The FRA has changed its contact procedures in the event of rail-related incidents. BNSF’s Job 2 Local makes its way south through rainy Sumner, Washington on December 11th, 2016. Image © 12/2016 by Nikki Burgess; all rights reserved.

It’s the last full week of autumn on the calendar, even though winter has made itself known across most of the country.  Things slowed a little on the regulatory front, but still important news to think about.  Let’s take a look:

EPA

• One big change on the horizon is the coming use of electronic manifests for the shipment of hazardous waste—and as you might guess, a new committee is involved.  There will be an inaugural three (3) day meeting of the Hazardous Waste Electronic Manifest System (‘‘eManifest’’) Advisory Board to consider and advise the Agency about the initial launch of the e-Manifest System.  (The meeting will be held on January 10–12, 2017).  Interested parties can find out more here
• The EPA is also proposing to ban certain uses of the toxic chemical trichloroethylene (TCE) due to health risks when used as a degreaser as well as a spot removal agent in dry cleaning.  TCE is a common solvent in industrial settings, so users may want to look over the proposed action

Health Canada

To provide guidance to suppliers of hazardous products destined for Canadian workplaces Health Canada committed to release Technical Guidance on the Requirements of the HPA and the HPR. Phase 1 was released on June 29, 2016. The Workplace Hazardous Materials Bureau has now released the full Technical Guidance on the Requirements of the HPA and the HPR – WHMIS 2015 Supplier Requirements as the second phase release. Access the guidance here

FMCSA

A very considerable FMCSR rule has been published which completely reorganizes and significantly upgrades the requirements for training and certifying drivers of commercial motor vehicles (CMV’s).  Among many other things this rule has a high impact to the training requirements to receive a hazardous materials endorsement.   The rule appears to mirror many of the EU ADR driver training requirements, which have always been somewhat more stringent than those in the United States.  The rule has a February effective date, with compliance deadlines stretching in to 2020.  A link to the rule is below

FRA

The agency issued a final rule to updates their accident/incident reporting regulations to provide the current electronic mail address that railroads must use to electronically submit to the FRA certain accident/incident report forms. The new address is effective as of December 7, 2016.  See the new contact and how to use it here

California Hazmat Rail Tax Update

California has voluntarily agreed to a court order issued on Dec. 5, 2016 preventing the state from collecting so-called “California Hazmat Charges” retroactively if it wins its appeal to restore the charges—collection of which is currently stayed pending resolution of the legal actions taken by the Union Pacific and BNSF railroads to forbid the charges based on constitutional grounds (i.e. federal primacy under the Interstate Commerce Clause). This means that if the courts later decide to reinstate the fees they will only be assessed prospectively on shipments from the date of the future court ruling.  The legal battle is ongoing.  See the latest here

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