With the rapid developments around the COVID-19 situation, our priority continues to be the health and safety of our workforce, their families and our communities.
Trans Mountain and our construction contractors are following all advice from government and health officials while maintaining the uninterrupted operation of our pipeline and the safe construction of the Expansion Project.
Some of the actions that have been taken to date include; suspending all non-essential travel, implementing restricted access measures at our control centres, adhering to recommendations being provided by health authorities on our construction sites, moving all non-essential workers from our worksites and transitioning to a work-from-home environment wherever possible.
While each worksite is unique, each of our construction contractors are required to adopt government and company recommended health and safety measures to ensure construction can safely continue on the Expansion Project, while ensuring the protection of our people on the ground. We continue to work with our construction contractors to revisit and update plans and monitor implementation. Some specific measures we are taking include:
- staggering work shifts to minimize number of people on any given site including adhering to the recommendations being provided by health authorities
- following social distancing guidelines between workers – on-site and in site offices
- staggering lunch and coffee breaks to minimize number of people gathering
- minimizing or eliminating in-person meetings, holding necessary meetings outside (for example, safety meetings), in smaller groups or via technology
- enhancing cleaning and sanitization protocols and increased availability of sanitation supplies
- increasing bus, vehicle and trailer cleaning requirements and frequency and reducing the number of people being transported per vehicle to adhere to health authority recommendations
- ensuring that workers orientation includes COVID-19 expectations, awareness and prevention
- ensuring non-essential workforce members are not entering any of our worksites or offices
- ensuring all individuals have access to appropriate safety equipment, understanding the expectation of personal hygiene
- checking people entering the sites for fever or sickness
- using Health and Safety personnel to monitor implementation of COVID-19 response guidelines on site
We are in constant contact with our construction contractors, and together are adapting to COVID-19 developments accordingly. This is a dynamic situation, and we will continue to respond in a thoughtful, balanced and disciplined way, considering all new and emerging guidance coming from government and health officials.
