All provinces and territories · Editable Word template

Excavation and civil earthworks safety manual template

A complete written health and safety program for excavation, earthworks and civil contractors doing residential and commercial excavation, site servicing, trenching, grading, road building and paving, gravel hauling and subdivision work, wherever in Canada the dig is. It is laid out on the 14 national COR elements and written for the work: locates and ground disturbance, trench protection by sloping, benching, shoring and trench boxes, spoil and edges, water and unstable ground, overhead power lines, excavators, quick couplers and lifting pipe, loaders, dozers and graders, dump and haul trucks, workers on foot and spotters, compaction, manholes and deep excavations, paving, silica and noise, traffic and the public. Section 15 sets out the law of every province and territory, and federal workplaces, side by side, with each jurisdiction’s depth for protection, engineer triggers, inspections, locate service, limits of approach and notice of excavation. Hydrovac excavation has its own manual. It arrives as an editable Word file you make your own.

A look inside

Sample pages from the manual, marked and cut short. Your copy has no watermark.

Cover with room for your logo and company name

Linked table of contents, laid out on the 14 national COR elements plus a section on working across Canada

Section 3: twenty safe work practices written for excavation and civil crews, trench protection shown

Section 15: each jurisdiction's excavation depths, engineer rules, notices, locates and limits of approach

Appendix A: all 74 documentation questions of the national COR elements mapped

Print-ready forms: the daily excavation and trench inspection shown

What’s in the manual

1. Safety and health policy

A signed, dated policy, the written program, and responsibilities for management, foremen, operators, pipe layers, labourers, truck drivers and grade checkers, and how we work as or under the prime contractor.

2. Hazard assessment, analysis and control

Formal hazard assessments by type of excavation and civil work, the 5 × 5 risk matrix, a critical task inventory, and the excavation hazard assessment done before every dig.

3. Safe work practices

Twenty practices for excavation and civil work: site rules, locates, ground disturbance, trench protection, trench boxes and shoring, sloping and benching, spoil and access, water, power lines, excavators, lifting with excavators, loaders and dozers, trucks, spotters, compaction, confined spaces, paving, dust and noise, traffic and weather.

4. Safe job procedures

Step-by-step procedures for locates and exposing a line, installing and moving a trench box, laying pipe in a protected trench, lifting pipe with an excavator, working near power lines, tipping a dump truck, a gas line strike and a trench collapse, including what not to do.

5. Company safety rules

Life-saving rules for excavation (no dig without locates, nobody in an unprotected trench, spoil back from the edge, never under a bucket), and a progressive discipline process applied the same way every time.

6. Personal protective equipment

High-visibility apparel, hearing protection, respirators for silica, and the rest of the basic PPE for operators and workers on foot.

7. Preventative maintenance program

Excavators and quick couplers, loaders, dozers and graders, trucks, trench boxes and shoring, compactors and paving equipment.

8. Training and communication

Competent persons for excavations, ground disturbance and locates, equipment operators, spotters, and orientation for every worker on site.

9. Inspections

A daily excavation and trench inspection before anyone enters, mobile equipment checked before each shift, and site inspections.

10. Investigations and reporting

Cave-ins, utility strikes, power line contacts, rollovers and near misses reported and investigated.

11. Emergency preparedness

A trench collapse, a gas line strike, a power line contact, a rollover, and first aid on every crew.

12. Statistics, records and document control

Locates, trench inspections, engineer designs, lift plans and power line work plans, kept for the longest period any jurisdiction requires.

13. Legislation

OHS law and its excavation rules, the locate service and damage prevention law, ground disturbance standards as standards, and the right to refuse.

14. Procurement and contractor management

Working for owners and general contractors, hydrovac and trucking subcontractors, and buying shoring and trench boxes.

15. Working across Canada

Whose law applies, then every province and territory and federal workplaces side by side: the act and regulation, the regulator, the depth for protection, engineer triggers, inspections, the locate service, limits of approach, notice of excavation, and serious incidents to report and how fast.

Appendix A. COR cross-reference

Every one of the 74 documentation questions in the 14 national COR elements, what it looks for in plain words, the section that answers it, and whether the auditor will also want your records.

Appendix B. Forms

37 print-ready forms that match the manual, each with a form code: among them the excavation hazard assessment, locate and ground disturbance checklist, daily excavation and trench inspection, excavator lift plan, overhead power line work plan and mobile equipment pre-use inspection.

Written for the work, not just the province

Excavation kills by cave-in, by a strike on a gas or power line, and by machines around workers on foot. This manual is written around them, practice by practice and procedure by procedure.

Nobody enters a trench until a competent person has inspected it that day, and the manual says what to do after a collapse, and what never to do.

One program for every province you work in

Your crews follow the occupational health and safety law of the province or territory where the dig is, not where your office is. The manual sets your company’s rules once and gathers what changes at each border into section 15, so a supervisor starting work in a new province looks up what applies there.

It is laid out on the 14 national COR elements, so it suits a COR audit wherever you certify. Each certifying partner uses its own audit tool, so check it against yours; our provincial manuals follow each province’s audit exactly. No template can guarantee a certificate on its own, and we don’t claim to.

Who it is for

Excavation, earthworks and civil contractors: site servicing, trenching, grading, road building and paving, gravel hauling and subdivision work. Hydrovac excavation and traffic control have their own manuals.

A template is a starting point, not legal or engineering advice: a qualified person must adapt it to your work and the provinces you work in before you issue it.

Lifetime updates

When the law changes, we publish a new edition and email everyone who bought the template. Every update is free, for as long as we publish it.

Version 1.0 October 29, 2026
- First edition, written for excavation and civil earthworks contractors and laid out on the 14 national elements of the harmonized COR audit.
- Section 15 sets out the law and the excavation, engineer, inspection, locate, limits of approach and notice rules of every province and territory and federal workplaces, checked against the legislation in force on 29 October 2026.