News & Updates – Oil Spills 101

GRP Quarterly Newsletter – October, 2023

Posted on October 3, 2023October 3, 2023 by David Prater

What are Geographic Response Plans?

Oil spills pose a risk to sensitive environmental, cultural, and economic resources. One important tool in our planning toolbox is the Geographic Response Plan (GRP). GRPs contain pre-identified strategies for specific areas of the state at risk from oil spills. These are pre-approved plans that guide early response actions during oil spills. A list of all Washington State GRPs, including those open for comprehensive updates, can be found online at OilSpills101.wa.gov.

GRP Updates: Comprehensive vs. Interim

GRPs currently open for comprehensive updates are listed below, along with the contact information if you have questions or want to participate.

Lake Chelan – Comprehensive update published July, 2023!
Grays Harbor – Comprehensive update published July, 2023!
Outer Coast – David Prater at Prater@ecy.wa.gov
Middle Columbia River-Bonneville Pool – Max Gordon at Gordon@ecy.wa.gov
South Puget Sound – Kaitlin Lebon at Lebon@ecy.wa.gov
Lake Washington – Sabrina Floudaras at Floudaras@ecy.wa.gov
Lower Columbia River – Max Gordon at Gordon@ecy.wa.gov
Strait of Juan de Fuca – Wendy Buffett at Buffett@ecy.wa.gov
Chehalis River —Nora Haider at Haider@ecy.wa.gov
Snake River: Lower Monumental Pool, Little Goose Pool, Lower Granite Pool – Scott Zimmerman at Zimmerman@ecy.wa.gov

Interim GRP updates during Fall, 2023

Because a lot can change in a GRP planning area between comprehensive updates, Ecology is committed to conducting interim GRP updates when necessary. Examples of interim updates include improvements to response strategies resulting from lessons learned during oil spill drills or actual spills, updated contact information, changes to driving directions, and other response-enhancing edits. Ecology publishes interim updates to GRPs on a quarterly basis. Interim updates completed this quarter include the following:

Spokane River – SPR-80.0M, SPR- 61.8R
Middle Columbia River-McNary Pool – M-299.4L, M-299.5M, M-299.9R, MSN-1.56R
- Marked for deletion during the next comprehensive update: M-299.2L, MSN-2R
Central Puget Sound – CPS-135, CPS-182
Samish River —SAMR 12.9, SAMR 13.1, SAMR 19.6, SWDC-0.1, FRIC-4.5
Upper Columbia River—UCR-466.8

GRP User Survey

The GRP Sub-Committee of the Northwest Area Committee has created a survey to better understand what elements of the Response Strategies and Priorities (2-pagers) people use and value the most. The sub-committee is looking for feedback from people who deploy, update, or otherwise use 2-pagers to make them as useful as possible during a response.

Take the survey here: https://arcg.is/0y5yXb
2-pager reference for survey: https://response-jtti.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2023/10/02092331/2Pager_Examples.pdf

Everyone has a Role in Improving the State’s GRPs

The oil industry regularly exercises oil spill contingency plans to ensure their readiness to respond to an oil spill. These exercises often involve the deployment of GRP strategies. Each deployment is an opportunity to validate a response strategy’s effectiveness, and to make improvements if it is necessary.

GRPs also rely on feedback from professional oil spill responders, natural resource agencies, tribes, and the public. This valuable feedback is reflected in either a comprehensive update or the interim update process.

If you have information or ideas that can make GRP’s even more effective, Ecology wants to know! Please email GRP feedback to GRPs@ecy.wa.gov. If you are visiting a response strategy site, you can use our new GRP Strategy Assessment Form to help document your assessment. We thank you in advance for helping the Northwest Area Contingency Plan maintain a high level of readiness to respond to oil spills.

Lake Washington GRP – Public Comment Opportunity!

Posted on July 24, 2023July 24, 2023 by David Prater

What’s going on?

My name is Sabrina Floudaras, I’m an oil spill preparedness planner with the Washington Department of Ecology, and I’m so excited to announce the Lake Washington (LKWA) Geographic Response Plan is now open for public comment!

Geographic Response Plans (GRPs) aim to protect sensitive natural, cultural, and economic resources at risk from an oil spill in a specified geographic area. A key part of this process is gathering input from the people who work, live, and play in this community. I hope to hear from you during this public comment period (July 24^th–August 25^th, 2023).

