Many questions after deadly gas explosions near Boston

BOTHELL, Wash. — It was an astonishing sight. Natural gas fires and explosions happening simultaneously across three cities north of Boston.

Now there are questions about what safety nets are in place and whether something like this could happen here.

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Puget Sound Energy, which provides natural gas to 820,000 customers, and Cascade Natural Gas are the largest natural gas providers in Western Washington. Both companies are using much newer pipelines than those on the East Coast.

Still what happened near Boston certainly got the attention of Duane Henderson, manager of Puget Sound Energy's Gas System Integrity.

"Certainly you take notice," said Henderson. "And you ask yourself, what can we learn from that and what can we apply in our daily operation?"

Henderson talked on this, the day after what one official described as "Armageddon" near Boston. But Henderson says there are basic differences in our natural gas system and theirs in Massachusetts.

"Our system tends to be newer," he said. "Natural gas didn't come to the Northwest until the 1950s where back on the East Coast they had gas much earlier than that."

Moreover, pipeline operators began to modernize the system 20 years ago under the guidance of the Washington State Utilities and Transportation Commission.

A map shows some of the 26,000 miles of pipeline Puget Sound Energy operates. The old cast iron pipes that are prevalent on the East Coast were replaced with polyethylene and steel gas piping, considered safer, a project PSE completed in 2007.

Also the system that delivers natural gas to homes here is different from the so-called ''low pressure'' system used back East.

"In a 'low pressure' system, the pressure in the pipe and in the house is all the same," Henderson said. "So if there is that overpressure condition which we've heard reported (in Massachusetts) then the house is also going to experience that higher pressure."

When asked if not having that system makes the system here safer, he said, "Our system has devices that will help control and safely vent any excess pressure that might accumulate."

Still, there have been natural gas explosions here before. This was the aftermath two years ago in Seattle's Greenwood neighborhood. But this explosion was blamed on a gas leak. Preliminary reports from Boston are that the utility itself was doing work that may have caused the catastrophe.

But even a safer system isn't foolproof. So Henderson says everyone whose house uses natural gas should always be alert.

"If you smell gas, get out of the structure, call 911," he said. "Get yourself to a location. That's your best defense." 

UTC officials say inspectors inspect pipelines across the state at least once every three years because no one wants what happened near Boston to happen here, ever.

Cox Media Group