Pipeline integrity

Ever since the San Bruno pipeline incident, there has been lot of debate on pileline safety in the USA. A article mentions the following
"Pipelines are by their nature distributed and remote. Having sensors and analytics available to help identify pipes at risk would be a sensible strategy. Oil and gas companies are, in fact, investing in smart technologies for safety monitoring. As part of the 2011 Vertical IT & Communications Survey conducted by IDC in January, 2011, which included 90 North American oil and gas companies, 42% stated that they would be investing in smart technologies for safety monitoring in the next one to two years. This is not surprising given the importance of safety in the upstream side of the business. But in midstream, there are a number of questions still to be answered. The major risks to pipelines are corrosion, digging and failure of materials. Is sensing technology available that can identify these potential risks to pipeline integrity? Sensors in remote locations should not have significant power requirements and should be able to be powered by long-life batteries. Are these sensors now available? Then too, is the telecommunications infrastructure available to support bringing the data back for analysis? We welcome your comments"
Read the complete article in this link..