§ 118.13 - Facility response training, drills, and exercises.

§ 118.13 Facility response training, drills, and exercises.

(a) The owner or operator of any facility required to prepare a facility response plan under § 118.3 shall develop and implement a facility response training program and a drills and exercise program that satisfy the requirements of this section. The owner or operator shall describe the programs in the facility response plan as provided in § 118.11.

(b) The facility owner or operator shall develop a facility response training program to train facility and non-facility personnel involved in CWA hazardous substance response activities. Training shall be functional in nature according to job tasks for both supervisory and non-supervisory operational personnel.

(1) A facility owner or operator must identify the method to be used for training any volunteers or casual laborers used during a response to comply with the requirements of 29 CFR 1910.120.

(2) The facility owner or operator is responsible for ensuring that all private response personnel are trained to meet the Occupational Safety and Health Administration standards for emergency response operations in 29 CFR 1910.120.

(3) The facility response plan shall include a description of the training program as required in § 118.11.

(4) The facility response plan shall include records, including logs, of CWA hazardous substance facility response plan meetings and describe the type of response training and dates, review of personnel responsibilities during a response action, and drills and exercises. These records may be included in the facility response plan or kept as an annex to the facility response plan. Completed records will be kept for five years following each activity. Records required under this part kept under usual and customary business practices will suffice for purposes of this paragraph.

(c) The facility owner or operator shall develop a program of facility response drills and exercises, including evaluation procedures. A program that follows the National Preparedness for Response Exercise Program (PREP) will be deemed as compliant with the drill and exercise requirements of this section. An alternative program or deviations from the PREP exercise requirements may also be developed by the owner or operator and are subject to approval by the Regional Administrator.

(1) Drills and exercises shall, when appropriate, be coordinated with local public emergency response officials and these officials shall be invited to participate. If a facility owner or operator is unable to coordinate with local public emergency response officials, documentation must show a good faith effort to contact and coordinate with those bodies.