April 2, 2004—At the Department of Labor, the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), OSHA and the American Petroleum Institute (API) recently announced an alliance to promote safe working conditions within the petroleum and petrochemical liquid storage industries.
The alliance will focus on providing industry workers with training and guidance to ensure their safety and health. The focus of this activity will be safe tank entry, cleaning, maintenance, and rescue operations regarding petroleum and petrochemical liquid storage tanks.
Alliance partners will encourage industry workers, many of whom are tank owners and operations supervisors, to take NFPA courses on safety and health standards, including confined space safe practices, and then share that knowledge with fellow operators. The alliance will also coordinate best practices and lessons learned with others in the industry and publicize those results through individual training programs and materials.
This agreement will be in effect for two years, and may be extended. An implementation team, made up of organization representatives, is developing a plan of action, working procedures, and partner roles and responsibilities.
For more information, contact NFPA.
