Class Location Monitoring

Class Location Monitoring is a COSMIC-EYE service from Orbital Eye that automates the detection and ongoing tracking of dwellings within pipeline right-of-way corridors to support class-location risk assessment under US PHMSA 49 CFR Part 192 and equivalent frameworks. Under PHMSA regulations, gas pipeline class locations (Class 1 through 4) are determined by dwelling density within a sliding-mile corridor; a class-location change triggers recalculation of maximum allowable operating pressure and additional integrity management requirements.^[1] The service uses high-resolution optical satellite imagery and time-series change detection to maintain a continuously updated, GIS-compatible dwelling baseline and issue change notifications when new or removed dwellings alter the classification. Orbital Eye states a 95 percent dwelling detection accuracy and a reduction of assessment time from months to approximately one hour, though no independent peer-reviewed validation of these figures has been found.^[2] Output includes audit-ready data for PHMSA compliance workflows and integrates with Geographic Information Platform environments. Orbital Eye BV is based in Delft, Netherlands, and has been an ESA Business Applications network member since its ESA BIC Noordwijk incubation in 2012-2013.^[3]