CALGARY, Alta. — Call it a twofer for Wheeler Transport.

The Port Moody, B.C.-based hauler snagged the Canadian Petroleum Products Institute Western Division’s 2009 Best Carrier Performance award, the second year in a row it was awarded that particular honour.

Other CPPI Western Division Fuel Carrier Safety Awards went to companies from Alberta, British Columbia and the Yukon.

At a luncheon ceremony in Calgary on April 22, CPPI’s Western Division v.p. Ted Stoner noted that the CPPI’s benchmark target for incidents was lowered for 2009 in recognition of a declining frequency of incidents overall. Yet, he pointed out with satisfaction, the carriers’ actual performance came in below that, with 0.34 incidents per 1,000 deliveries compared to the new benchmark of 0.4.

“CPPI members certainly congratulate and appreciate the carriers’ work, and it’s showing up in their performance throughout the year,” Stoner said at the ceremony. “These awards are our appreciation in recognition of that.”

The Common Carrier Awards Program was started by the CPPI Western Division in 2004 to encourage and recognize contracted common carriers for reducing the frequency of incidents compared to the previous calendar year. It also stresses overall safety performance and promotes driver and fleet safety within the transportation industry.

Awards were also handed out to ECL Transportation for Most Improved Mixes, Denwill Enterprises for Most Improved Spills, Mantei’s Transport for Most Improved Vehicle Accidents and Petrohaul for Most Improved Personal Injury.

Speaking to the Most Improved Mixes award, which was given out first, Stoner pointed to the varied nature of the liquids CPPI members contract to ship and applauded carriers who ensure there’s no unintentional mixing of products for delivery to the various sites.

Accepting the award for ECL Transportation, Don Bietz said “Mixes are a big part of our cost, and I think I can pretty safely say that we won’t have many of them this year.” Their target, he said, is zero.

Stressing the importance of the Most Improved Spills award, which is given for the greatest improvement in reducing product spills, Stoner said “Obviously the public is very aware of any hydrocarbon products that’s on the ground or any other place where it doesn’t belong.” In accepting the award for Denwill Enterprises, Dale Tsuruda noted that the company had no spills last year, down from two the year before, and he credited safety supervisor Gord Morley and “fearless captain” and general manager Jeff Salmon for making it happen.

Speaking to the award for Most Improved Vehicle Accidents, Stoner noted that reducing vehicle accidents lowers carriers’ insurance rates and “certainly improves the safety performance of the employees themselves,” while also lowering costs of repairs, etc.

Glenn Dougan, on behalf of the winning Mantei’s Transport, said “I think this is a direct result of the safe and defensive driving culture that we promote at our company on a continuous basis.” Any time vehicle accidents can be reduced, he said, the risk of people getting hurt is also cut back.

“That’s our top priority, to keep our people safe, so this award means a lot to us.”

While introducing Kate Thompson on behalf of Most Improved Personal Injury-winning Petrohaul, Stoner said “Personal injury frequency is a very important aspect throughout the whole industry, and is taken very seriously.” Thompson responded by complimenting the “remarkable team” she works with at Petrohaul.

As for what Stoner referred to as the “Grand Poobah” award given out each year, he said it went to “The best overall carrier who excelled in all safety areas” and noted with satisfaction that it was the second year running that Wheeler Transport had earned it.  

Tony Spring and Kelly Stead, who had flown in that morning for the awards luncheon, accepted the plaque and obelisk and hard hat stickers on behalf of Wheeler. “Our employees are a real asset to the company,” Stead remarked, “and one of the things we really strive to do is reinforce all our training. At the end of the day we just want them to all go home safe.”

Stoner said the CPPI hopes to expand the awards throughout all of Canada and challenged the carriers in the room to become national winners when that happens.

“Western CPPI division has been a little bit advanced over the rest of the country,” he said after the festivities had wrapped up. “Since we’re in the west and we don’t have the large population of Quebec or the Golden Horseshoe around Toronto it was quite obvious that we could use the western provinces as a base to get good calculations about incident performance, which is what we’ve done.”  

The awards program has borne fruit over the years since its inception, Stoner says. “Just look at the incident frequency and how it’s improved over the years.” He points out the CPPI uses such data when selecting carriers to contract with and that “It works out as an advantage to the carriers and the CPPI members.”

The Awards Selection Committee (ASC) was made up of three members, one each from Husky Energy, Shell Canada and Suncor Energy. Each member serves a maximum two-year term.

To be eligible for an award, a carrier must be contracted to haul petroleum products for one or more CPPI companies but not be a CPPI member branded carrier (such as Chevron, Petro-Canada, etc.). The carrier must also have been under contract to a CPPI member company for at least two years in a row and have no fewer than 4,000 contracted deliveries to a CPPI member company during that time.

Nominations must be made by a CPPI member company and are made at the CPPI’s last Joint Distribution/Carrier Task Force Meeting before a term ends.