Event Summary
Effective risk management depends on alignment—not silos. This course is designed for leaders, compliance teams, and risk professionals responsible for ensuring that risk is identified, prioritized, and managed consistently across operations, regulatory requirements, and Pipeline Safety Management Systems (PSMS).
Participants will explore how API RP 1173 integrates with broader risk management and compliance programs to support informed decision-making and operational resilience. The course focuses on connecting PSMS risk processes with compliance obligations and day-to-day operational realities, helping organizations move from fragmented risk activities to a coordinated, enterprise-wide approach.
Through practical examples, the training highlights how risk identification, assessment, mitigation, and monitoring flow across engineering, operations, and compliance functions. Emphasis is placed on governance, data sharing, and communication—ensuring risks are visible, prioritized appropriately, and addressed before they result in incidents, findings, or operational disruptions.
Course Objectives
- Explain how PSMS risk management processes align with compliance and operational risk programs.
- Identify gaps and overlaps between PSMS, compliance, and operational risk activities.
- Apply a coordinated approach to risk identification, assessment, and prioritization across functions.
- Evaluate risk information to support governance decisions, resource allocation, and performance monitoring.
- Integrate lessons learned, incident data, and assurance results into ongoing risk management and continuous improvement efforts.
Who Should Attend
Leadership, compliance, risk professionals
Attendees will receive 2 Professional Development Hours (PDH) upon completion.
Meet Your Instructor
Mark Hereth
Managing Director, Blacksmith Group/P-PIC
Mark is a managing director of the Blacksmith Group / P-PIC which has served the energy pipeline industry since 2002. Prior to starting P-PIC, he worked for 23 years for Hartford Steam Boiler Inspection and Insurance Co. (HSB) the largest insurer of machinery and process equipment in the world. During the first 14 years of his time within HSB, Mark worked for Radian Corporation (now part of AECOM), an engineering subsidiary serving the petrochemical, petroleum refining, metals processing, pipelines and electric power industries. He joined the parent company of HSB in 1993 and ran HSB’s worldwide Chemical, Oil and Gas Insurance Operations. He testified before the House Energy and Commerce Committee during Pipeline Safety Reauthorization in 2002.
He has advised Company Boards by leading independent investigations and proposing long-term plans following major accidents for PG&E, El Paso Corporation, Olympic Pipeline and Colonial Pipeline. He also served as a lead advisor for Entergy following Hurricane Katrina as they worked to emerge from bankruptcy and then successfully realized insurance recovery for major damage to their gas distribution system. Mark led the technical work within INGAA that provided the foundation for MAOP Reconfirmation and Extending Integrity Management as well as the Joint Trade Associations comments on the PHMSA proposed rule on these topics.
Mark served as Chairman of the Board of the INGAA Foundation in 2018 and has been a member since 2003. He served as the technical lead for work group developing API RP 1173, Recommended Practice for Pipeline Safety Management Systems. He was appointed by the Secretary of the US Department of Transportation in 2016 to the serve on a Federal Advisory Committee for Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration on Voluntary Information Sharing. He has an M.S. in Chemical Engineering from Ohio University.
