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Meeting between USEPA/ OEM staff and American Forest and Paper Association (AFPA)

On the Risk Management Program Proposed Rule 

March 22, 2016

Teleconference meeting at 3 pm

Attendees:

Jim Belke, USEPA/Office of Land and Emergency Management/Office of Emergency 

Management

Kathy Franklin, USEPA/Office of Land and Emergency Management/Office of Emergency 

Management

Steward Holm, AFPA, Chief Scientist

Linda Tsang, AFPA, Attorney

Tim Hunt, AFPA, Senior Director, Air Quality Programs

Discussion Topics:

AFPA had questions about the criteria used to select industries subject to the safer technology 

and alternatives analysis (STAA) provisions. EPA explained that industries covered were based 

on complexity of operations with opportunities to implement inherently safer technology (IST)

and based on accident rate (accidents/facility).

AFPA asked if EPA had any definition of complex, as it related to complex facilities as 

described in rationale for STAA coverage. EPA answered no. AFPA said that simple and 

complex facilities were terms also used in conjunction with cost data on facilities subject to 

emergency response provisions, but paper industry does not seem to be included in this analysis 

as a complex facilities. EPA explained that for cost estimates, differentiation could have been 

made at various levels, for example, gas processors and paper manufacturing could have been 

included as complex in the cost estimates. Accident rate was a factor that drove coverage of 

NAICS code 322- pulp and paper, for STAA provisions.

AFPA wondered if the STAA coverage determination was driven by use of particular chemicals. 

EPA explained that no, this was not only factor, IST includes other risk reduction actions besides 

chemical substitution.

AFPA wondered why accident rates for particular industries in the technical background 

document were based on number of facilities, instead of something else, such as man-hours. 

AFPA said the paper facilities have between 350-1600 employees per facility. EPA explained 

that one could use various metrics to normalize accident data. The Wharton School has done a 

study looking at accident rates using quantities of chemicals above the threshold as a basis for 

comparison. AFPA requested this information. EPA agreed and on March 22, 2016 sent the 

following study by email to Stewart Holm:
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Elliott, M.R., Kleindorfer, P.R., and Lowe, R.A. October 2003. The Role of Hazardous 

and Regulatory Practice in the Accidental Release of Chemicals at U.S. Industrial 

Facilities. Risk Analysis, Vol. 23, No. 5, pp. 883-896.

This study is also available at 

http://opim.wharton.upenn.edu/risk/downloads/archive/arch312.pdf

EPA will make the document available in the rulemaking docket EPA-HQ-OEM-2015-

0725.

AFPA also noted that their industry had very few off-site impacts. They cited only 1 worker 

death, 59 onsite injuries and only 2 off-site injuries. They believe this is much less than other 

industries based on looking at the RMP accident spreadsheet data. Also they note very little 

accident property damage for their industry. They cited higher off-site impacts for other 

industries, such as 14,000 people impacted off-site. EPA explained that most of the 14,000 offsite medically treated were from one refinery accident where thousands of people went to the 

hospital due to effects from smoke inhalation (this particular incident was pointed out in the 

Regulatory Impact Analysis) and this data was considered an outlier. Property damage is more 

common among the facilities, such as refineries, that use flammable substances.

AFPA wanted to know why EPA had not decided to take any action on ammonium nitrate, 

which was the substance involved in the West Texas fertilizer plant accident. EPA explained 

that OSHA and DHS, who have regulations covering AN fertilizer, are in the process of 

reviewing their regulations for possible changes and EPA wanted to wait for any decisions from 

their review before making any decisions regarding AN.

AFPA wanted more detailed information on the RMP data for their industry, and particularly for 

the accidents cited in the RMP 10-year accident data in the currently available spreadsheet. EPA 

explained that the RMP data, which does not include the sensitive, restricted-access off-site 

consequence analysis data, is publicly available via FOIA, as a large size file in a database 

format. Both AFPA and EPA discussed the time it might take to obtain this data via FOIA as 

problematic because public comments on the rule are due on or before May 13, 2016. EPA said 

it would investigate getting this data to AFPA directly without having them request it by FOIA 

and would follow up on this issue. On March 24, 2016, EPA delivered to AFPA a DVD 

containing the Risk Management Plan (RMP) National Database, Non-Offsite Consequence 

Analysis (non-OCA) Version, files in .mdb format. EPA will also make copies of this disk 

available in the public rulemaking docket EPA-HQ-OEM-2015-0725.