OSHA's Flame-Resistant Clothing Policy - ASSE Members

STANDARDSBY ADELE BASSETTMopping UpStandards for Oil Spill Cleanup & Toxicity AssessmentWorking in conjunctionwith boomsare skimmers, theotherworldly lookingequipment thatuses vacuums,disks, brushes andother devices toremove oil from thewater’s surface.It is a sad fact of life that it often takes a catastropheto spotlight a chronic issue. The Deepwater Horizonspill in the Gulf of Mexico was not the largest oilspill ever. That record is currently held by the 36 billiongallons [93 million m 3 ] that retreating Iraqi forcesuncorked when they left Kuwait in 1991 (Broder &Zeller, 2010). But, oil spills are far from rare.“Oil spills of 1,000 gallons [3.8 m 3 ] or so are actuallyroutine occurrences throughoutthe world,” says Mervin Fingas, anindependent consultant in Alberta,Canada, veteran member of ASTMInternational Committee F20 onHazardous Substances and Oil SpillResponse, and author of The Basicsof Oil Spill Cleanup. “Eight to ninespills occur daily in Canada, withabout 10 times that many happeningin the U.S.”The Deepwater spill was especiallydisconcerting because of its locationin the Gulf of Mexico (bothdeep undersea and far off the U.S.shore) and its nature (a continuous,rather than more readily controlledand contained one-point spill, such as a leaking tanker ora ruptured pipeline).THE ROLE OF STANDARDSThe enduring economic and environmental consequencesof the Gulf spill demonstrated the crucial significanceof the standards developed over the past 35 yearsby ASTM International Committee F20. According toPeter Lane, president of Applied Fabric Technologies inOrchard Park, NY, and F20 committee chair, nearly halfof the 56 standards overseen by the committee will comeinto play sooner or later, directly or indirectly.Since 1975, the oil producers, regulators, equipmentsuppliers and manufacturers who have written the standardsfor Committee F20 have not necessarily anticipatedthe political turmoil, extreme engineering challengesor human failure that have characterized more recent oilspills. But, their standards have grown to cover justabout every aspect of response from control, removaland treatment to in-situ burning, surveillance and tracking,shoreline measures and bioremediation.BOOMS &SKIMMERSAmong the more significant standards developed byCommittee F20 have been those related to booms, thelong, sausage-like devices that corral slicks during the initialstages of a spill. ASTM International standards F962,Specification for Oil Spill Response Boom Connection:Z-Connector, and F2438, Specification for Oil SpillResponse Boom Connection: Slide Connector, ensure thatcompliant booms link together, much like the perfect fit ofstandardized electrical plugs and wall sockets.Fingas, who chairs F20 subcommittees on in-situburning and remote sensing and detection, says, “It hastaken 20 years to align manufacturers to produce better,stronger booms that meet an industry standard and thatconnect together, no matter what their size and shape.”In the case of the Gulf spill, the crews in fishing boats,laying miles of booms, “may have been among the mosteffective control measures, catching oil in the initialstages of the spill and preventing it from coming toshore,” he says.Working in conjunction with booms are skimmers,the otherworldly looking equipment that uses vacuums,disks, brushes and other devices to remove oil from thewater’s surface. Committee F20 has developed a numberof standards related to equipment selection and testing,but a more recent standard, F2709, Test Method forDetermining Nameplate Recovery Rate of Stationary OilSkimmer Systems, holds manufacturers responsible foraccurately reporting the capabilities of their skimmers.The standard specifies the skimmer capacity that is actuallyneeded to clean up certain types of oil spills.14Well Informed www.asse.org 2011