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Our Approach to Emergency Preparedness

Our Approach to Emergency Preparedness

Mining can pose significant health, safety and environmental risks to employees and communities. Certain risks, such as the health and safety of our workforce and tailings management, have the potential to become emergencies if not managed properly. See our approach to managing emergency preparedness.

Our Approach to Emergency Preparedness

Mining can pose significant health, safety and environmental risks to employees and communities. Certain risks, such as the health and safety of our workforce and tailings management, have the potential to become emergencies if not managed properly.

We recognize that maintaining strong relationships with our communities of interest and ensuring business continuity depend on our ability to effectively manage risks and to be prepared to respond in a timely and appropriate manner, should an emergency occur. Recent tailings incidents at other companies have underscored for Teck the importance of continued focus on emergency planning and management systems.

The importance of emergency preparedness is reflected in the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) 10 Principles. ICMM Principle 4 is to “implement risk management strategies based on valid data and sound science” and states that member companies must develop, maintain and test effective emergency response procedures in collaboration with potentially affected parties.

Emergency Preparedness Planning and Management at Teck

We identify a comprehensive range of potential emergencies and ensure we are prepared to respond to, and recover from, these situations as quickly and effectively as possible. Potential risks are mitigated through robust risk management measures. Various emergency scenarios are tested each year via emergency drills to evaluate the adequacy and effectiveness of our emergency preparedness — including human and physical resources. Emergency preparedness and planning are conducted at a corporate and site level as well as within the communities near our operations, as outlined in the table directly below.

Emergency Preparedness at Corporate Offices, Sites and Communities

Corporate Risk Group — Crisis Management Team
  • Develops and designs Teck’s overall approach to risk management, including the risk management practices related to the development and oversight of sites’ emergency preparedness plans, which includes annual review, design and development of crisis simulations and training at sites
  • Provides risk identification and analysis support for individual sites
  • Coordinates additional training, capacity building and simulations as necessary

Individual Sites
  • Develop emergency preparedness plans tailored to site-specific risks
  • Work closely with the Corporate Risk Group to ensure alignment with Teck’s overall risk approach
  • Conduct training and simulations to ensure readiness and capabilities of workers and managers
  • Coordinate with local stakeholders 

Local Communities
  • Develop their own emergency preparedness and response plans
  • May collaborate and conduct joint simulations with adjacent Teck sites
  • May exchange information and best practices with adjacent and non-adjacent Teck sites

Emergency Response Planning at Individual Sites

Components

Example

Clearly defined roles/responsibilities
  • Identifying, equipping and training first responders 

Emergency response guidelines and procedures
  • Security
  • Medical
  • Fire and explosion
  • Special considerations (earthquake, avalanche, tailings dam breach)

Communications systems and procedures
  • Establishing internal and external communications mechanisms
  • Call-out procedures
  • Musters and/or evacuations
  • Media management (reporters, social, etc.)

Response and Control
  • Organizational structure and responsibilities
  • Reviews and inspections (internal/external)
  • Capital replacement plans
  • Continuous improvement

Internal Emergency Response

  • Plans for addressing emergencies within Teck’s facilities, including scope, personnel involved, training, facilities and equipment, and maintenance

External Emergency Response
  • Plans for addressing emergencies outside of Teck’s facilities, including mutual aid agreements, joint responsibilities and other agreements
  • Contractor service agreements
  • Medical treatments, including availability, means of transport and transport time

Testing and training for emergency situations
  • Scheduling and conducting exercises and simulations
  • Ongoing tabletop reviews
  • Collaborative effort by operations, the Risk Group, Corporate Crisis Management Team and occasionally with multi-jurisdictional participation

Incident investigation procedures
  • Maintaining documentation
  • Incident Cause Analysis Method (ICAM) or other form of investigation
  • Sharing of lessons learned

 

Our framework within Teck’s Global Risk Management Program guides the process of:

  • Identifying hazards
  • Assessing the risks associated with those hazards
  • Applying relevant controls to minimize the potential risks
  • Regularly checking effectiveness of controls
  • Ensuring appropriate plans and resources are put in place to respond to emergencies that may occur

Standards for emergency preparedness are updated on a regular basis as required. With the support and guidance of our Risk Group, each operation develops site-specific emergency preparedness and response plans based upon those requirements. As such, emergency response plans and preparations are appropriate for site-specific conditions and are based on a range of credible — although extremely unlikely — incident scenarios.


Teck

As one of Canada’s leading mining companies, Teck is committed to responsible mining and mineral development with major business units focused on copper, zinc, and steelmaking coal, as well as investments in energy assets.