one service line.
(17) Maximum actual operating pressure means
					 the maximum pressure that occurs on a system during normal operations over a
					 period of one year.
(18) Maximum
					 allowable operating pressure means the maximum pressure at which a pipeline or
					 segment of a pipeline may be operated under this Part.
(19) Maximum certified operating pressure
					 means the maximum pressure at which a pipeline may be operated, as certified by
					 the original filing under section
					 255.302(b) 
					 of this Part, a predecessor rule thereof, or as modified in accordance with
					 section
					 255.555
					 or
					 255.611 
					 of this Part.
(20) Municipality
					 means a city, county, or other political subdivision of New York
					 State.
(21) Operator means a person
					 who engages in the transportation of gas.
(22) Person means any individual, firm, joint
					 venture, partnership, corporation, association, State, municipality,
					 cooperative association, or joint stock association, and including any trustee,
					 receiver, assignee or personal representative thereof.
(23) Pipe means any pipe or tubing used in
					 the transportation of gas.
(24)
					 Pipeline means all parts of those physical facilities through which gas is
					 transported, including pipe, valves, and other appurtenances attached to pipe,
					 compressor units, metering stations, regulator stations, delivery stations,
					 holders, and fabricated assemblies.
(25) Pipeline facility means new and existing
					 pipeline, rights-of-way, and any equipment, facility, or building used in the
					 transportation of gas or in the treatment of gas during the course of
					 transportation.
(26) Plastic means
					 a material which contains as an essential ingredient one or more organic
					 polymeric substances of large molecular weight, is solid in its finished state
					 and, at some stage of its manufacture or processing, can be shaped by flow. The
					 two general types of plastic referred to in this Part are thermoplastic and
					 thermosetting.
(27) Reading means
					 any sustained deviation on a properly calibrated combustible gas indicator
					 (CGI) or approved equivalent instrument taken in a sample point expressed in
					 percent LEL (lower explosive limit) or percent gas-in-air.
(28) Secondary stress means stress created in
					 the pipe wall by loads other than internal fluid pressure. For example,
					 backfill loads, traffic loads, beam action in a span, loads at supports and at
					 connections to the pipe.
(29)
					 Service line means the piping, including associated metering and pressure
					 reducing appurtenances, that transports gas below grade from a main or
					 transmission line to the outlet of the customer meter or at the connection to a
					 customer's piping, whichever is further downstream where a meter is located
					 within the building; if a meter is located outside the building, the service
					 line will be deemed to terminate at the outside of the building foundation
					 wall.
(30) SMYS means specified
					 minimum yield strength.
(31) Stub
					 means a service line that terminates at or before the property line.
(32) Thermoplastic means a plastic which is
					 capable of being repeatedly softened by increase of temperature and hardened by
					 decrease of temperature.
(33)
					 Thermosetting plastic means a plastic which is capable of being changed into a
					 substantially infusible or insoluble product when cured by application of heat
					 or chemicals.
(34) Transmission
					 line means a pipeline, other than a gathering line, that:
(i) transports gas from a gathering line or
					 storage facility to a distribution center or storage facility, or directly to a
					 large volume user that is not downstream from a distribution center;
					 or
(ii) operates at a hoop stress
					 of 20 percent or more of SMYS; or
(iii) transports gas within a storage field.
Note:A large volume customer may receive similar volumes
						of gas as a distribution center, and includes factories, power plants, and
						institutional users of gas.
(35) Transportation of gas means the
					 gathering, transmission, or distribution of gas by pipeline, or the storage of
					 gas.
(36) Excess of flow valve
					 means a device installed in or near the service tee to prevent gas from flowing
					 downstream in the event of failure of the service between the tee and meter.
					 When the gas flow through the device exceeds a designated rate, the valve
					 automatically closes and stops all or a major portion of the gas
					 flow.
(37) Abnormal operating
					 condition means a condition identified by the operator that may indicate a
					 malfunction of a component or deviation from normal operations that may
					 indicate a condition exceeding design limits or result in a hazard(s) to
					 persons, property, or the environment.
(38) Evaluation means a process, established
					 and documented by the operator, to determine an individual's ability to perform
					 a covered task by any of the following: written examination; oral examination;
					 work performance history review; observation during:
(i) performance on the job;
(ii) on the job training;
(iii) simulations; or other forms of
					 assessment.
(39)
					 Qualified means that an individual has been evaluated and can:
(i) perform assigned covered tasks;
					 and
(ii) recognize and react to
					 abnormal operating conditions.
(40) Covered tasks are activities, identified
					 by the operator, that:
(i) are performed on a
					 pipeline facility;
(ii) are
					 operations and maintenance tasks;
(iii) are performed as a requirement of this
					 Part; and
(iv) affect the operation
					 or integrity of the pipeline.
(41) Abandoned means permanently removed from
					 service.
(42) Customer meter means
					 the meter that measures the transfer of gas from an operator to a
					 consumer.
(43) Service regulator
					 means the device on a service line that controls the pressure of gas delivered
					 from a higher pressure to the pressure provided to the customer. A service
					 regular may serve one customer or multiple customers through a meter header or
					 manifold.
(44) Department. For this
					 Part, department shall mean the Department of Public Service, Office of
					 Electric, Gas and Water, Safety Section, or its successor, Three Empire State
					 Plaza, Albany, NY 12223-1350, (518) 474-5453, Safety @dps.ny.gov.
(45) Alarm means an audible or visible means
					 of indicating to the controller that equipment or processes are outside
					 operator-defined, safety-related parameters.
(46) Control room means an operations center
					 staffed by personnel charged with the responsibility for remotely monitoring
					 and controlling a pipeline facility.
(47) Controller means a qualified individual
					 who remotely monitors and controls the safety-related operations of a pipeline
					 facility via a SCADA system from a control room, and who has operational
					 authority and accountability for the remote operational functions of the
					 pipeline facility.
(48) Supervisory
					 control and data acquisition (SCADA) system means a computer-based system or
					 systems used by a controller in a control room that collects and displays
					 information about a pipeline facility and may have the ability to send commands
					 back to the pipeline facility.
(49)
					 Action corrosion means continuing corrosion that, unless controlled, could
					 result in a condition that is detrimental to public safety.
(50) Electrical survey means a series of
					 closely spaced pipe-to-soil readings over pipelines which are subsequently
					 analyzed to identify locations where a corrosive current is leaving the
					 pipeline.
(51) Pipeline environment
					 includes soil resistivity (high or low), soil moisture (wet or dry), soil
					 contaminants that may promote corrosive activity, and other known conditions
					 that could affect the probability of active corrosion.