A blaze ignited at an Energy Transfer (ET) site in La Porte, Texas, continues to “safely burn itself out” and flames have diminished since the fire began on Sept. 16, the company told Hart Energy on Sept. 18.

The fire was reportedly caused by an unknown vehicle that entered Energy Transfer’s right-of-way and struck an aboveground valve location. 

TPH & Co. analysts suspect the pipeline involved in the accident is the Justice pipeline, a 20-inch Y-grade line that connects with the company’s Liberty and West Texas Gateway pipelines. The company has not confirmed which pipeline was affected by the accident.

The connected system moves Y-grade collected from the Permian Basin and Eagle Ford Shale to Energy Transfer’s fractionators at Mont Belvieu, TPH said in a Sept. 18 report. News of the event sent LPG prices higher, with propane and butane up 7% and 10% since markets closed on Sept. 13.

TPH said that the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s pipeline database shows that Justice went into service in fourth-quarter 2012 with a capacity of 375,000 bbl/d.

Energy Transfer said they shut down the portion of the affected pipeline to allow the remaining product in the line to burn out.

After the fire subsides, ground crews should be able to assess the level of damage to the line and the potential timeline to restart service,” TPH analysts said.

“In the meantime, ET will likely be able to utilize its vast network, including its storage assets and Lone Star NGL line, to absorb the service disruption,” TPH said.

Energy Transfer said that its air quality monitoring continues to show no impact.

“We are in the process of installing specialized pipeline isolation equipment on either side of the damaged area to accelerate the removal and replacement of the damaged components,” Energy Transfer spokesperson Vicki Granado said in an email.

When the isolation equipment is installed, the company will purge the short section with nitrogen to extinguish the fire before starting repairs. 

“The safest way to manage this process is to let the products burn off,” Granado said. “Impacted landowners who have reached out for assistance have been provided lodging at area hotels. This will continue until evacuation orders are lifted.”

Law enforcement agencies continue to investigate the accident that caused the damage to the pipeline.

“We are working closely with local authorities to manage the response and are cooperating in the investigation,” she said. “We thank all the emergency response teams for their ongoing efforts to safely manage the response to this incident.”

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