[All] Congratulations LULU!!! RE: Line 9: Amazing developments

Mon May 28 13:49:29 EDT 2012

Well said Peter,

Susan K 

From: all-bounces at gren.ca [mailto:all-bounces at gren.ca] On Behalf Of Peter
Kofler
Sent: May-28-12 1:14 PM
To: randybmclean at rogers.com; Daphne Nicholls; all at gren.ca
Subject: Re: [All] Congratulations LULU!!! RE: Line 9: Amazing developments

Actually engineers/engineering firms are held accountable, individually,
jointly & severally. You could have amply verified this with about a half
hour's worth of internet/library search. They're subject to the criminal and
civil justice codes, just like other individuals and legal entities,
probably to a much greater extent because they deal directly with risk-prone
ventures as part of their raisons d'etre. Most, if not all, engineering
codes of ethics have a fundamental clause about being ultimately accountable
to the public. These ethics codes are incorporated into the section of the
federal/provincial legislation that deals with regulation of professional
engineers. That's why they're required by law to carry such high levels of
liability insurance. Unfortunately, like all sectors of the economy, money
tends to buy power in the judicial system, as elsewhere - the wealthier
firms can afford the better lawyers and thus are more likely to obtain
favourable legal outcomes.

Re. the Region vs. corporations like Enbridge - if I'm not mistaken, the
Region is not a for-profit corporation while Enbridge is - that makes a bit
of a difference in their objectives on the positive side of the balance
sheet, I would think.

"In good faith they build their pipes thinking that the work is done right.
Enbridge assumes the liability risk of that data they purchased to justify
their pipeline." Corporations like Enbridge aren't naiive - they carry a
staff of engineers/technologists/lawyers/accountants themselves. They have
access to very well-paid P.R. firms, which they use to manipulate public
opinion, especially in crafting public opinion on what is considered "safe"
and "good for the economy". If by "in good faith" you mean that Enbridge
maintains a relatively neutral stance in their transactions with engineering
firms/contractors, I think you're mistaken. Their ultimate goal, like most
for-profit corporations, is maximizing profit. They exert a huge amount of
"gravity" on the system (including government/regulators) which tends to
draw all players in their spoken/implied direction.

As we're beginning to find out, some systems, such as biodiversity, the
stock market, climate change, natural resource depletion, social systems
etc., can be subject to asymmetric risks. These are risks which are
non-linear, difficult to calculate with a great amount of certainty, do not
obey the rules of normal Gaussian probability distributions, but can have
huge negative implications on the system in question. Nassim Taleb calls
such events "Black Swans". Black Swans can be both positive (writing a
best-seller) or negative (stock market/ecological disasters, etc.). If a
firm is using a Gaussian (i.e. "bell curve") model to calculate an
asymmetric risk, the result will probably indicate that an extreme negative
event ( for example, 10 standard deviations from the norm) is astronomically
improbable or, probable on a time scale on the order of billions of years.
The truth, as Black Swans go, will sometimes prove otherwise. Stock market
failures and near failures in the eighties, late nineties (LTCM fiasco),
2008, etc. proved this in spades. The upshot: even risk-benefit analysis is
evolving, albeit hesitantly, owing to organizations/individuals who are
reluctant to change from established ways of doing things, fearing it might
unnecessarily impact their bottom lines/livelihoods. That, too, is a matter
of human behaviour/cognition/perception.

To assume that energy-related corporations like Enbridge will always choose
the highest possible level of safety is to misunderstand risk-benefit
analysis. There's an implied optimization in the risk-benefit analysis which
will probably discard the highest possible level of safety, if it is deemed
to cover a highly unlikely event. Add to this the fact that corporations
like Enbridge have an enormous, often perverse incentive to maximize
shareholder equity/profit, sometimes to the detriment of the
public/environment, and you have a recipe for disasters typical of Exxon
Valdez, Bhopal, Gulf of Mexico deepwater oil spill, Chernobyl, Fukushima
etc. 

I agree with Randy's statement:  "When your salary depends on economics then
that will be the direction one takes.  That is instinctive."  That,
unfortunately, applies to many diverse links in this increasingly unstable
economic chain, including employees/officers of Enbridge, engineering and
contracting firms they hire and, unfortunately, to an increasing extent
these days, as the natural resources liquidation sale reaches ever crazier
proportions globally, captured/neutered regulators and politicians who play
along with policies of dubious long-term benefit, "because it's good for the
economy". The very reductive, siloed structure of this system belies the
complex systemic, interconnected nature of it and has the unfortunate (and
perhaps intentional) side effect of diluting overall accountability, or
rather, causing outcomes to flow down to the accountability reservoirs of
last resort - the public and the environment.

  _____  

From: randybmclean at rogers.com
To: gordanddaph at sympatico.ca; all at gren.ca
Date: Fri, 25 May 2012 11:11:33 -0400
Subject: Re: [All] Congratulations LULU!!! RE: Line 9: Amazing developments

Engineers are not held accountable in this country, the US or many others.

Clients signoff off acceptance within 6 months after completion and that is
the end of the Engineering responsibility.  

