We kicked off our series of reports on last week’s Pipeline Safety Trust conference in New Orleans by describing some of the response from attendees to our presentation (if you haven’t seen it yet, you can still watch it here). In that report, we described Enbridge’s odd (but ultimately not surprising) snubbing of us. We’ve been mulling this over  and can’t quite decide if it’s because we are simply insignificant to them (this is likely; we have no illusions about our importance) or because we’ve become a slight menace to them (probably less likely) or because they really just don’t want to hear from any of their critics (in our view, by far the most likely option).

One reason we think the last explanation is the most likely is because we learned at the conference that other companies do want to hear it– or at least they are willing to listen. Craig Pierson and Randy Stansberry from Marathon Pipe Line, in particular, struck us as quite sincere about wanting to take a hard look at their own practices. We thought the same of of Francisco Salguero from Pacific Gas & Electric.  And we know that Vern Meijer from TransCanada actually took the time to sit down with Bonnie and Jon Kruse after their rather scathing presentation on how TransCanada has treated landowners out west.

We mention Marathon, TransCanada, and PG&E again because one of the things we learned at the conference is just how much these companies are inevitably linked together, rather than simply separate and in competition with one another. For instance, a refrain among regulators at the conference was the importance of companies’ willingness to share information when it comes to safety– whether that information is data, best practices, or technology. Claudia Bradley from Canada’s National Energy Board stressed the importance of sharing, as did Mark Rosekind of the NTSB. In fact, Rosekind made the point quite forcefully, almost as an injunction: “You don’t compete on safety!” he said. So while it may make for good advertisement for a company like Enbridge to claim (as they do) that “Enbridge is recognized as an industry leader in pipeline safety and integrity,” Rosekind’s point was that no one (or, if you prefer, everyone) should be the industry leader in safety.

A similar need for a confluence of interests (or so one would hope) was implicit in Carl Weimer’s (and others’) discussion of the strange and disturbing story of how industry standards become incorporated into federal regulations. Because they often rely on consensus, industry standards may not always reflect best practices when it comes to matters of safety (since standards may need to be watered down in order to achieve consensus). Within such a system, it’s not hard to imagine how a handful of bad actors– who place self interest ahead of safety– can actually work against outcomes that are in the best interests of everyone.

The same holds true, we believe, when it comes to the treatment of landowners. One of the things we said to those executives from other companies (and we weren’t telling them anything they didn’t already knew) is that Enbridge’s bad behavior, its alienating actions, aren’t just bad for Enbridge and bad for the landowners who are forced to bear the brunt of them. They’re bad for the whole industry. They’re bad for Marathon and PG&E and TransCanada. After all, the general public (understandably) doesn’t much distinguish between one pipeline company and the next. So when Enbridge violates a local ordinance, deals unfairly with a landowner, or ignores its own safety protocols, those actions reflect upon every pipeline company; they tarnish everybody’s reputation. Frankly, if I were Craig Pierson, I’d be furious with Patrick Daniel and I’d be on the phone with Al Monaco telling him to get his house in order. Enbridge may not want to listen to ordinary people like us, but we  suspect they’d listen to their industry peers.