In the aftermath of a serious chemical release and fire at Chevron’s Richmond oil refinery in August, 2012, the Brown Administration formed an Interagency Working Group to examine ways to improve public and worker safety through enhanced oversight of refineries, and to strengthen emergency preparedness in anticipation of any future incident. The Working Group consisted of participants from 13 agencies and departments, as well as the Governor’s office. Over an eight-month period, the Working Group met internally and with industry, labor, community, environmental, academic, local emergency response and other stakeholders. The Working Group’s findings and recommendations include:
- Oversight and Coordination: Multiple regulatory agencies have responsibility for oversight of aspects of refineries, sometimes with overlapping jurisdiction. Agency actions and efforts to ensure information sharing, joint prioritization of enforcement or regulation, or other coordinated efforts to avoid potential duplicative action, are insufficient.
- Emergency Response and Preparedness: Regulations need to define more precisely a refinery’s requirements for reporting leaks or releases of a hazardous material to local and state agencies. Hazardous Materials Area Plans developed at the local level are written as general response guidance and not specifically to address the unique hazards a refinery poses. The current air monitoring network also does not provide real-time air pollution tracking following an industrial accident in all geographic regions.
- Safety and Prevention of Hazardous Events: Refineries are subject to California Accidental Release Program (CalARP), Risk Management Program (RMP), and Process Safety Management (PSM) regulation, as well as an Industrial Safety Ordinance in Contra Costa County, where four refineries are located. However, gaps in the regulatory schemes exist, including limitations on their ability to cover all aspects of process safety and the extent to which they are enforceable. Regulatory agencies face multiple issues relating to inspection and enforcement capabilities including: difficulty in hiring, retaining, and training inspectors; lack of mechanisms for information sharing and coordination; deficiencies in data and transparency; and, insufficient penalties to create meaningful deterrence.
- Community Education and Alerts: There are shortcomings in existing emergency alert systems, public education and timely dissemination of public information. These difficulties include coordination between emergency responders and challenges in communicating with surrounding communities regarding health risk and appropriate actions. Public involvement is not well integrated into air monitoring improvement discussions.
Recommendations
- Oversight and Coordination: An Interagency Refinery Task Force will be created within the California Environmental Protection Agency (Cal/EPA) by September 1, 2013, to coordinate agencies’ activities and carry out the recommendations in this report.
- Emergency Response and Preparedness: The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES), formerly the California Emergency Management Agency (Cal EMA), will coordinate improved emergency response by clarifying reporting thresholds during hazardous materials release or threatened release, and work with local Certified Unified Program Agencies (CUPAs) to create refinery-specific elements in Hazardous Materials Area Plans. The Working Group has identified at least four elements that must be included in the Area Plans:
- (1) alignment of radio communications between response officials;
- (2) clear criteria for the establishment of a Unified Incident Command and Joint Operation Center;
- (3) plans and protocols for persons outside the refineries; and
- (4) requirements for joint drills and exercises. The California Air Resources Board (ARB), in collaboration with the California Air Pollution Control Officers Association (CAPCOA), is working on a parallel effort focused on toxic air contaminant monitoring to improve knowledge and information sharing for real-time air data.
- Safety and Prevention of Hazardous Events: Existing regulations and practices must be strengthened to ensure that more data and the information is provided to agencies. In addition, agency enforcement capabilities need to be enhanced. Additional regulatory changes to improve refinery safety procedures include five prevention strategies that should be required as soon as possible, requiring refineries to:
- (1) implement inherently safer systems to the greatest extent feasible;
- (2) perform periodic safety culture assessments;
- (3) adequately incorporate damage mechanism hazard reviews into Process Hazard Analyses;
- (4) complete root cause analysis after significant accidents or releases; and
- (5) explicitly account for human factors. The Working Group additionally identified three areas for further study that include reporting of leading and lagging indicators, increasing worker involvement, and exploring the safety case approach.
- Community Education and Alerts: State agencies will evaluate improvements to public input during the emergency planning process, create enhanced public information and outreach protocol for use during a toxic chemicals release or fire, and improve alerts and public access to information during emergency events. Agencies are also working toward enhanced public availability of air monitoring information.
For actions identified in this report requiring regulatory change, the Governor’s office has directed the relevant agencies to begin that process immediately. Where actions identified require Legislative authority, the relevant agencies will consult with the Legislature. This report also identifies interim steps to improve interagency coordination and public communication, and to improve air monitoring near refineries, which the relevant agencies will undertake as soon as possible in order to ensure that this report results in measurable progress in the coming year.
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