Evidence of meeting #4 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was goods.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:10 p.m.
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
At the moment, if a community is in opposition to a transload facility being located without an appropriate emergency response plan, do they have any opportunity for preventing it from taking place?
4:10 p.m.
Director General, Transportation of Dangerous Goods, Department of Transport
When we look at amendments to regulations, we do ask. Provinces, territories, and municipalities are part of the minister's advisory council that I participate in with the chair, and they have a chance to voice their concern and comment on whether this requirement should go ahead or not.
4:10 p.m.
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
Outside of voicing their concerns, they can't actually stop the transload facility from taking place.
4:10 p.m.
Director General, Transportation of Dangerous Goods, Department of Transport
This is not part of....
4:10 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
Not under Transport Canada's jurisdiction; we don't have any legislative authority to do that.
4:10 p.m.
Conservative
4:10 p.m.
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
In the matter of testing for classification purposes, of course, you might not have the jurisdiction in North Dakota or South Dakota, but you certainly would in southeast Saskatchewan. What is being done to ensure that the classification is appropriate?
4:10 p.m.
Director General, Transportation of Dangerous Goods, Department of Transport
What we are doing right now is...after the protective direction came out...we have plans now to go in and inspect and take enforcement action if the classification is not done.
4:10 p.m.
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
So you would essentially verify that what the shipper says is there is actually there and not something else.
November 27th, 2013 / 4:10 p.m.
Director General, Transportation of Dangerous Goods, Department of Transport
Yes, it's properly classified. You can classify under three packing groups, packing group I being the most dangerous or highly risky and packing group III meaning the ones that are less risky. So depending on how you classify, it has to come under packing group I, II, or III.
What the protective direction says is that you need to properly classify the crude oil. If you don't have the test, then classify under packing group I. That's what we're basically saying. So we're avoiding a gap there if they don't have the proper testing. While the tests are being done, please ship those goods under—
4:15 p.m.
Conservative
4:15 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Larry Miller
You're out of time, Mr. Komarnicki. We may get back to you later.
I'll now turn it over to Mr. Watson for seven minutes.
4:15 p.m.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to our witnesses for being here today.
At what point is a ship, a truck, or a train inspected for dangerous goods by Transport Canada? Is it at the...?
Well, I should say that trucks are probably inspected by the provinces, so let me step back for a second. When are ships or trains inspected by Transport Canada? Is it at the point of loading? Is it somewhere in transit? Is it at final destination? Just how does that occur? How does an inspection for what's loaded onto a train happen?
4:15 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
It can be anywhere. Obviously there are high volumes of dangerous goods moving across the country every day, so we try to focus on those areas that pose the highest risk. That would be largely the transloading facilities, where they're loaded onto the ship or the train. Then we can spot check at any point to make sure the dangerous goods are properly placarded and classified.
4:15 p.m.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
You refer on slide 9 to the compliance estimation program. Is that where the spot checks, these sorts of random checks, would occur?
4:15 p.m.
Director General, Transportation of Dangerous Goods, Department of Transport
The random inspections are actually taken out of an inspection database that's finding facilities and basically giving us a baseline of compliance. We're actually randomly picking sites and going and inspecting them. Those are the spots, yes.
4:15 p.m.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
When you say “sites”, what are you referring to? Is that terminals, plants...or are you talking about the vehicles themselves?
4:15 p.m.
Director General, Transportation of Dangerous Goods, Department of Transport
The way the transport of dangerous goods program works is a bit different. We look at means of containment. You're right, we look at trucks, we look at tank cars, but we also look at cylinders on trucks. We look at cylinders on ships. We look at different types of dangerous goods.
So when we're talking about sites, we're talking about shippers' sites at the origin—when the dangerous goods or the means of containment leave for transport at the origin—but we're also talking about means of containment sites when they are manufactured and repaired and tested.
The means of containment, according to standards, need to be tested normally every three, five, six, seven years. A truck needs to be retested, and tested often. We do our inspection at that point to make sure that the means of containment are done properly and that the repairing and testing are also done properly. There are different types of inspection.
4:15 p.m.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
I understand that Transport Canada has to effectively approve each containment method. I'm not sure what I'd call it; it could be a vehicle or it could be cylinders, as you're talking about. So Transport Canada must inspect these and verify that they're suitable to a given task.
How many different containment methods have been inspected or approved by Transport Canada? I don't know how many different containment methods would exist.
4:15 p.m.
Director General, Transportation of Dangerous Goods, Department of Transport
We have about 20 standards, going from larger means of containment to smaller means of containment. For some types of dangerous goods, it's a box, actually, with some tape—if you're looking at batteries, for example.
We look at different types of means of containment. We go to these facilities that manufacture the means of containment to ensure they're done properly, they're done according to the standards, and they're repaired. The means of containment are tested according to the standards.
4:15 p.m.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
When you inspect the loading of vehicles at a transloading facility, for example, you'll be able to test several different trains, let's say, not just any random one train, if you will.
4:15 p.m.
Director General, Transportation of Dangerous Goods, Department of Transport
No, we look at the tank car per se. We look at everything that accompanies the trains. We look at how it's transloaded. We look at the safety marks, at the means of containment. An inspection includes all components.
4:15 p.m.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
With the compliance estimation program and these random inspections, how many of those would you do in a year?
4:15 p.m.
Director General, Transportation of Dangerous Goods, Department of Transport
We do approximately 1,000 per year.