I was privileged to work on the first Lake Washington GRP back in 2014. A lot has changed since in the area since then, which is why we opened the GRP for a full update in June 2020. As the world began to emerge from the pandemic, coordination with the community, tribes, and other local, state, and federal partners became my central focus to help expedite needed fieldwork and narrative updates completed, and it worked! The draft plan, now available for public comment, is something we can all be proud of.

Familiarize yourself!

This area densely populated also has abundant natural areas, public spaces, and culturally rich and diverse communities. On the shores of the lake sit Boeing manufacturing, the University of Washington campus with Botanical Gardens and an Arboretum, and the NOAA HQ Northwest Fisheries Science Center Montlake Laboratory. Adjacent to Warren Magnuson Park is NOAA’s Western Regional Center, Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, and many parks supporting natural and economic resources. Importantly floating bridges, I-90 east and west bridges and 520 run across Lake Washington, and I-405 along the east side of the Lake bypasses I-5 through Seattle, crosses waterways that flow westward from eastern uplands.

Risks from oil spills in this area come from multiple sources. Aside from the bridges and recreational boating, there are two smaller oil holding facilities on the lake that store marine fuel, the Olympic Pipeline that carries refined petroleum product crosses the Sammamish River to the north, natural gas pipelines, and a large shore-side terminal with a worst case spill potential of over 2,000,000 gallons.

What has changed?

Overall I updated 20 GRP response strategies with contractor suggested changes, revised most response strategy Implementation Details to include more succinct information in support of a rapid, aggressive, and well-coordinated response, updated driving directions, photos, verified contacts, and coordinated with local officials to improve information on all the Boat Launches and Staging Areas. Additional improvements were made thanks to important feedback from the City of Seattle, Seattle PUD, Seattle Parks & Rec Dept, King County, City of Kirkland, Kirkland Parks, City of Bellevue, homeowners, and more.

Review the draft GRP: https://fortress.wa.gov/ecy/ezshare/sppr/Preparedness/LKWA-Public/LKWACoverPage.pdf

Comment online:

Use our online comment form: https://sppr.ecology.commentinput.com/?id=TgZfF9Hpx2

Comment by mail:

Sabrina Floudaras
Department of Ecology, Spills Program
PO Box 47600
Olympia, WA 98504-7600

GRP Quarterly Newsletter – April, 2023

Posted on March 31, 2023April 3, 2023 by David Prater

What are Geographic Response Plans?

GRP Updates: Comprehensive vs. Interim

GRPs currently open for comprehensive updates are listed below, along with the contact information if you have questions or want to participate.

Outer Coast – David Prater at Prater@ecy.wa.gov
Middle Columbia River-Bonneville Pool – Max Gordon at Gordon@ecy.wa.gov
South Puget Sound – Kaitlin Lebon at Lebon@ecy.wa.gov
Lake Chelan – Kaitlin Lebon at Lebon@ecy.wa.gov
Lake Washington – Sabrina Floudaras at Floudaras@ecy.wa.gov
Lower Columbia River – Darcy Bird at Bird@ecy.wa.gov
Strait of Juan de Fuca – Wendy Buffett at Buffett@ecy.wa.gov
Snake River: Lower Monumental Pool, Little Goose Pool, Lower Granite Pool – Scott Zimmerman at Zimmerman@ecy.wa.gov
Grays Harbor – Max Gordon at Gordon@ecy.wa.gov

Interim GRP updates during Winter, 2023

Because a lot can change in a GRP planning area between comprehensive updates, Ecology is committed to conducting interim GRP updates when necessary. Examples of interim updates include improvements to response strategies resulting from lessons learned during drills or real spills, updated contact information, changes to driving directions after roadwork, and other response-enhancing edits. Ecology publishes interim updates to GRPs on a quarterly basis. Interim updates completed this quarter include the following:

San Juan Island – SJI-12, HEN-02, SJI-13, SJI-14, SJI-15, SJI-16 (New Strategy), SJI-17 (New Strategy)
Samish River – LKSAM-0.5, LKSAM-2.7, LKSAM 4.0, SLVRC-0.0
Moses Lake/Crab Creek – MOLK-39.0, MOLK-39.3
Spokane River – 80.0M
North Puget Sound – Response Contact Sheet, NPS-06, NPS-32
Nooksack River – NOOR-15.1
Middle Columbia River-McNary Pool – M-312.0L
Central Puget Sound – CPS-161, CPS-170-N

Everyone has a Role in Improving the State’s GRPs

GRPs also rely on feedback from professional oil spill responders, natural resource agencies, tribes, and the public. This valuable feedback is often reflected in a comprehensive update, or through the interim update process.

