Cleanup, waste and restocking

Once a spill has been stopped and contained, it still has to be cleaned up properly. That means getting the fuel off the ground, dealing with what is left behind, handling the contaminated absorbents and fuel as waste, and getting the station ready for the next spill. This part is less urgent than the first minutes, but it is where many stations go wrong: used pads end up in the regular garbage, a stain is left to wash into the drain with the next rain, or the spill kit is never refilled.

This lesson covers finishing the cleanup, deciding when a spill needs a contractor, handling the waste, and keeping a log of spill kit use so that kits are always ready.

Finishing the cleanup

After the socks and pads have soaked up the free fuel, the job is not done. Work through these steps:

• Pick up saturated pads and socks with gloved hands and put them straight into a hazardous waste bag or container. Do not wring them out.
• Spread granular absorbent over any remaining wet areas, work it in with a broom, leave it for the time on the package, then sweep it up with a non-sparking shovel and bag it.
• Check the edges of the spill, the cracks and joints in the concrete, the base of the dispenser island and the drain cover for fuel that was missed.
• Look at the drain: lift the cover only when the area around it is clean, and check for any sheen or smell in the catch basin. If fuel got in, the drain needs a contractor (Lesson 6).
• Leave the cones out until the surface is dry and no longer slippery, especially after a diesel spill.
• Clean tools such as the shovel and broom by wiping them with pads, and bag the pads. Wash hands and any exposed skin with soap and water.

A small stain left on concrete after a thorough cleanup is normal. A stain that is still wet, still smells strongly or is spreading is not done. On asphalt, gasoline can soften and stain the surface; if it is damaged, the manager should arrange a repair so the next rain does not wash fuel out of it.

When the spill needs a contractor

Station staff handle small spills on hard surfaces. A spill response contractor is needed when the job is bigger or harder than that. At Northfield, Leah Morin calls the contractor when:

• The spill is larger than the station's kits can handle (about 25 gallons of gasoline at Northfield).
• Fuel has reached soil, gravel, landscaping, a drain, a ditch or water.
• Fuel has soaked into asphalt or has run under a building, a sidewalk or a dispenser island.
• There is recovered liquid fuel or fuel and water to be pumped out.
• The regulator or fire department asks for professional cleanup.

Spill response contractors have vacuum trucks for pumping out drains and catch basins, equipment for digging out contaminated soil, sampling equipment, and the licenses to transport and dispose of the waste. They will usually take samples of the soil or water after the cleanup to show it meets the cleanup standard, and send a report that the station keeps with its spill records.

Recovered fuel

Sometimes fuel can be recovered as a liquid, for example from a spill bucket, a drip tray under a leaking vehicle, or a pool in a low spot that the contractor pumps out. Recovered fuel must never go back into the station's tanks or into a customer's vehicle. It is usually mixed with water, dirt and grit, and putting it in a tank can damage engines and the tank system. It is handled as waste, or recycled by a licensed contractor.

Fuel-contaminated waste

In the United States, waste contaminated with gasoline is often a hazardous waste under the federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) and Montana's hazardous waste rules, because it can be ignitable or contain benzene. Absorbents contaminated only with used oil or diesel may be managed under the used-oil rules instead, if they are handled that way. A station's obligations depend on how much hazardous waste it generates each month; most stations are very small quantity generators, generating no more than about 220 lb (100 kg) of hazardous waste a month, with lighter requirements. All of it must be stored in closed, labeled containers and taken by a qualified hauler to a permitted facility, and none of it may go in the regular trash or down a drain. The waste contractor and Montana DEQ guidance confirm which rules apply to each waste.

At Northfield, the waste goes into a 55 gal (205 L) steel drum with a lid, kept in a fenced, covered area behind the store, on a containment pallet away from drains. The drum is labeled with the contents ("Fuel-contaminated absorbents"), the date the first waste went in, and the hazard symbols. The waste contractor collects it when it is about three-quarters full or every few months, whichever comes first, and leaves a copy of the shipping document. The receipt from the disposal facility comes back later and is filed with the spill records.

Rules for storing the drum are simple: keep the lid closed except when adding waste, keep it out of the rain, do not mix in other wastes such as used oil filters, antifreeze or garbage unless the contractor says so, and do not let the drum overflow. A drum of fuel-soaked pads is itself a fire hazard, so it must be kept away from ignition sources and not in the store.

