ADVANCE CONTRACT AWARD NOTICE
An ACAN is a public notice indicating to the supplier community that a department or agency intends to award a contract for goods, services or construction to a pre-identified supplier, thereby allowing other suppliers to signal their interest in bidding, by submitting a statement of capabilities.
If no other supplier submits, on or before the closing date, a statement of capabilities that meets the requirements set out in the ACAN, the competitive requirements of the government’s contracting policy have been met.
Following notification to suppliers not successful in demonstrating that their statement of capabilities meets the requirements set out in the ACAN, the contract may then be awarded using the Treasury Board electronic bidding authorities.
If other potential suppliers submit statements of capabilities during the fifteen (15) calendar days posting period, and meet the requirements set out in the ACAN, the department or agency must proceed to a full tendering process on either the government’s electronic tendering service or through traditional means, in order to award the contract.
Refer to the ACAN PDF document under the "Bidding Details" tab on this solicitation page for information on the requirement and how to submit a statement of capabilities.
Definition of Requirements
The Transportation of Dangerous Goods Directorate (TDG) of Transport Canada (TC) has a requirement to develop documented guidance or best practices on damage assessment criteria and guidelines for general-service (i.e. non-pressure) tank cars. Damage assessments are conducted by technical advisors, including TC TDG remedial measures specialists (RMSs), to assess damage to means of containment (MOC) such as rail tank cars or highway tanks at an incident site to determine whether it is safer to transfer the dangerous goods to another MOC on-site or to move the MOC to another location before off-loading.
The outcomes of this project will aid TC TDG RMSs in their decision-making at incident sites involving general-service (i.e. non-pressure) tank cars and other emergency responders, emergency response training centres, rail carriers, as well as owners and users of general-service tank cars.
The Contractor must perform the following tasks upon completion of this project:
- Literature review and industry scan, including:
o Identification of the types of damage and/or failure modes in general-service tank cars;
o Identification of any existing criteria used by emergency responders and/or industry in performing damage assessment of general-service tank cars;
o To supplement the above information, review and documentation of recent incidents (within the last 15 years) involving general-service tank cars. This task should include, at minimum, the following:
? Types of commodities (dangerous goods) being transported during the incident,
? Types of damage or failure modes,
? Damage assessment criteria that were used, and
? Action(s) and/or decision-making process(es) that were taken to mitigate the danger; and
o Consultation with tank car and damage assessment experts (e.g. emergency responders, emergency response training providers, etc.) to identify any knowledge gaps.
- Analysis and recommendations, including:
o An analysis of the gathered information leading to development of a guidance document [or identification of the best practices] to help emergency responders with their action(s) and/or decision-making process(es) in performing damage assessment of general-service tank cars; and
o Any recommendations for future work.
3. Criteria for Assessment of the Statement of Capabilities
The Transportation of Dangerous Goods Directorate requires a contractor with the following qualifications and experience:
a) The Contractor must have access to the Association of American Railroads (AAR) Hazardous Materials Committee.
b) The Contractor must have at least two individuals with experience working on the development of AAR’s 2021 document, Assessment Best Practices for Tank Car Tank Damage.
c) The Contractor must have at least one individual with ten years of experience as a training program expert in tank car damage assessment within North America.