GRP Quarterly Newsletter – December, 2022

Posted on December 30, 2022December 21, 2022 by David Prater

What are Geographic Response Plans?

GRP Updates: Comprehensive vs. Interim

GRPs are periodically updated to ensure the information is relavant and up-to-date. These comprehensive updates require a lot of work and often take a year or two to complete. Work is coordinated with other state and federal agencies, tribes, industry partners, oil spill response professionals, and communities.

Because a lot can change in a GRP planning area between comprehensive updates, Ecology is committed to conducting interim GRP updates when necessary. Examples of interim updates include improvements to response strategies resulting from lessons learned during drills or real spills, updated contact information, changes to driving directions after roadwork, and other response-enhancing edits. Ecology publishes interim updates to GRPs on a quarterly basis.

This quarter, we finished comprehensive updates of two GRPs: Snohomish Basin (formerly WRIA-7) and Clark, Cowlitz, SW Lewis. GRPs currently open for comprehensive updates are listed below, along with the contact information if you have questions or want to participate.

Snohomish Basin (formerly WRIA-7) – Published December, 2022!
Clark, Cowlitz, SW Lewis — Published December, 2022!
South Puget Sound – Kaitlin Lebon at Lebon@ecy.wa.gov
Lake Chelan – Kaitlin Lebon at Lebon@ecy.wa.gov
Lake Washington – Sabrina Floudaras at Floudaras@ecy.wa.gov
Lower Columbia River – Darcy Bird at Bird@ecy.wa.gov
Strait of Juan de Fuca – Wendy Buffett at Buffett@ecy.wa.gov
Snake River: Lower Monumental Pool, Little Goose Pool, Lower Granite Pool – Scott Zimmerman at Zimmerman@ecy.wa.gov
Grays Harbor – Max Gordon at Gordon@ecy.wa.gov

Everyone has a Role in Improving the State’s GRPs

The oil industry regularly exercises oil spill contingency plans to ensure their readiness to respond to an oil spill. These exercises often involve the deployment of GRP strategies. Each deployment is an oportunity to validate a response strategy’s effectiveness, and to make improvements if it is necessary.

If you have information or ideas that can make GRP’s even more effective, Ecology wants to know! Please email GRP feedback to GRPs@ecy.wa.gov. If you are visiting a response strategy site, you can use our new GRP Strategy Assessment Form to help document your assessment. We thank you in advance for helping the Northwest Regional Contingency Plan and the Area Plans maintain a high level of readiness to respond to oil spills.

Updates to Washington’s GRPs

Posted on April 26, 2022April 26, 2022 by David Prater

What are Geographic Response Plans?

GRP Updates: Comprehensive vs. Interim

GRPs are periodically updated to ensure the information is relevant and up-to-date. These comprehensive updates require a lot of work and often take a year or two to complete. Work is coordinated with other state and federal agencies, tribes, industry partners, oil spill response professionals, and communities. GRPs currently open for comprehensive updates are listed below, along with the contact information if you have questions or want to participate.

WRIA-7 (Snohomish Basin) – Nora Haider at Nora.Haider@ecy.wa.gov
South Puget Sound – Kaitlin Lebon at Kaitlin.Lebon@ecy.wa.gov
Lake Chelan – Kaitlin Lebon at Kaitlin.Lebon@ecy.wa.gov
Lake Washington – Sabrina Floudaras at Sabrina.Floudaras@ecy.wa.gov
Lower Columbia River – Darcy Bird at Darcy.Bird@ecy.wa.gov
San Juan Islands – Max Gordon at Max.Gordon@ecy.wa.gov
Clark, Cowlitz, Southwest Lewis – Max Gordon at Max.Gordon@ecy.wa.gov
Strait of Juan de Fuca – Wendy Buffett at Wendy.Buffett@ecy.wa.gov
Snake River: Lower Monumental Pool, Little Goose Pool, Lower Granite Pool – Scott Zimmerman at Scott.Zimmerman@ecy.wa.gov
Grays Harbor – Max Gordon at Max.Gordon@ecy.wa.gov
Outer Coast – Scott Zimmerman at Scott.Zimmerman@ecy.wa.gov

Because a lot can change in a GRP planning area between comprehensive updates, Ecology is committed to conducting interim GRP updates when necessary. Examples of interim updates include improvements to response strategies resulting from lessons learned during drills or real spills, updated contact information, changes to driving directions after roadwork, and other response-enhancing edits. Ecology publishes interim updates to GRPs on a quarterly basis.

