A team of five gas control technicians has spent months working on the northside of Indianapolis to allow for increased capacity from Citizens’ natural gas supplier, Panhandle Eastern, to meet customer demand.
Gas transmission pipes circle the city in a loop similar to Interstate 465. Several gate stations around the loop reduce the pressure of natural gas from what is needed for transmission to what is needed to distribute the gas to our customers.
The gate station located between 86th and 96th Streets off of Zionsville Road needed to be upgraded in order to accomplish this.
Because they were working in this area, they also were able to accomplish another much-needed project – eliminating a section of unodorized pipe. Odorizing the pipeline is a method the natural gas industry utilizes to readily detect a leak. The pipeline is leak surveyed annually with leak detection equipment.
The team of Darrel Edwards, Jim O’Gara, Mitch Perry, Andy Sebastian, and Ron Sebastian worked from January to August to accomplish these two projects. Project Engineer Dan Decker and Construction Coordinator Josh Fanning also were instrumental in completing the work. Additionally, the gas technicians worked alongside the valve and regulating crews for the transmission main shutdowns that were necessary.
“We started talking to Panhandle about upgrading the station in 1998 but budget constraints and more pressing projects by both entities repeatedly postponed the project until it was resurrected a few years ago,” said Mike Sullivan, Director of Energy Distribution Engineering.
Pictured left to right: Ron Sebastian, Jim O'Gara, Steve Griffin, Mitch Perry, Jeremy LaFara, Darrel Edwards, Dan Decker, Andy Sebastian; not pictured: Josh Fanning
The two-fold project involved wiring for metering and measuring temperature, pressure, and flow; re-locating an odorant tank; laying conduit; hanging lights, installing gas detection devices; and installing pipeline inspection gauge (PIG) launchers to electronically assess piping for defects.
“Installing PIG launchers allows us to run a smart PIG, which provides data on the condition and integrity of the pipe, in an effort to operate the system more safely and reliably,” said Sullivan.
Read more about a day in the life of a gas control technician in this month's Q&A.
