['Risk Assessment and Management']
['Risk Assessment and Management']
01/02/2024
Copyright 2024 J. J. Keller & Associate, Inc. For re-use options please contact copyright@jjkeller.com or call 800-558-5011.
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Chemical accidents can occur at businesses of any size. Many businesses handle propane, ammonia, chlorine, and other chemicals that could pose a risk to the surrounding community if an accident were to occur. When Congress passed the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, Section 112(r) required EPA to publish regulations and guidance for chemical accident prevention at facilities that use substances that pose the greatest risk of harm from accidental releases.
Subsequently, EPA established chemical accident prevention requirements at 40 CFR 68 for businesses of all sizes that use certain listed regulated flammable and/or toxic substances. The regulation is known as the Risk Management Plan (RMP) rule. Owners and operators of a facility (considered a stationary source) that manufactures, uses, stores, or otherwise handles more than a threshold quantity of a listed regulated substance in a process must implement a set of hazard assessment, accident prevention, and emergency response elements and submit a single written RMP to EPA or the state implementing agency for all covered processes at the facility. The submitted information helps local fire, police, and emergency response personnel (who must prepare for and respond to chemical accidents) and is useful to citizens in understanding the chemical hazards in communities.
Scope
An owner or operator of a stationary source that has more than a threshold quantity of a regulated substance in a process, as determined under 68.115, must comply with the requirements of Part 68.
The regulations do not apply to transportation, including storage incident to transportation. However, transportation containers used for storage not incident to transportation and transportation containers connected to equipment at a stationary source are considered part of the stationary source and are potentially covered by the regulations.
Regulatory citations
- 40 CFR 68 — Chemical accident prevention provisions
Key definitions
- Accidental release: An unanticipated emission of a regulated substance or other extremely hazardous substance into the ambient air from a stationary source.
- Administrative controls: Written procedural mechanisms used for hazard control.
- Article: A manufactured item, as defined under 29 CFR 1910.1200(b), that is formed to a specific shape or design during manufacture, that has end use functions dependent in whole or in part upon the shape or design during end use, and that does not release or otherwise result in exposure to a regulated substance under normal conditions of processing and use.
- Implementing agency: The state or local agency that obtains delegation for an accidental release prevention program under Subpart E of 40 CFR 63. The implementing agency may, but is not required to, be the state or local air permitting agency. If no state or local agency is granted delegation, EPA will be the implementing agency for that state.
- Mitigation or mitigation system: Specific activities, technologies, or equipment designed or deployed to capture or control substances upon loss of containment to minimize exposure of the public or the environment. Passive mitigation means equipment, devices, or technologies that function without human, mechanical, or other energy input. Active mitigation means equipment, devices, or technologies that need human, mechanical, or other energy input to function.
- Owner or operator: Any person who owns, leases, operates, controls, or supervises a stationary source.
- Process: Any activity involving a regulated substance including any use, storage, manufacturing, handling, or on-site movement of such substances, or combination of these activities. For the purposes of this definition, any group of vessels that are interconnected, or separate vessels that are located such that a regulated substance could be involved in a potential release, shall be considered a single process.
- Public receptor: Offsite residences, institutions (e.g., schools, hospitals), industrial, commercial, and office buildings, parks, or recreational areas inhabited or occupied by the public at any time without restriction by the stationary source where members of the public could be exposed to toxic concentrations, radiant heat, or overpressure, as a result of an accidental release.
- Regulated substance: Any substance listed pursuant to section 112(r)(3) of the Clean Air Act as amended. See 68.130.
- Retail facility: A stationary source at which more than one-half of the income is obtained from direct sales to end users or at which more than one-half of the fuel sold, by volume, is sold through a cylinder exchange program.
