History

Incorporated on July 7, 2003

The Oil Sands Safety Association began their safety journey back in 2003. They were equally funded and resourced by:

Albian Sands Energy Inc.
Canadian Natural Resources Ltd.
Suncor Energy Inc.
Syncrude Canada Ltd.

Their Vision was “An Incident Free Workforce” and their Mission was “Agreed Safety Training Standards for the Oil Sands Industry”

Principal Objective

The Oil Sands Safety Association’s principle objective was to bring together these oil sands owners to design and implement an agreed set of Safety Training Standards and Practices for the purpose of creating “an incident free workforce.“

These Standard and practices apply to the contractor workforce working in the oil sands region.

Accredited Training Programs

The association accredited training provider’s programs to a specific safety training standard. Contractors that train to these standards could move across plant sites without having to be re-trained.

The association endorsed 5 safety training standards and 1 regional code of practice. These standards pertained to the following courses.

Fall Protection (2004)
Aerial Work Platform (2006)
Confined Space Entry (2006)
Confined Space Monitor (2006)
Fire Watch (2007)

OSSA had high hopes of adding Fundamentals of Rigging and Overhead Crane to this list, but it never materialized. They did however add Driving in the Mine and Work Safe Permits codes of practice.

OSSA Regional Orientation

The OSSA Regional Orientation Program (ROP) was a site-access requirement for all new workers coming to OSSA Member sites.

The final compliance date all workers requiring this course was April 1. 2006. This training program did not have an expiry date.

ABCS Safety Training Inc. conducted an online pilot project to deliver the OSSA Regional Orientation Program in Dec. 2006. They were subsequently the first company to get accredited to teach this course through computer-based training (online or in a computer lab environment).

This was the beginning of a change in how OSSA courses would be delivered through ABCS Safety Training and led ABCS to where they are today.

HSAN

HSAN (Health & Safety Association Network) was intended to share key activities with OSSA such as:

Existing OSSA Standards Review
Consistent Accreditation Process
Common Records Database

The possible impact HSAN was to have on training providers:

Develop provincial wide training standards
Obtain accreditation from other accrediting bodies other that OSSA
Uploading training records to central DB

Ultimately, HSAN never really gained any traction beyond a poorly designed Database and fumbled implementation processes.

Basic Safety Orientation

The Basic Safety Orientation (BSO) soon replaced the Regional Orientation Program as a site-access requirement.

In February of 2015, OSSA released a request for proposals to its Accredited Training Providers to deliver a new Basic Safety Orientation program that they developed in collaboration with Keyano College to replace the Regional Orientation Program.

ABCS Safety Training Inc. was awarded a contract to deliver this course and went on to train more workers in the program than all other training providers combined.