Are you prepared to navigate the complexities of the Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasures Plan (SPCC)? Well, you're in luck! SPCC expert Shannon Oelkers is ready to guide you through the maze of this federal regulation applicable to all facilities storing over 1,320 gallons of petroleum oil or lubricants. Join us as we review why an updated SPCC is a legal requirement and a shield against additional violations during inspections.
We'll get into the nitty-gritty of how to audit your own SPCC and spot when it's due for an update, with Shannon generously sharing her checklist. We'll also confront common gaps in SPCCs, like outdated transfer procedures, missing tanks, and incorrect container volumes. This is particularly crucial if your business grapples with high volumes of petroleum oil and lubricants. For those dealing with over 10,000 gallons, we have a special segment discussing additional requirements. So gear up and get ready to master your SPCC compliance!
This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal or regulatory advice. We are not responsible for any losses, damages, or liabilities that may occur from using this podcast. This podcast is not intended to replace professional regulatory or legal advice, and the views expressed in this podcast may not be those of the host, which would be me or Integrity Environmental. Thank you very much for listening. We would be happy to provide professional regulatory advice as part of our consulting services if you need professional regulatory advice.
Are you prepared to navigate the complexities of the Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasures Plan (SPCC)? Well, you're in luck! SPCC expert Shannon Oelkers is ready to guide you through the maze of this federal regulation applicable to all facilities storing over 1,320 gallons of petroleum oil or lubricants. Join us as we review why an updated SPCC is a legal requirement and a shield against additional violations during inspections.
We'll get into the nitty-gritty of how to audit your own SPCC and spot when it's due for an update, with Shannon generously sharing her checklist. We'll also confront common gaps in SPCCs, like outdated transfer procedures, missing tanks, and incorrect container volumes. This is particularly crucial if your business grapples with high volumes of petroleum oil and lubricants. For those dealing with over 10,000 gallons, we have a special segment discussing additional requirements. So gear up and get ready to master your SPCC compliance!
This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal or regulatory advice. We are not responsible for any losses, damages, or liabilities that may occur from using this podcast. This podcast is not intended to replace professional regulatory or legal advice, and the views expressed in this podcast may not be those of the host, which would be me or Integrity Environmental. Thank you very much for listening. We would be happy to provide professional regulatory advice as part of our consulting services if you need professional regulatory advice.
Good morning, shannon, welcome back. I'm excited to continue our discussion on SPCCs.
Shannon:
My favorite plan.
Amanda:
Just to start off and remind our listeners what does SPCC stand for?
Shannon:
It stands for Spill Prevention, control Encounter Measures Plan. It's related to the federal regulation 40 CFR 112. And fun facts It applies to all facilities that store more than 1,320 gallons of petroleum oil or lubricants or more. There are exemptions for residential storage of petroleum oil and lubricant products. So that's why someone who has a shop at their house and maybe has a 1,000 gallon heating oil tank plus some drums for fueling up their boat, residential use is generally excluded. But for commercial enterprises, like our clients mostly are, they need an SPCC if they store more than 1,320 gallons of we call it POL petroleum oil and lubricant. So for most of our clients they actually store more than 10,000 gallons of petroleum oil and lubricant products And that puts you into a category of plan that requires a professional engineer to sign off on.
Amanda:
And why is it important to have an updated SPCC?
Shannon:
Well, first of all it's the law. It's required if you have those storage amounts I just mentioned. Secondly, if you have a spill ever or you are inspected by a federal agent from the EPA, they will ask for a copy of that SPCC and wherever that plan is out of compliance it will show up as additional violations for you. We call it the sleeper permit because it's dormant until activated. So a lot of people we've noticed they kind of ignore the SPCC because it's not required to be submitted, it's not very frequently audited or inspected for. but where it really catches up with people is if they have some sort of spill event. once that spill is reported then the EPA will send an email saying send us all your records And that record includes the SPCC plan itself.
Amanda:
How can you tell if your SPCC needs to be updated?
