Gas Emergency Planning, Training and Exercises

Challenge

Gas emergencies are thankfully rare, but when they do occur, can be very dangerous and extremely destructive. This large utility needed a more robust emergency response plan and training program that aligned with FEMA/NIMS/ICS processes and accounted for the characteristics inherent to their operations and company structure – for both best practices and regulatory requirements.

Solution

TRC worked with four of the company’s state-based operations across the Northeast to develop emergency response plans for each company, including training materials for key incident command positions and roles to support emergency response regardless of the incident’s type and scale Our team developed and facilitated tabletop exercises aligned with Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program standards over multiple years to educate and practice each operating company’s responses based on simulated real-world emergencies. Each exercise included a subsequent after-action report to support improvements for future practices.

Results

Year-over-year, more staff at each operating company became more comfortable and adept at implementing the ICS and focused more on their incident roles for themselves and peers than their assigned blue-sky roles. They also shared anecdotes about improved results in real-world incidents and recognized areas for future improvements.