The Oil and Gas Company’s Role

An oil and gas company that wants to build and operate in your area (such as a well, a pipeline, or a production facility) has to follow strict rules set up by provincial governments. These rules are quite complicated and take a long time, but basically they have to prepare emergency response plans and consult with the community before they can get started.

In their ERPs, they have to plan out measures that will protect their workers, the public, and the environment in case of an emergency such as a spill, an H2S release, or a blowout. Those ERPs have to get approved by the regulator (e.g. the ERCB in Alberta) and then they will have to do practice drills using them, depending on the level of risk.