• Licensees of wells, pipelines and facilities must be a member in good standing of WCSS Oil Spill Cooperative or have an approved plan registered with Provincial Regulators in Alberta, British Columbia and Saskatchewan. WCSS is the most cost effective means of meeting this regulatory requirement.
  • WCSS is a not-for-profit company with approximately 490 member companies that provide volunteers at the field level to ensure the energy industry is prepared to respond to oil spills.
  • WCSS provides a number of services to its members including:
  • WCSS is a spill preparedness organization, not a response contractor. It is the responsibility of the company that experiences the spill (responsible party) to have trained responders at their spill.
  • WCSS typically provides spill response support to the responsible party if requested to do so, including:
    • Assistance with the identification of equipment and getting the equipment mobilized to a staging area.
    • Assistance finding certified boat operators when WCSS boats are being used.
    • Provision of volunteer responders from other member companies for initial spill response only; it is important to recognize that these volunteers are not on stand-by.
    • Assisting with the identification of subject matter experts and specialized resources.
  • WCSS maintains a list of certified boat operators and can assist the responsible party with scheduling them for boat operations linked to the spill.
  • WCSS maintains an internal resource list but does not publish the list for reasons linked to confidentiality and liability; member companies are advised to maintain their own list of spill contractors.
  • WCSS will provide the names of subject matter experts during the initial spill response phase provided we obtain clearance to do so from those contacts in our resource list; however it is the member company’s responsibility to determine if the contacts that we provide qualify for the work.
  • The regional equipment custodians may assist you with transporting the equipment to your spill site; in some cases the initial spill response units in the Cooperatives are maintained at member company sites and it will be your responsibility to have someone pick them up and deliver to your spill.
  • Most of the smaller units can be towed by light-duty vehicles, and the hauling requirements can be found on our website and in your WCSS oil spill contingency manual.
  • If you experience problems accessing equipment call our Operations Manager directly at 587-999-4030 for assistance.
  • WCSS verifies existing critical control point information in each Co-op and uses a live portal to provide access to registered users.
  • If a company wishes to upload their own control points to the live portal, please contact operations@wcss.ab.ca.
  • We recommend that companies assess their oil spill risks and identify access sites downstream from high-risk operations.
  • The WCSS Operations Manager is responsible for all our equipment and relies on each of the 9 Oil Spill Cooperatives for support for maintenance linked to the area’s initial spill response units.
  • WCSS has a maintenance program that includes spring and fall equipment checks and routine maintenance.
  • During a spill the Operations Manager typically visits the spill site and identifies equipment issues and is involved in corrective action if appropriate; the authority to do this is written in the Equipment Lease Agreement which must be signed by the responsible party before it is released from WCSS.
  • Following a spill the Operations Manager coordinates an assessment of the equipment and replacement of consumables and damaged equipment and the invoicing process to the responsible party.
  • With the exception of a boat rental fee for training purposes, WCSS members in good standing do not pay rental fees for our equipment unless the equipment is required outside of our jurisdictional area (Alberta, NE British Columbia and Area 1 in Saskatchewan); if they do they are charged 1/3 of the rental rate that non-members pay.
  • WCSS coordinates a minimum of 1 exercise per year in each of our 9 Cooperatives; the type of exercise is linked to objectives in our 5 year training plan.
  • If your company would like to have a specific type of training in your co-op area, bring a recommendation forward to the Co-op Chair.
  • WCSS also offers open registration courses and contract training for individual member companies.
  • It is the responsibility of the members to ensure that they have appropriate representation at co-op exercises in each area of their operations.
  • The exercise schedule is posted at the beginning of each year and is provided in the membership information package that is sent out with the annual invoice.
  • You can also register your contact information to receive exercise notifications, and/or join our mailing list to receive additional information.
  • WCSS only gets involved if the provincial regulator requests that we do so, and we have a cap on the amount of funding for spills of unknown origin.
  • Typically we become involved if the material dumped cannot be linked to a licensee’s lease and/or access road; for the example provided in your question, the regulator would almost certainly hold your company responsible.