ILTA Developing Robust Schedule for December 2021 TOPS

ILTA’s annual Terminal Operating Practices Symposium is back and better than ever in 2021! Every year, ILTA hosts TOPS, an educational series designed to provide terminal operators a forum to exchange lessons learned from facility incidents and near hits while discussing effective operating practices with their peers.  This year’s event will be held in-person December 6-7 in Houston, TX. 

Presentations are provided by terminal operator employees who will share their experiences in addressing everything from natural disasters, environmental releases, malfunctions, worker injuries and illnesses, near misses/hits and other abnormal operating events at their facilities. They will discuss the causes of these events and what was changed to mitigate or eliminate future occurrences. Each presentation is approximately 30 minutes, including 10 minutes for Q&A.

The symposium is for terminal operating company personnel only. No service providers, vendors, consultants, members of the press, regulators or the public will be allowed to participate in the event. There may be times when an outside party has significant information to share with the industry (e.g., U.S. CSB), in which case that party may be allowed to attend only to make a presentation. Consultants representing Terminal Members may be allowed to attend so long as an officer of a terminal company (e.g., President, CEO, Vice President, General Manager) makes a request in writing to ILTA requesting an exception.

To be successful with this event each year, ILTA is always looking for new presentations and presenters. We also need to hear from a diverse array of terminal operators that are different in size, geographic scope of operations and product types. The learnings shared help others in the terminal industry avoid operational incidents that can lead to significant public, personnel, environmental and reputational impacts. If you would like to offer a presentation at a future TOPS or know of an incident or learning opportunity that should be presented by another operator, please contact us at TOPS@ilta.org.

Likewise, registration for this year’s event will be opening soon. Be sure to be on the lookout!