Chemical manufacturing site pollution incident prevention
How you can prepare and deal with pollution incidents to minimise the risk of fines and clean-up costs.
Accidents on industrial and commercial sites can cause serious pollution incidents. These may damage the water environment and biodiversity, cause air pollution and land contamination and harm human health.
Pollution incidents can be caused by:
- fuel drips, spills or overfilling during refuelling or tank filling
- plant, pipes, equipment or containers leaking oil or chemicals
- pump and pipeline failures
- treatment plant failures
- contaminated water entering a waterway or drain
- natural events, such as flooding, lightning strike and temperature extremes
- vandalism and theft
- deliberate acts, such as illegal disposal, dumping or fly-tipping
- wind blown dust and waste
Produce a pollution incident response plan
You should have a pollution incident response plan which outlines the actions you will take to reduce the chances that your business causes pollution from an incident or accident at your site.
Your plan should include:
- your site activities and operations
- what you store on your site
- emergency and out-of-hours contact details for key staff, regulators and emergency services
- a detailed site plan showing drainage layout, areas where the chances of causing pollution are high and areas vulnerable to pollution
- the actions to take in the event of an incident
Prevent and remediate environmental damage
A pollution incident may cause, or threaten to cause, environmental damage to water, land and biodiversity.
You must take action to prevent environmental damage and to remedy any damage you cause.
Prevent pollution from firefighting
Firewater is water that has become contaminated by being used for firefighting. It is polluting and may be classified as hazardous waste. Ensure you have a plan and equipment in place to collect or contain it in the event of an emergency.
You should:
- store firewater correctly
- ensure firewater is treated and disposed of correctly
- prevent firewater from running into surface drains, polluting nearby waterways (rivers, streams and groundwater), foul drainage systems and land