Review - ChemLock – Secure Your Chemicals – Overview

NOTE: On November 18^th, 2021, CISA announced their new voluntary chemical security program, ChemLock. This post is part of a deep dive into that program. ‘Short version’ links below are abbreviated posts on this blog that do not require subscriptions to my CFSN Detailed Analysis. Earlier posts in this series include:

CISA Announces ChemLock – Voluntary Chemical Facility Security (short version)

ChemLock and the Chemical Security Summit

ChemLock - On-Site Assessments and Assistance (short version)

Once a chemical facility has completed their vulnerability assessment, they are able to start preparing the facility security plan (FSP). Since the ChemLock program is a completely voluntary program, there is no requirement to involve chemical security inspectors (CSI) from CISA’s Office of Chemical Security in the development or approval of an FSP. But CSI do have years of experience in the unique security situations associated with chemical facilities and have a broad institutional knowledge of what has been tried and what works at high-risk chemical facilities. The ChemLock program makes this security plan knowledge base available to facilities that are not covered by the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) program.

ChemLock Documents

The ChemLock Security Plan web page provides a starting off point for the development of facility security plan. It re-emphasizes the goals of a chemical security program that were discussed on their ChemLock Assessments page. It then provides a brief description of the process of developing an FSP and the concept of Security-in-Depth. The page also provides links to the following resources:

Secure Your Chemicals (.PDF manual),

Secure Your Chemicals Template (.docx download link), and

ChemLock Services Request Form

Moving Forward

Chemical facilities wishing assistance from CISA’s Office of Chemical Security in either establishing a new facility security plan, or having an existing plan reviewed by experienced professionals, should certainly consider contacting OCS via the new ChemLock program. I will be looking in more detail about the FSP process that ChemLock is using, as well as other support available from ChemLock, in future posts in this series.

For more details about the manuals and forms described above, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/chemlock-secure-your-chemicals - subscription required