Environmental Specialist Certification – Online Course
Get your environmental specialist certification online today! This course is for professionals in environmental safety. It was designed to help you fully understand the various regulations set up by the EPA, helping you ensure compliance from companies/facilities and the safety of workers and the public.
After completing the course, we’ll provide you with your EPA Certified Environmental Specialist certificate.
Register now for the 24-hour online course.
Some of the topics covered include:
- Important environmental laws/regulations including recent updates to them.
- What the Clean Air Act is and why it was established.
- The purpose behind the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), as well the details of the regulation.
- Distinguish the different types of hazardous waste in accordance with the RCRA.
- Implementation and compliance management systems for hazardous waste materials.
- The different features of the Clean Water Act (CWA) and how to use them in the work place.
- The various regulatory and management issues related to Storm Water Discharges.
- What’s required by your Spill Prevention, Control and Countermeasure (SPCC) plan.
This course is only available online, we do not provide onsite training for it. Call us at 817-874-5000 if you’d like to learn more about this or any of our other OSHA training courses, online courses, or onsite training and consultation services.
Why should you take this course for Environmental Specialist Certification?
In 2015, an ExxonMobil oil refinery in Southern California exploded and covered a community in ash. Twelve workers were injured, and some had to be decontaminated. Cal/OSHA shut down the plant until it could prove safe operations. Also, it issued 19 citations for health and safety violations, which cost the company over $550,000 in fines. What was even costlier was the disruption of oil refining. Californians paid a cumulative $2.4 billion more at the pump, and Torrance residents were exposed to harmful air pollution. Repairs cost the company well over $150 million.
A leaky valve in a piece of equipment that controlled gasoline and hydrocarbons with steam was the cause of this environmental disaster. Workers were careless in how they handled the knowledge of the leaking steam. Stopping the machine and having it inspected could have prevented this costly catastrophe. This is a good example of how serious preventable accidents cost the workplace greatly and can even affect the community or the entire state. In this instance, the company was lucky that no workers were killed when 80,000 pounds of equipment flew through the air after the blast.
This story is a good example of why proper training is important. Training should be an ongoing process. Too many companies make the mistake of providing only initial training. As time passes, many employees forget important safety rules. Since there are so many health and safety regulations, regular training can help prevent violations, costly fines and the crippling expense of lost productivity from an interruption of operations. Being properly trained to understand the Environmental Protection Agency’s standards is a crucial first step, and that’s exactly what the Certified Environmental Specialist course provides. Ready to get started?
Why Are EPA Standards Important To Learn?
The EPA was started in 1970 after a successful proposal by President Richard Nixon. The agency consisted of environmental scientists, researchers and other experts. This agency was a welcome change after the country’s steady increase of industry and the noticeable negative effects on water and air supplies.
Today’s standards help company owners and the people who work for them understand what they must do to protect our environment. If these standards are not followed, the workplace and community may be in jeopardy just as the city of Torrance, California was affected by the harmful ash from the ExxonMobil plant explosion.
We provide critical training that addresses important EPA regulations in our Certified Environmental Specialist course. This knowledge gives employers or workers the ability to keep themselves, their workplace and their community safer. A safer workplace may mean a stronger bottom line. These are some important EPA compliance regulations covered in the course.
Clean Water Act
Although the original law that this act stemmed from was enacted in 1948, concern and heightened public awareness of water pollution prompted the 1972 amendments. They give the EPA authority to start programs to control water pollution. The amendments define standards for disposing of pollutants in bodies of water and specified prohibitions.
This act also mandates that only those who have lawful permits may discharge pollutants into bodies of water that are used for navigation. Some specific examples would include the Pacific Ocean and the Mississippi River. This act also resulted in new and improved sewage treatment plants. With our training, workers learn how to dispose of pollutants and how to avoid improper disposal that could affect drinking water or other important water sources.
Resource Conservation And Recovery Act
As industrial and municipal waste grew to problematic proportions, the RCRA was implemented in 1976 and replaced the Solid Waste Disposal Act. It addresses underground tanks, solid waste programs and methods for controlling waste. This training covers regulations that minimize hazardous waste disposal on land, underground tank regulations and other standards for solid waste management.
Clean Air Act
By 1970, people across the country were aware of the lethal effects of air pollution. Just one of the many incidents leading to this landmark standard of 1970 was that of Donora, Pennsylvania. In 1948, the city was covered in a thick cloud of smog. Steel and zinc factories were the smog culprits, and a thick pocket of warm air just above the smog layer made a lethal equation that trapped and recirculated the growing pollutants.
Forty people died, and over half of the town’s population suffered from respiratory illnesses. The Clean Air Act establishes standards for protecting and maintaining air quality. Our training covers these standards and explains what actions are prohibited and how technology, governments and workers all play a key role in preserving air quality.
Oil Spill, Control And Countermeasure Regulation
This act was originally established in 1973. During the next two decades, there were several notable oil spills. Amendments and a task force strengthened and improved the regulations. Today, this act addresses ways to prevent oil spills but also focuses on preparedness for reacting to a spill and proper responses after an accident. Workers in oilfields or on rigs can benefit from this training to keep themselves and coworkers safer with proper prevention or preparedness and reaction plans.
These EPA regulations have saved many lives. In a 1997 report to Congress, the EPA said that the Clean Air Act alone had prevented the following between 1970 and 1990:
205,000 deaths
18 million child respiratory illnesses
21,000 heart disease cases
672,000 chronic bronchitis cases
843,000 asthma attacks
EPA standards are important not only in industrial workplaces but in all places with environmental hazards. For example, training is also important in places such as college campus research labs. A University of Hawaii postdoctoral researcher was in a campus lab looking at ways to create plastics and fuels from biomass. There was a sudden explosion that left her deaf and disfigured. The cause was static electricity that had transferred to an underground tank. Better environmental safety standards regarding the underground tank could have prevented the accident.
Call us to learn more about the course and the benefits of environmental specialist certification.
Sources:
https://www.desmogblog.com/2016/05/31/why-there-could-be-more-blasts-2015-exxonmobil-torrance-oil-refinery-explosion-putting-millions-risk
https://www.epa.gov/clean-air-act-overview/highlights-clean-air-act-40th-anniversary-celebration
http://undark.org/article/lab-safety-universities-oversight/