ACAPMA held petroleum-contractor workshops last week in Sydney and Melbourne, attended by industry stakeholders including contractors, service providers, equipment suppliers, major retailers and regulators.
The principal purpose of the workshops was to secure feedback on issues affecting the petroleum-contracting and petroleum-service industry with the aim of informing ACAPMA’s future advocacy activities, and on any areas for development of best-practice guidelines additional to those released last year (on stormwater management, UPSS monitoring and biofuels storage).
“These annual forums provide us with an opportunity to secure direct feedback from petroleum contractors and petroleum-equipment suppliers on some of the current challenges impacting their industry segment,” ACAPMA CEO Mark Mckenzie said.
“ACAPMA then uses this information to inform our advocacy priorities for the year ahead, as well as providing topics and ideas for discussion at the annual Contractors Forum, which is held in conjunction with the Asia Pacific Fuel Industry Forum (APFIF).”
Two common themes emerged during the workshop discussions. The first was the need for ACAPMA to finalise a guideline on vapour recovery (an attempt was made to develop this guideline last year, but the discussion was put on hold given some conflicting messages about the experience with VR2 systems in NSW).
Both workshops suggested a need to dust off the work from last year and push through to finalise the VR2 guideline in time for release at the 2018 APFIF in September.
The second theme centred around the requirement for development of a formal accreditation mechanism for petroleum contractors. It is understood that this has been a longstanding issue in the petroleum-contracting industry – and one that has proven difficult to solve.
“During the conversations, I noted that we now have the National Petroleum Recognition Scheme in place – with more than 150 recognised contractor businesses – and that this scheme could be readily expanded to incorporate training and accreditation in some key areas of high-risk competency,” Mr McKenzie said.
“Three potential areas of focus for such accreditation were identified: fuel-system design (overall), site commissioning and site decommissioning.”
Apart from these themes, discussions also included suggestions that ACAPMA might consider building on the work led by SafeWork NSW relating to the physical safety and security of service-station sites in the face of increased criminality at these sites around the country.
“There is significant merit in this third suggestion, and ACAPMA will investigate options for development of such a guideline as part of our normal business,” Mr McKenzie said.
With these priorities identified, ACAPMA will now work to produce a best-practice guideline for vapour recovery and establish a national steering committee to examine options for the development of a petroleum-contractor accreditation course.
For more details, visit: http://acapmag.com.au/home/2018/04/acapma-petroleum-contractor-workshops-2018/