Interim GRP Updates for Spring 2022

Grays Harbor GRP: new information provided by NRCES from a site visit resulted in updates to CHRC-0.1 (site access, site safety, and land owner contact information) and NSKC-0.2 (site access and safety information).

Central Puget Sound GRP: during a recent spill in Elliott Bay, notification strategy CPS-31-N was utilized. New contact information for this strategy has been added.

North Puget Sound GRP: We updated NPS-75, NPS-74, and NPS-73 to remove references to the old refinery name; and updated contact and access information for NPS-07.

Moses Lake/Crab Creek GRP: after lessons learned from a GRP deployment exercise, we moved the location of MOLK-39.3 slightly east so that it is further away from a dam gate and allows for better access, monitoring, and boom maintenance.

Strait of Juan de Fuca GRP: A lot of good work and collaboration with tribes and other stakeholders has been done on this GRP. Equipment, boom, and/or location information has been updated for the following strategies while the rest of the plan is undergoing a comprehensive update: STR-01, STR-02, STR-03, STR-04, STR-05, STR-06, STR-07, and STR-11.

Everyone has a Role in Improving the State’s GRPs

If you have information or ideas that can make GRP’s even more effective, Ecology wants to know! Please email GRP feedback to GRPs@ecy.wa.gov. If you are visiting a response strategy site, you can use our new GRP Strategy Assessment Form to help document your assessment. We thank you in advance for helping the Northwest Regional Contingency Plan and the Area Plans maintain a high level of readiness to respond to oil spills.

Habitat Strategic Initiative Grant Program Webinar: Pilot Program – “Oil Spill Awareness and Response Support” Training

Posted on December 9, 2020December 9, 2020 by Jase Brooks

Are you interested in how to use training and development opportunities to connect volunteer organizations with agencies and others that can use them in an emergency?

Each year, over 20 billion gallons of oil and other hazardous chemicals are transported in the Puget Sound. Trained volunteers can support spill response and assessment led by local and state agencies. The Oil Spill Awareness and Response Support (OSARS) training was designed to engage and prepare volunteer organizations to assist with oil spills in the Puget Sound region. This pilot program has helped to determine how to best connect volunteer organizations to oil spill response leads through expert-led trainings. With continued OSARS trainings, diverse volunteer organizations can help build a network to support the coordinated agency response to oil spill emergencies.

Join the Habitat Strategic Initiative and Washington State University Extension on December 16^th, 2020 at 1pm to learn more about the OSARS pilot program and the novel approach to connecting volunteer organizations with local and state emergency response agencies. For a project summary, check out the Project Factsheet.

Webinar Details

December 16^th, 2020 at 1pm

Click here to join the meeting

Or call in (audio only): (206) 809-2214

Phone Conference ID: 144 532 092#

Project leads

Dr. Patricia Townsend is an Extension Specialist for Washington State University (WSU) and directs the Natural Resource Programs at Snohomish County Extension including Beach Watchers, Sustainable Community Stewards, and Promotores del Medio Ambiente. Patricia also works with stakeholders throughout the Pacific Northwest on issues related to climate change, sustainability, renewable energy, ecosystem services, and green infrastructure. Patricia received a Ph.D. from the University of Washington and a M.S. from the University of Florida.

Associate Professor and Natural Resources Regional Extension Specialist

Snohomish County Extension

Urban Natural Resources Specialist

Metropolitan Center for Applied Research & Extension

Washington State University

Snohomish County WSU Extension

(425) 357-6020

patricia.townsend@wsu.edu

Jonathan Robinson is the Beach Watcher Program Coordinator for Washington State University (WSU) Extension in Snohomish County. In this position he oversees volunteers that are dedicated to protecting the Salish Sea through education, research and stewardship. Jonathan received his M.S. from Western Washington University and B.A from University of Hawaii at Hilo.

Beach Watchers Program Coordinator

Washington State University Snohomish County Extension

https://extension.wsu.edu/snohomish/beach-watchers/

(425) 357-6008

This project is associated with NTA 2016-0315

This project has been funded wholly or in part by the United States Environmental Protection Agency under assistance agreement PC-01J22301 through the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. The contents of this document do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Environmental Protection Agency or the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, nor does mention of trade names or commercial products constitute endorsement or recommendation for use.

Please contact Jennifer Griffiths (jennifer.griffiths@dfw .wa.gov) or Cynthia Catton (cynthia.catton@dnr.wa.gov) with general questions regarding the Habitat Strategic Initiative and Cynthia Harbison (cynthia.harbison@dfw.wa.gov) regarding the webinar. Follow the work of all the Strategic Initiatives on our blog.