SPCC

SPCC (Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasure) plans are required by EPA’s SPCC regulations for thousands of facilities that store oil. EPA requires regulated facilities to develop and implement an SPCC plan to avoid oil spills and minimize impacts of spills on public health and the environment. The plans must include provisions for oil spill prevention, spill response, and SPCC training. As defined in the SPCC regulations at 40 CFR 112, regulated facilities are non-transportation-related facilities with an aboveground oil storage capacity greater than 1,320 gallons or underground tanks with an oil storage capacity greater than 42,000 gallons that can be reasonably expected to discharge oil into navigable U.S. waters or shorelines.

According to EPA, more than 400,000 facilities are potentially regulated under the SPCC regulations. Many of those must have a written SPCC plan. Lack of an SPCC plan can and will hurt you. Consider:

• A Maine energy corporation was fined $157,500 by EPA for failing to implement SPCC plans for six of its facilities.
• EPA fined an Oklahoma company $32,940 for not having an SPCC plan.

Implementing SPCC plans will help protect waters and natural resources through spill prevention and control mechanisms such as secondary containment. Regulated facilities are also subject to EPA inspections. In fact, EPA performs hundreds of SPCC inspections annually! So compliance is more than environmental protection. It’s also necessary to prevent penalties that could cost up to $37,500 per day.

SPCC plans also help save you time. By implementing your SPCC plan properly, you can provide effective training to employees and organize inspection checklists and records. It’s not enough to just write an SPCC plan—its procedures must be followed in order to comply with SPCC regulations! EPA inspectors are looking for implementation through proper spill prevention, spill response, training, documentation and recordkeeping, and spill containment measures when they visit a facility.

Enviro.BLR.com® provides comprehensive state and federal SPCC compliance analysis. It also offers extensive SPCC compliance and training guidance documents, sample plans, forms, and checklists.

Some of the most used SPCC compliance tools available from BLR® include:

• SPCC regulatory analysis, including the Clean Water Act (CWA) and Oil Pollution Act rules
• EPA guidance documents
• Employee training materials
• Customizable prewritten SPCC Plan template
• SPCC reporting and recordkeeping forms
• SPCC compliance checklists

If you need an SPCC compliance solution, BLR has it!

Spill Prevention (SPCC Plan)
Benefits of SPCC Plans—Beyond Compliance
Compliance Tip: Secondary Containment
Navigable Waters Definition Restored
Equivalent Protection in SPCC Program
Suggested Training for SPCC
Common SPCC Violations
SPCC's Reasonable Expectations
SPCC Training Checklist pdf