Shannon:
We joke that if you pull the SPCC out of your filing cabinet and there's a nice layer of dust on top, it's probably time to update it. And I can't tell you how many times I've gone to facilities and asked to see the plan and they are very literally pulling it off the back shelf or out of a filing cabinet and blowing the dirt off it. No, no. So first of all, i have a couple of checklist items and maybe we can make this into a checklist for people if they want to audit their own SPCCs and see if it needs to be updated. The first one is age. If it has not been updated in the last five years, that is a good sign that you need to update it. Also, if your SPCC predates 2002, like the last time it was written was in the 90s, which we unfortunately see quite a bit of as well they made changes to the SPCC regulations in 2002. And then in 2011,. In 2013, the EPA issued additional guidance for things like double walled tanks and secondary containment area volumes. If your SPCC was written prior to that 2002 date, or even prior to 2013, you're probably going to want to have it updated by somebody knowledgeable about the regulations so they can get some of those newer requirements. What was written in the 90s may not be compliant now because of the changes. So that was number one. Number two is that you have incorrect or outdated transfer procedures. So you have a tank truck loading rack and when your SPCC was first written you were top loading all of your trucks. But over time, as regulations have changed, you are now bottom loading all of your trucks. But if you look in the middle of your SPCC where there are transfer operations required to be listed, you may notice that they're for top loading still and nobody's doing top loading at your facility. Or maybe they are doing top loading but they're also doing bottom loading and that's not included in the transfer procedures. So that's another good sign that your SPCC needs to be updated is like what you're doing is not actually reflected. Then my favorite missing tanks. If you go to your SPCC and you're reading through it and there's typically a list of all your tanks and portable containers and you realize that you have four tanks at your site but there's only two in the SPCC because you added some tanks along the way between when it was last updated and now and they didn't get captured in there. We also have it the other way, where the SPCC lists four tanks but you took two out of service and you never bothered to go back in and pull them out of the listing. So missing tanks is a good clue that it's time to get it updated. And then also just missing entire areas of your facility. So did you add a warehouse in 2013 and it's got a waste oil burner with a 300 gallon tank and that's nowhere in your SPCC because nobody thought to update it at the time. Other things we see is that they've removed old infrastructure, like they pulled out an old dock and put in a new dock and it's a slightly different configuration and has a marina fueling element. And so the old SPCC talks about the dock, but it doesn't match what your current facility operations and configuration is, or the maps are really outdated and the facility site maps don't show all the pieces. Let's see just a couple more here on my little list of does your SPCC need to be updated?
Shannon:
container volumes When we write SPCC's, you're supposed to write how many estimated containers you might have on site. So for a lot of shops it's like two or three drums are in the shop right One for lube oil, one for waste oil, maybe one for something else. But this is kind of the unique quirk about the SPCC is, if you tell them you have three drums at the facility and they show up and there's four, you get a violation for not having the correct number. But if you tell them there's four drums and there's only three, you have less than they're totally fine with that. So what we tell people is imagine the biggest number that could ever possibly be in the facility space that you have, right? So if it's a warehouse and you normally have eight isotopes, but seasonally gearing up for construction, a client will store an additional eight isotopes in that warehouse, right, you're going to want to write it for 16, because that's the most it'll ever be there, even if those totes for the construction contractor are only there for a few weeks or a few days. Because if you happen to get inspected or have a spill on that day, you want it to be written for your max. And I see in the older SPCC plans a lot of our facilities, especially in Alaska, are doing higher volumes of throughput on retail products like that. What you were doing in the 90s is nowhere near what you're doing now a lot higher volume there.
Shannon:
Another thing that's really common, even in newer SPCCs, is that personnel and local notifications are not updated. So you know, if there's people on that list that don't even live in your community anymore, you might want to make sure to get it updated. And then businesses and contacts at businesses change, like if, let's say, you're along a shoreline and there's fish processors and other people that maybe you need to notify if you were gonna have a spill or an accident. You used to have someone next to you that was I don't know a flight service or something, and now it's a fish processor with a saltwater intake. You need to make sure that's all updated in there so that you can correctly make your local notifications and make sure that if you do have a spill, the emergency procedures are tight. And then I have two more just for the facilities over 10,000 gallons in storage. So these are the bigger ones that require the professional engineer. And specifically, does your SPCC plan have a signature page from a professional engineer with their stamp? I get questions a lot about whether the stamp has to be the state that you're located in.
Shannon:
For Alaska it does not have to be a state of Alaska stamp. It's a federal plan. So it can be. Any professional engineer in the United States of America can actually stamp that plan. But Alaska doesn't have any additional requirements. For the PE to be based in Alaska. In the state of Washington, where we do a few plans as well, they require a professional engineer to be located in Washington and have a Washington PE stamp. And then the state of Washington also utilizes the SPCC permit as part of their requirements. So they have like a beefier SPCC. That's required and they're often combined. So you're meeting the federal requirements in the state of Washington. For those 10,000 gallon and bigger facilities you're gonna wanna make sure you have a PE And if you're in the state of Washington it's gonna have to be a Washington PE.