Failure, upset, etc can be blamed on poor maintenance or poor operations by
the client.  This pipeline will eventually leak as all manmade things fail
eventually.  Case in point oil rigs and nuclear reactors.  Unfortunately
there is no preventative interaction or viable economical means to take
these manmade things out of operation.  We have not evolved to that point.

This pipe line has an expiry date as do all things.  These are the questions
which may be put to the client (Enbridge), the consultant and the materials
supplier.  20 years is the norm but economically motivated inspectors are
pushing expiry dates to the limit.  When your salary depends on economics
then that will be the direction one takes.  That is instinctive.

2 cents.

From: all-bounces at gren.ca [mailto:all-bounces at gren.ca] On Behalf Of Daphne
NICHOLLS
Sent: May-25-12 10:32 AM
To: GREN
Subject: [All] Congratulations LULU!!! RE: Line 9: Amazing developments

Hi Lulu, 
What an amazing week you've had! From losing your presentation and phone on
Tuesday to yesterday's conflict resolution success ... what a rollercoaster
ride!  Sounds like you've opened doors to environmental progress in the long
run!
Thank you!! and well done!
Daphne

  _____  

Date: Thu, 24 May 2012 17:44:53 -0700
From: butterflybluelu at rogers.com
To: all at gren.ca
Subject: [All] Line 9: Amazing developments

Hi folks

Today's hearing makes me more and more convinced, that miracles are
possible. 

I arrived in London and saw the headline in the London Free Press that
reads: THE BIG LEAK. Half a million southwestern Ontario residents are
without water due to the Region's largest water pipe breaking. Stantec used
the data they did for THIS pipeline and simply doubled it to get their price
estimates for our Region's Lake Erie pipe proposal.

As I sat at the NEB hearing, I had a Eureka moment. When a water main
brakes, you don't hear people complaining that it was the Region's fault and
yet when an oil pipeline breaks, they plaster the name of Enbridge all over
the place. The fact of the matter is, the spills Enbridge has been
experiencing are not based on corrosion issues, they are based on the same
reason as this water main break: Underestimated risks in the Environmental
Impact Studies. 

Root cause Stantec? Not necessarily. The guidelines for what is considered a
reasonable test have not been designed. Folks will usually do the minimum of
whatever it takes to get the job, to get something approved, done rather
than to do the job right. So how do we secure the best strategy for risk
prevention? Easy. Hold environmental engineering firms liable. 

I told the NEB chairs, oil distribution agencies like Enbridge pay other
firms to do their environmental impact studies. In good faith they build
their pipes thinking that the work is done right. Enbridge assumes the
liability risk of that data they purchased to justify their pipeline. When
pipes break and the reason is linked to poor quality data of the EIS report,
the blame should be on the firm who conducted the study, not Enbridge. Oil
distribution firms should keep a check worth the entire value of the
services these Engineering firms provide. If the pipes break due to the
negligence of a poor EIS report: Cash it. That money incentive will assure
the job gets done right. It will also serve to prevent destruction for
profit scenarios. 

When it came down to the final argument, the Enbridge rep clairified, the
existing line has not been in use for over a year but the industry wants to
open it up to move light crude to refineries in Montreal but they also
stated, "If we can't move this oil safely, were not going to move it."
Enbridge is open to further discussion on the matter with the public. 

At that point, the NEB chairs stated, they will now take their first
Undertaking: Enbridge must figure out how to involve parties in this process
and how to inform citizens of emergency plan development and include them in
the process. 

After that the hearing was adjourned.  I had a whole bunch of folks come up
to offer handshakes and thanks from the staff of Enbridge, all the oil
company reps as well as the staff of Ecojustice, Equiterre and Environmental
Defence. People really liked the idea. NEB liasion officer said that the
policy was a direct result of my presentation and said that in 12 weeks
we'll hear from Enbridge on how they are willing to proceed with the
undertaking. 

As I left I thought about Forest Ethics and how they created ground breaking
protection for Carolinian Forests by creating sustainable harvesting
programs directly with the forestry sector. Things get done much faster with
industry partnerships to create better standards than they do via political
processes. Enbridge is willing to work with us to figure out how to avert
risks. This could be groundbreaking stuff. They need to figure out what to
do with the existing pipe that's already on top of our moraine. It was
installed in 1976. Should it stay or should it be removed? Is there any way
they could modify things to make it safer? What are reasonable test times
and methods should they use to build pipes safer?  What sort of monitoring
should they do? Their job is distribution. They move product from point A to
B.  They want to know how to keep things safer because the last thing their
company wants is another leaky pipeline. If we can help them design things
safer or to explain why they should opt out of dealing with Line 9 all
together, now is the time to structure those arguments. The Line 9 project
report info is all online here:
http://www.neb-one.gc.ca/clf-nsi/rthnb/pplctnsbfrthnb/nbrdgln9phs1/nbrdgln9p
hs1-eng.html

This is a most unusual opportunity to foster greater public debate during an
NEB hearing. I didn't know that could be done but sure enough, it's
happening. I would really like GREN to be a part of this. Any contribution
we can make to give recommendations to prevent spills or prevent risks could
become a new industry standard. What say GREN?

Lulu 

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