Heat Illness Prevention
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Heat-Related Injury Prevention Training Module: Download ↗ |
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Heat-Related Illness Preference Quick Reference Card: Download ↗ |
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Heat Awareness and Tracking Plan: Download ↗ |
American Clean Power
Environmental, Health, and Safety Services
Creating a culture of safety is a priority for the U.S. clean energy industry.
Ensuring a safe clean energy workforce.
ACP and the clean energy industry place a high priority on protecting the safety and health of the clean energy workforce.
ACP's Safety First Focus Areas
Key priorities for ensuring workplace safety include:
- Safe systems of work: Confirm permits, risk assessments, controls, and rescue plans are in place before high-risk work (excavation, confined space, hot/energized tasks), and be mindful of community considerations.
- Wellness for work: Be fit for duty by promptly reporting any fatigue, illness, or impairments (both physical and mental) that could impact your safety or the safety of others.
- Stop work responsibility: You have the full responsibility and authority to stop work immediately whenever you identify unsafe conditions-to protect yourself and everyone around you.
- Working at height: Use approved fall protection and prevent dropped tools or materials when working at height.
- Line of fire: Position yourself and others to avoid the line of fire from moving equipment, pressure, or stored energy.
- Electrical safety: Verify all energy sources are isolated, locked, tagged, and verified safe conditions before starting work. Use of required PPE is last line of defense.
- Lifting and hoisting: Only operate lifting equipment when authorized, have spotters, and keep clear of suspended or moving loads.
- Bypassing safety systems: Do not disable or override safety systems without formal approval and risk controls.
- Transport safety: Stay alert, drive defensively, wear seatbelts, avoid mobile device use, follow ride/ vessel transfer protocols, use spotters, and respect route boundaries.
Key Safety Programs
ACP supports the clean energy industry with the environmental, health, and safety resources, data, and tools needed to ensure a safe working environment.
- Safety First Campaign: October is ACP Safety Month, focusing on key areas to help keep employees healthy and safe.
- Safety Data Collection: Every year, ACP collects data on the safety and health performance of the industry to help companies benchmark themselves against their peers, improve performance, and identify areas of focus for training and other activities. This includes our Safety Incident Alert System.
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Qualified Electrical Workers (QEW) Program for Wind Operations: Guidelines to help companies build their QEW program.
- Qualified Electrical Workers (QEW) Program for Solar PV Operations: Guidelines to help companies build their QEW program.
- Qualified Electrical Workers (QEW) Program for Battery Energy Storage (BESS) Operations: Guidelines to help companies build their QEW program.
Improving Worker Health and Safety Together
ACP engages regularly with federal agencies, including the Center for Disease Control’s National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE).
ACP works closely with OSHA, BSEE, and NIOSH to improve worker health and safety, and to better inform the clean energy industry about these agencies and the agencies about the clean energy industry.
If you are interested in further involvement in ACP’s environmental, health, and safety work, please email [email protected].
Tools to help build a safe clean energy workforce.
ACP offers a wide variety of tools and educational materials to help ensure safe workplaces for clean energy workers.
Safety First Learnings
The people of the clean energy workforce are the heartbeat of our industry, and the importance of their safety cannot be understated. Learning from past incidents and near misses helps us prevent future ones.
To support this effort, ACP has launched its Safety First Learnings to share ongoing learnings across the clean energy industry. Use the form below to submit incidents and near misses, so that the entire industry can quickly address underlying risks that could lead to harm for workers in the industry. Submitted reports are kept anonymous and distributed to ACP members on a biweekly basis.
- Submit a Safety Alert here.
- To join the Safety Alert email list please visit: cleanpower.org/environmental-health-and-safety/acp-safety-alert-reporting/safety-alert-signup
For ACP Members interested, please email [email protected].
Offshore Marine Transfer Guidance
ACP has developed Offshore Marine Transfer Guidance with the intent of being utilized as a basis for identifying suitable methods of transferring personnel in various functions while working in North American waters under an approved Safety Management System/Construction and Operations Plan (SMS / COP).
This guidance has been developed to provide a framework for how to execute safe transfer of personnel in the American Offshore Wind Industry. It indicates where further good practices or deviation is required in the American Offshore Wind Industry to provide a framework for how to execute safe transfers. This document also provides recommendations about the split of responsibilities within an organization to properly plan for and execute transfers.
This guidance takes into consideration the following transfer scenarios:
- Transfer from vessel to offshore structure
- Transfer between vessels
- Transfer using walk to work (W2W) gangways
- Identification of hazards and mitigation methods associated with marine transfers
- Protection against drowning, including a risk-based approach to the use of immersion suits
- Crane operated personnel transfer carriers and the use of man baskets for work over water
- Gangways, including motion compensated gangway
- Bridge or accommodation ladders
This resource is free for members – sign in and view product details here. For non-members interested in this resource, please contact [email protected].
Repower EHS Lessons Learned Survey Results
Lessons for safely repowering wind facilities
The wind industry partially repowered over 12 gigawatts of land-based wind energy facilities in the U.S. between 2015–2021. While the focus on repowering has traditionally been centered around market drivers and economics, this report highlights how to ensure the work is done safely.
In this report, you’ll find lessons learned for development, construction, and operation of repowered facilities from the companies who have done the work. ACP hopes that by sharing these experiences more broadly, we can help with the industry’s continuous improvement on safety performance.