- Stationary source: Any buildings, structures, equipment, installations, or substance emitting stationary activities which belong to the same industrial group, which are located on one or more contiguous properties, which are under the control of the same person (or persons under common control), and from which an accidental release may occur. The term stationary source does not apply to transportation, including storage incident to transportation, of any regulated substance or any other extremely hazardous substance under the provisions of this part. A stationary source includes transportation containers used for storage not incident to transportation and transportation containers connected to equipment at a stationary source for loading or unloading. Transportation includes, but is not limited to, transportation subject to oversight or regulation under 49 CFR 192, 193, or 195, or a state natural gas or hazardous liquid program for which the state has in effect a certification to DOT under 49 U.S.C. 60105. A stationary source does not include naturally occurring hydrocarbon reservoirs. Properties shall not be considered contiguous solely because of a railroad or pipeline right-of-way.
- Threshold quantity: The quantity specified for regulated substances pursuant to section 112(r)(5) of the Clean Air Act as amended, listed in 68.130 and determined to be present at a stationary source as specified in 68.115.
- Vessel: Any reactor, tank, drum, barrel, cylinder, vat, kettle, boiler, pipe, hose, or other container.
- Worst-case release: The release of the largest quantity of a regulated substance from a vessel or process line failure that results in the greatest distance to an endpoint defined in 68.22(a).
Summary of requirements
Determine the following:
- Is the facility a stationary source?
- Does the facility have any regulated substances?
- Does the facility have a process or processes?
- Does the facility have any regulated substances above a threshold quantity in a process?
- Assign a “program level” to each process at the facility. There are three possible program levels.
- Program 1: Processes which would not affect the public in the case of a worst-case release and with no accidents with specific offsite consequences within the past five years are eligible for Program 1. It imposes limited hazard assessment requirements and minimal prevention and emergency response requirements.
- Program 2: Processes not eligible for program 1 or subject to Program 3 are placed here. It imposes streamlined prevention program requirements. It also has added hazard assessment, management, and emergency response requirements.
- Program 3: Processes not eligible for Program 1 and subject to OSHA’s process safety management (PSM) standard under federal or state OSHA programs are classified in one of ten North American Industrial Classification System (NAICS) codes are placed here. It imposes OSHA’S PSM standard as the prevention program. It also has further hazard assessment, management, and emergency response requirements.
- Undertake the appropriate program-level activities for each covered process.
- Complete and implement an RMP and submit it to EPA or the state implementing agency. Note:
- Software called RMP*eSubmit is the only way to submit RMPs to EPA.
- Facilities submitting confidential business information and trade secrets cannot use RMP*eSubmit at this time; please contact the RMP Reporting Center for submission options.
- Before a facility uses RMP*eSubmit for the first time, the facility must have the facility name, location, mailing address, and basic contact information (including email address). After the first time using RMP*eSubmit, a facility will also need its EPA Facility Identification (ID) Number.
- To set up an RMP*eSubmit account: (1) register the certifying official in http://CDX.epa.gov; (2) complete the electronic signature agreement (ESA) and mail it to EPA; and (3) register the preparer and activate RMP*eSubmit access in CDX.
- For submission and/or resubmission of an RMP, the facility is required to review all nine sections of the RMP, update as appropriate, and certify that the entire updated RMP is true, accurate, and complete.
- Fully update and resubmit the facility RMP at least once every five years.
- Update and resubmit the RMP if certain process changes described in 68.190 occur at the facility prior to the 5-year anniversary of the facility RMP.
- Resubmit, correct, or withdraw an RMP after it has prepared an RMP using RMP*eSubmit. Resubmissions reset the five-year anniversary date by which the facility must next update its RMP. Corrections do not generate a new anniversary date.
- Meet any deadlines set by Part 68.
- If changes occur at your facility that make it no longer subject to Part 68, the facility should submit a letter to the RMP Reporting Center within six months and include the effective date of the de-registration (the date on which the facility was no longer covered by the RMP regulation), a signature of the owner or operator, and the facility RMP Facility ID number (the 12-digit ID number assigned by EPA).
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Copyright 2024 J. J. Keller & Associate, Inc. For re-use options please contact copyright@jjkeller.com or call 800-558-5011.