EnLink maintains the highest regard for the health and safety of our employees, contractors, customers, and communities where we operate. Our award-winning Environmental, Health, and Safety (EHS) program focuses on mitigating risk, increasing knowledge and skills, improving processes, and measuring performance.
We invest substantial resources to ensure the integrity and impact of our EHS efforts and follow comprehensive environmental and safety practices, in addition to all applicable laws and regulations.
Employee and Leadership Responsibility
EnLink is committed to providing safe, responsible, and ethical operations. As part of this commitment, companywide safety goals are included in EnLink’s Short-Term Incentive Program via the Safety and Sustainability Scorecard (click here to learn more about our incentive program).
The scorecard promotes our safety-centric culture by measuring key performance indicators focused on risk management, compliance, process improvement, and employee knowledge and development. Progress is reported to employees during monthly safety meetings, discussed in quarterly all employee calls, and available via our employee intranet.
Our EHS team hosts safety training sessions each month, with attendance required for employees based on their job position. Employees are assessed against a set of established and measurable safety goals each quarter, and EnLink reinforces the power of all employees to ensure the safety of operations, as every employee on an active job site has stop-work authority to use at their discretion.
Contractor Safety and EHS Risk Identification and Audits
EnLink utilizes process hazard analyses, pre-job tailgate meetings, inspections, and incident investigations to identify and mitigate work hazards throughout each phase of new projects and existing operations. EnLink conducted over 400 EHS audits and inspections in 2022. Audits are captured in EnLink’s incident management system and any concerns are addressed with EnLink’s contractors and construction and engineering teams.
EnLink also expects those we partner with, including our contractors, to focus on safety. This starts with our contractor selection process, which assesses safety performance. EnLink also requires general and site-specific safety orientation prior to working alongside our employees and in our operational facilities.
Although EnLink’s contractors are responsible for their own safety and control over their work activities, EnLink expects all contractors to follow all Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and Department of Transportation (DOT) regulations, as well as follow their own established safety protocols and procedures. EnLink also encourages and expects contractors to identify and communicate risks with EnLink.
In 2022, EnLink held contractor safety summits in asset areas with significant contractor activity. These summits allowed EnLink and the contractor community to share best practices, trends, and solutions to common challenges and safety risks facing the midstream industry. The Petroleum Alliance of Oklahoma gave EnLink the “Safety Program of Merit” award for EnLink’s 2022 contractor safety summit in Oklahoma.
In addition to the contractor safety summits, EnLink also conducted monthly contractor inspector safety meetings in active growth areas. Bringing the contractor inspector force together to discuss incidents, near misses, risks, best practices, and solutions allows them to better assist the contractor workforce. Our engineering and construction teams also set goals to strengthen the relationship and interaction between EnLink project managers and our contractor workforce.
GoalZERO Program Continues to Realize Success
EnLink’s “GoalZERO” program provides tools and encouragement to help employees always strive for zero injuries, zero vehicle accidents, zero line strikes, zero fires, and zero spills. One of the most successful tools within the program is EnLink’s “Take 2, Ask 3” initiative, which employees and contractors have adopted as a regular first step to getting any job done. Our teams start every job by taking just two minutes to ask three important safety questions: “What can go wrong? What precautions should I take? Can I do this job safely?” This focuses our team on the task at hand and helps prevent potential risks.
The program has been highly successful, resulting in EnLink receiving national safety recognition by winning the 2022 Chairman’s Award for Safety Improvement for the third consecutive year from the GPA Midstream Association, an industry organization representing nearly 100 natural gas processors. The award is given to select companies that have improved safety performance over previous years – a testament to EnLink’s commitment to continuous improvement and a GoalZERO mindset. EnLink also received the 2022 Perfect Record Award for the first time from GPA Midstream, given to companies that achieve a full year without a single lost-time injury. EnLink was the only Division I company to receive the award in 2022.
