The United States Environmental Protection Agency’s (USEPA) Oil Pollution Prevention regulations (
40 CFR 112) requires certain facilities storing oil products in quantities greater than 1,320 gallons to develop and implement a Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasures (SPCC) Plan. However, these regulations do not specify how to clean up a spill or what training is required to safely clean up spills.
Instead, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) complements the SPCC rules by directing employers to give operators training in accordance with their job duties. In many cases, spill response planning described in a site’s SPCC plan is appropriate for an incidental release that is limited in quantity and poses no safety and health threat to employees working in the immediate vicinity of a spill. Note that an incidental release does not have the potential to become an emergency within a short time.
It sounds straight forward, but as consultants, Trinity Consultants work in site-specific worlds where “it depends” often applies. In the event that a site has a complex SPCC plan, tank farms, or hazardous chemicals onsite, another type of training may be appropriate: Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response (HAZWOPER) (
29 CFR 1910.120). The HAZWOPER rules have multiple levels of training requirements depending on the job roles of employees during clean-up activities and the severity of an emergency.
Oil Spill Management
Oil is a common chemical handled by maintenance and production personnel at facilities across the country and requires an SPCC plan when applicable thresholds are exceeded. The National Contingency Plan (NCP) defines oil as any kind of oil in any form, including petroleum, fuel oil, sludge, oil refuse, and oil mixed with wastes, but can include a variety of chemicals that act like oil. The appropriate response to a spill that is safe to respond to is to care for anyone injured, stop/isolate the spill, deploy spill kits, always protect drains, and then consider clean up and reporting.
From our experience, an incidental oil spill cleanup is likely to include grabbing bags of speedy dry (oil dry) or other spill kit contents, placing piles of it around and on top of a liquid to absorb the material, and shoveling the mess into a container for proper disposal. (Used oil, oily debris, and oily PPE is non-hazardous waste in most jurisdictions, and waste containers should be labeled as such.) Level D PPE is usually appropriate: steel toe shoes, gloves, safety glasses. If the spill is small enough for routine maintenance to clean up the spill, and there is no hazard to employees, then HAZWOPER training is NOT required for this spill response scenario.
Contractor Arrangements
All personnel involved in spill response require an adequate level of training. If there are no on-site resources available to clean up a spill, or if the potential release volume is greater than an incidental spill, it is reasonable to have a response agreement with a contractor and call that contractor in the event of a spill. Their crew may, or may not be, HAZWOPER trained but is likely to be managed by someone who has this training. HAZWOPER trained personnel will know how to secure the scene, divert traffic, gather resources for spill response and direct safe spill response activities.
Spill Management Training Considerations
Following our theme, per OSHA, operators should be given training in accordance with their job duties.
Here is where we enter the “it depends” scenario. A site with an SPCC plan may have more than oil onsite, or there may be oils stored in bulk quantities. Please consider the following when determining the appropriate training for personnel that may be expected to respond to a spill:
- What chemicals are present onsite? For example, would site personnel be expected to respond to a release of diesel fuel or other flammable materials, water reactive chemicals, or respiratory irritants?
- What is the maximum spill volume that may be released? Are there tank farms onsite with interconnected piping?
- Are there sensitive receptors that could be impacted by a spill?
- What is the response time for an offsite responder relative to the potential for off-site impacts?
- What resources are available to respond to a spill at the site and in the surrounding area?
- What are the routine duties of plant personnel and what is their experience and baseline training?
- Is there anything special about a specific site’s operations?
The answers to these questions may suggest HAZWOPER training is appropriate for site personnel. If it is unsafe to respond to a spill, or it becomes unsafe to respond to a spill, a HAZWOPER trained crew with the appropriate resources to respond safely should be called to respond.
Regulatory Excerpts
SPCC Training requirements, as defined in 40 CFR 112.7: Personnel, training, and discharge prevention procedures include:
- At a minimum, train your oil-handling personnel in the operation and maintenance of equipment to prevent discharges; discharge procedure protocols; applicable pollution control laws, rules, and regulations; general facility operations; and the contents of the facility SPCC Plan.
- Designate a person at each applicable facility who is accountable for discharge prevention and who reports to facility management.
- Schedule and conduct discharge prevention briefings for your oil-handling personnel at least once a year to assure adequate understanding of the SPCC Plan for that facility. Such briefings must highlight and describe known discharges as described in § 112.1(b) or failures, malfunctioning components, and any recently developed precautionary measures.
Compared to the regulatory requirements in 29 CFR 1910.120(q)(6) for Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response (HAZWOPER):
Training shall be based on the duties and function to be performed by each responder of an emergency response organization. The skill and knowledge levels required for all new responders, those hired after the effective date of this standard, shall be conveyed to them through training before they are permitted to take part in actual emergency operations on an incident. Employees who participate, or are expected to participate, in emergency response, shall be given training in accordance with their job duties and comply with the standard.
In summary, OSHA HAZWOPER training qualifications include:
- First Responder Awareness level: responsible for release notifications
- First Responder Operations level: 8 hours of training to respond defensively without actually trying to stop a release.
- Hazardous Materials Technician: 24 hours of training to respond to releases or potential releases for the purpose of stopping the release.
- Hazardous Materials Specialist: 24 hours of training equal to the technician level and have additional competencies related to spill response.
- On Scene Incident Commander: 24 hours of training equal to the first responder operations level and in addition have competency to assume control of the incident scene.
Final Considerations
OSHA does not define the actual size of an incidental spill, and allows this to be defined by industry, to an extent. A rule of thumb is how much oil can be reasonably cleaned up using a spill kit. Generally, this is somewhere between 40 to 100 gallons, which is a reasonable volume for a maintenance technician to handle provided there are no other extenuating circumstances that would pose a hazard to the employee. A team of operators and maintenance technicians may be able to handle a larger spill if it is contained and, again, if there are no other extenuating circumstances that would pose a hazard to the employees. Another rule of thumb is if the spill can be cleaned up within a reasonable amount of time given site resources. Normally, this is within the span of one shift (despite the tendency for spills to occur just before shift change, due to rushing).
Once the volume of an incidental spill has been considered for planning purposes, what site resources may be available, and what other hazards or conditions may be present, facilities must then determine if their employees will be responsible for responding to spills. Many factors will be a part of this decision, including the size, training, and response time of their local fire department, the response time for spill response contractors, complexity of the facility, types of chemicals stored, and the number of employees at the facility. Once these have been evaluated, then either an agreement with spill response contractors or the local fire department should be reached to provide appropriate spill response to the facility, or the facility should provide HAZWOPER training to employees to ensure personnel are available to safely respond to spills.
Trinity provides both SPCC and HAZWOPER training to facilities across the country including initial and annual refresher training. They can be made client and site-specific to ensure your employees are properly trained and prepared for spill scenarios at your facility.
Contact Josh Haar, PE or Andrea Simmons with any SPCC or HAZWOPER questions.