Keeping kits ready: the spill kit log

A spill kit that was used last week and never refilled is one of the most common findings in station inspections. The fix is a simple log: each time a kit is used or checked, someone writes down the date, which kit, what was used and whether it was restocked. The same log, kept for a few months, shows how often spills happen, where and how much material they take, which helps with ordering and with spotting problems.

The program below keeps a small spill kit log, works out what needs to be restocked in each kit and summarizes the month. The log entries are illustrative.

# Spill kit log: what was used, what needs restocking (illustrative entries).
full_kit = {"forecourt": {"pads": 50, "socks": 6, "granular_bags": 2, "drain_covers": 2},
            "fill area": {"pads": 30, "socks": 4, "granular_bags": 1, "drain_covers": 1},
            "store":     {"pads": 20, "socks": 2, "granular_bags": 1, "drain_covers": 0}}
log = [  # (date, kit, gallons spilled, items used)
    ("Mar 02", "forecourt", 0.5, {"pads": 6}),
    ("Mar 09", "forecourt", 4.0, {"pads": 18, "socks": 3, "drain_covers": 1}),
    ("Mar 14", "store",     0.3, {"pads": 4}),
    ("Mar 21", "fill area", 1.5, {"pads": 10, "socks": 2, "granular_bags": 1}),
]
stock = {k: dict(v) for k, v in full_kit.items()}
for date, kit, gal, used in log:
    for item, n in used.items():
        stock[kit][item] -= n
for kit, items in stock.items():
    short = {i: full_kit[kit][i] - n for i, n in items.items() if n < full_kit[kit][i]}
    text = ", ".join(f"{n} {i.replace('_', ' ')[:-1] if n == 1 else i.replace('_', ' ')}" for i, n in short.items())
    print(f"{kit:10} restock: {text or 'nothing, kit full'}")
print(f"March: {len(log)} spills, {sum(e[2] for e in log):.1f} gal in total, "
      f"largest {max(e[2] for e in log)} gal ({max(log, key=lambda e: e[2])[0]})")

forecourt  restock: 24 pads, 3 socks, 1 drain cover
fill area  restock: 10 pads, 2 socks, 1 granular bag
store      restock: 4 pads
March: 4 spills, 6.3 gal in total, largest 4.0 gal (Mar 09)

In this example, the forecourt kit is about half empty after two spills in March, and is missing a drain cover; if it is not restocked, the next spill will find a kit without the most important item in it. A paper log works just as well as a program: what matters is that it is filled in every time and that someone acts on it.

Cleaning up after a vehicle or delivery spill

The same steps apply to larger spills, with a few additions. After a delivery spill, the hauling company usually has its own responsibilities for cleanup and reporting, and the driver will call their dispatcher. The station and the hauler need to agree who is calling the contractor and the regulator, so it is not done twice or not at all; the station procedure should say which, and the station should always make sure the report has been made. After a vehicle spill, the customer's insurer may be involved, but the cleanup cannot wait for them: the station cleans up and sorts out the cost later.

Cleaning up in winter

Winter adds its own problems at a station in a cold climate. Fuel spilled on snow or ice spreads under the surface and along ruts, so the spill can be larger than it looks. Absorbents work poorly on ice, and granular absorbent can freeze into clumps. Scoop contaminated snow and slush into bags or a lined container and treat it as waste; never push it into the snowbank at the edge of the lot, because it will melt into the drain or the ditch in spring. Gasoline evaporates more slowly in the cold, so the vapor hazard lasts longer than on a warm day, but the fire hazard does not go away: gasoline gives off flammable vapor even far below freezing.

Snow clearing itself can cause a spill problem. A plow that hits a fill cap, a vent pipe or a dispenser island can damage the tank system, and snow piled over fill caps and monitoring wells hides them from the driver and from inspection. Mark them with tall poles before the first snowfall, and check them after every clearing.

For supervisors: the cleanup checklist

Before a spill is closed in the log, the manager or shift lead should walk the area and confirm: no free fuel or wet stains; drains checked and clean; all waste bagged, labeled and in the drum; tools cleaned; kits restocked or ordered; the spill report complete; and, if a contractor was used, their report and the waste paperwork requested. A two-minute walk with this list catches most of the problems inspectors find later.