Additional 2022 GoalZERO safety achievements include:
- Achieved the lowest employee Total Recordable Incident Rate (TRIR) in EnLink history of 0.26, which is a 41% improvement from EnLink’s 2021 TRIR and 61% better than the 2022 GPA Midstream Division I¹ TRIR average of 0.67; EnLink’s TRIR was the second best TRIR within Division I
- Achieved ZERO lost-time incidents for the first time in EnLink history
- Given the 2022 Chemical Transportation Safety Pinnacle Award from Union Pacific
- Received the Petroleum Alliance of Oklahoma’s 2022 Safety Program of Merit award for our contractor safety summit program and was named a finalist for the Alliance’s “Excellence in Environmental Stewardship” award
- Continued EnLink’s GoalZERO Excellence awards in which EnLink operating areas were celebrated for achieving zero incidents in key safety focus areas
Public Safety and 811
Pipelines have a safety record well in excess of any other mode of transporting petroleum and natural gas products². EnLink operates our pipelines and facilities safely, reliably, and with a focus on environmental stewardship. Through our Public Awareness Program, we provide information about EnLink’s operations and safety initiatives to community members who live and work near our pipelines and facilities. We develop and distribute customized information packets each year to local communities, schools, public officials, excavation contractors, and emergency responders. To promote pipeline safety, EnLink participated in over 90 public awareness meetings in communities across our asset base in 2022.
EnLink also regularly promotes digging safety through our partnership with the Common Ground Alliance, an association of underground utility companies and organizations committed to underground infrastructure safety. The Common Ground Alliance promotes the national “811” call-before-you-dig phone number, which helps professionals and homeowners safely complete digging projects by connecting them with a local “one call center” that can identify and mark approximate locations of underground utility lines. Once lines are flagged, the project may be commenced, and underground lines can be safely avoided. In 2022, EnLink cleared over 127,000 tickets assigned to the company via the 811 system, with 99.99% of these tickets cleared on time.
For our heavy-duty trucking fleet, we utilize control systems such as in-cab vehicle surveillance, telematics, overfill protection, and speed governors to promote and protect the safety of our employees and local communities. We also work closely with the National Safety Council to provide driver training to company drivers. In 2022, our heavy-duty fleet had zero vehicle accidents.
- The GPA Midstream Association classifies companies that complete 1 million or more midstream operational workhours in one year as Division I. The 2022 industry average for GPA Division I companies, EnLink’s peer group, is 0.67. EnLink calculates TRIR by multiplying the number of recordable injuries by 200,000 work hours and dividing by EnLink's total actual work hours.
- “Transportation Accidents by Mode,” U.S. Department of Transportation: https://www.bts.dot.gov/content/transportation-accidents-mode
More in the "Responsible Operations" section:
- Responsible Operations Overview
- Energy Use and Emissions
- Environmental Performance & Stewardship
- Emergency Preparedness
- Asset Integrity Management
Other sections:
The information and data (collectively, “Information”) provided in EnLink’s 2022 Sustainability Report (“Report”) reflects content as of and for the period ending December 31, 2022, unless otherwise indicated. Such Information in this Report is for informational purposes only. EnLink does not make, and hereby expressly disclaims, any representation or warranty as to the accuracy or completeness of the Information contained herein. This Report is being published on August 1, 2023, and EnLink has no obligation or duty to (1) update or correct the Information, (2) provide additional details regarding the Information, or (3) continue to provide the Information, in any form, in the future. EnLink reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to modify, update, change, delete, or supplement the Information from time to time without notice. The Information should not be interpreted as any form of guaranty or assurance of future results or trends. EnLink is not expressly incorporating by reference any of the Information into any filing of EnLink made with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission or in any other filing, report, application, or statement made by EnLink to any federal, state, or local governmental authority. This Report contains information based upon EnLink’s role in the broader economy, environment, and society and for the purpose of responding to issues that are important to a wide range of interested parties. While events, scenarios, and efforts discussed in this report may be significant, any significance should not be read as necessarily rising to the level of materiality of the disclosures required under U.S. federal securities laws, which have distinct and specific concepts of materiality.