Industrial turnaround and shutdown safety manual template
A complete written health and safety program for contractors who work planned turnarounds, shutdowns and outages at refineries, upgraders, oil sands, gas and petrochemical plants, mills and power stations across Canada. It is laid out on the 14 national COR elements and written for the work: the owner’s permits and isolations, line breaking and first break, toxic and flammable process materials, vessel and tower entry, hot work, scaffolds, bundle pulls, pressure testing, high-pressure water jetting and catalyst handling. Section 15 sets out the law of every province and territory, and federal workplaces, side by side. 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.
What’s in the manual
1. Safety and health policy
A signed, dated policy, the written program, and responsibilities for management, the turnaround superintendent, foremen, workers, permit receivers and subcontractors, and how we work under the owner’s safety program and operations.
2. Hazard assessment, analysis and control
Formal hazard assessments by type of turnaround work, the 5 × 5 risk matrix, a critical task inventory, controls in order with a person and a date for each, and the field-level assessment tied to the owner’s permit and redone when unit conditions or isolations change.
3. Safe work practices
Practices written for turnaround work: owner permits and SIMOPS, isolation and blinding, line breaking, gas testing, H2S, benzene and other process materials, confined spaces, hot work, scaffolds, rigging and bundle pulls, pressure testing, water jetting, catalyst, radiography exclusion zones, heat, fatigue and camp life.
4. Safe job procedures
Step-by-step procedures for verifying isolation, first break, vessel entry, bundle pulls, hot work, hydrotests, catalyst unloading and loading, and scaffold use, and the written plans the law requires.
5. Company safety rules
Life-saving rules for turnaround crews, working under the stricter of our rules and the owner’s, and a progressive discipline process applied the same way every time.
6. Personal protective equipment
Flame-resistant clothing, personal gas monitors, respirators from air-purifying to supplied air with fit testing, chemical protection for catalyst and caustic, fall protection and water jetting PPE.
7. Preventative maintenance program
Gas detectors, breathing air equipment, bundle extractors, rigging, cranes, water jetting units, test pumps and gauges, scaffold components and tools, with calibration records and defective equipment tagged out.
8. Training and communication
A training matrix by turnaround role, from H2S and confined space to scaffolds, rigging and gas testing, owner orientations at mobilization, competency checks and tailboards every shift and at handover.
9. Inspections
Daily work area inspections at the owner’s site, scaffold tags, rigging, gas detectors and permits checked, and our own shop and equipment.
10. Investigations and reporting
Reporting to the owner at once and to the regulator of the jurisdiction where it happened, using section 15’s table, releases and fires, near misses, investigations with the owner and corrective action.
11. Emergency preparedness
Fitting into the owner’s emergency response: alarms, muster, toxic gas releases, shelter in place, confined space and fall rescue, fire, medical and camp emergencies, and drills.
12. Statistics, records and document control
Permits, gas tests, isolation lists, scaffold inspections, fit tests and exposure monitoring kept for the longest period any jurisdiction requires, and the annual program evaluation.
13. Legislation
Keeping the law current for each jurisdiction you work in, the federal laws that apply everywhere, the standards and industry guidance the manual follows, and the right to refuse unsafe work.
14. Procurement and contractor management
Working as a contractor under an owner (prequalification, orientations, permits, bridging documents), choosing subcontractors, renting cranes and buying equipment.
15. Working across Canada
Whose law applies where the crew is working, then every province and territory and federal workplaces side by side: the act and regulation, the regulator, the rules for confined spaces, toxic gases, scaffolds, hot work and pressure equipment, serious incidents to report and how fast, and the other rules that change at the border.
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 field-level hazard assessment, line break checklist, isolation verification record, confined space entry permit and standby log, pressure test checklist and jurisdiction start-up checklist.
Written for the work, not just the province
A turnaround crew’s risks come from the plant it is opening up: hydrocarbons and toxic gases left in equipment, a line that was never fully drained, pyrophoric scale, nitrogen in a vessel, hot work beside live units, and hundreds of workers from many contractors in one unit at once. This manual is written around them, practice by practice and procedure by procedure.
Your crews work under the owner’s permits, isolations and site rules. The manual says how yours and theirs fit together: the owner isolates and issues the permit, your workers verify, put their own locks on and test before they break, and the stricter rule always wins.
One program for every province you work in
Your crews follow the occupational health and safety law of the province or territory where the plant 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 superintendent mobilizing to 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
Mechanical, piping, boilermaker, welding, scaffolding, insulation, rigging and industrial cleaning contractors who work planned turnarounds, shutdowns and outages, and the general contractors who manage them.
A template is a starting point, not legal or engineering advice: a qualified person must adapt it to your work and your owners’ programs 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 15, 2026
- First edition, written for turnaround, shutdown and outage contractors and laid out on the 14 national elements of the harmonized COR audit.
- Section 15 sets out the law of every province and territory and federal workplaces, checked against the legislation in force on 15 October 2026.
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Questions
Which province’s law is it written to?
All of them. Your crews follow the law of the province or territory where the plant is, so the manual sets your company’s rules once and section 15 sets out, jurisdiction by jurisdiction, what the law there adds. Federally regulated workplaces are in it too.
Will it get us COR?
It is laid out on the 14 national elements every harmonized COR audit shares, with all 74 documentation questions cross-referenced. Each province’s certifying partner uses its own audit tool, so check the manual against the one you are certifying with. The audit also interviews workers and observes work, so no template can promise a pass.
Does it replace the owner’s safety program?
No. On the owner’s site you work under their permits, isolations and rules as well as your own. The manual is your company’s program and says how the two fit together, with a bridging document where they meet.
What format is the manual in?
An editable Microsoft Word (.docx) file on US Letter pages. It works best in desktop Word for Windows or Mac. It also opens in Google Docs and Word on the web, where you use Find and replace to put your company name in.
What happens when the legislation changes?
We update the template, and you get every update free for as long as we publish it: lifetime updates at no extra charge. We email you when a new edition is ready, with what changed and a link to download it.
Can I use it for more than one company?
Each purchase is licensed to one company. Consultants setting up programs for several clients should contact us.
Want it tailored to your work?
Our safety advisors can fit the manual to your trades, your owners’ programs and the provinces you work in.
OHS program development