Amanda:
But if you're in.
Shannon:
Alaska. It can be anyone, as long as they're a PE. Secondly, we also wanna make sure for the facilities over 10,000 gallons that you have initial steel tank institute or American Petroleum Institute inspections for each tank over 5,000 gallons in size. And we have an episode coming up. We'll post a link to that episode in our show notes. But we talk about why SPCCs and the Steel Tank Institute in particular are best friends forever. Because they require inspections of horizontal tanks and there's initial and then ongoing, and so if you don't have any inspections for your tank performed by an external third party and your tanks are over 5,000 gallons in size, that's typically a sign your SPCC needs to be updated to, because the two go together.
Amanda:
All right, so say, one of these eight red flags has popped up. How would we go about getting it updated?
Shannon:
Ha, call us call integrity or a similar firm. There's lots of firms that provide SPCC services, but make sure that it's a reputable firm that understands your industry. We typically do a site visit to make sure that we've captured everything, because a very old SPCC often is missing some of those things like facility changes and tank management. It can be done with local on-site people, but typically they also have their full-time jobs And so we've found over the years it's easier if we are able to go out and do a nice site inspection and grab all the things we know are important to the SPCC plan and then asking the terminal manager to review what we found for errors, rather than asking them to create the whole list. For us that's a best management practice, but you know you're mileage may vary. The second is that this is sort of like a pro tip. If you're doing a capital improvement project at your facility, you can include updating the SPCC in the RFP because most engineering firms that do design work they also write SPCCs to go with the changes to the facility And so it doesn't cost a whole lot as a percentage of you know this big capital improvement plan that you've got. But if you're doing that and you've got an engineering design firm, you could include updating the SPCC in that proposal and then it'll be handled as part of that update. We do a lot of subcontracting for engineers here in Alaska, where we write the SPCC while they're handling the design work. It's an easier way to get it updated and caught up as part of this existing thing that you're doing.
Shannon:
And then, lastly, if you're under 10,000 gallons in storage, you can DIY it. You don't need a professional engineer to stamp it And we can include the link. There's two kinds of facilities under 10,000 gallons at the EPA list. They're called Tier 1 and Tier 2 facilities And they're based on how much total storage volume you have and the actual size of your largest tank. So if you're under 10,000 gallons and no tank is bigger than 5,000 gallons, you're a Tier 1. And if you are under 10,000 gallons and at least one of your tanks is larger than 5,000 gallons, you're a Tier 2. And those tiers have templates and we can include the links to those templates from the EPA's website.
Shannon:
But I do want to just throw a caution out there, because we actually do Tier 1 and Tier 2 plans for people all the time because EPA definitions and requirements for things like secondary containment areas can be very different from common sense completely different And so sometimes people have tried to DIY it and then we get brought in because they're confused about how big the secondary containment needs to be. They're confused about what actually needs secondary containment and what doesn't, and it can be a little tricky, but there is a guidance out there that we've linked in other episodes And we definitely there is a template that you can fill out. I think somebody who's pretty savvy and is like an environmental manager. That's totally within their grasp.
Shannon:
If it's not your primary job and you're real shaky on environmental regulations, you might want to bring in a professional. These plans are typically not as expensive because they don't involve a professional engineer, and I think the guidance and the knowledge and wisdom you can get from somebody who does this all the time will help you not over or under. Do something. Those are my thoughts on how to get it updated. I mean really it's just reaching out to a firm or maybe including it in the capital improvement project or talking to somebody. If you can DIY it, maybe bounce ideas off them or do in your internet research.
Amanda:
And for those listeners that want to learn a little bit more about SPCCs I know that we do cover them in a few of our episodes and upcoming episodes What other resources can we point them towards?
Shannon:
Well, those episodes are a good place to start for bite-sized chunks. And then, if you really want to learn about SPCCs, you've got to go to the EPA's website and download the regional guidance for SPCC inspection and then read through. I don't know, 300 pages of guidance. It's a little out of reading, but that's a good place to start And we've linked that before and we can link it again here. if this is the first episode that you've found of ours that deals with SPCCs.
Amanda:
Great. Well, that's a wrap for today. Thank you so much for your time, shannon. I appreciate it. Indeed.