Water and Effluent Treatment Magazine
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Eliminating risk from confined spaces • An updated code of practice for confined space entry highlights the dangers of accessing unventilated areas. Could utilities do more to share best practice? Maureen Gaines has been finding out. M ention confined spaces and some people would immediately think of engineers with harnesses squeezing through limited entry openings to areas such as sewers, silos and pipelines. However, what people may be unaware of is that confined spaces do not have to be small. What makes a confined space is any place that is enclosed, creating conditions where serious injury or a lack of oxygen can occur from hazardous substances or conditions within the space or nearby. According to the Health & Safety Executive (HSE), a number of people are killed or seriously injured in the UK every year, and across a wide range of industries. In December, the HSE published its Approved Code of Practice (ACOP) for confined space entry, outlining the risk of working within a particular confined space, and the precautions that should be put in place for work to be carried out safely. Precautions The code is aimed at those involved in work within confined spaces, those who employ or train such people and those that represent them. It explains the definition of a confined space in the Regulations and gives examples, and helps assess the risk of working within a particular confined space and put precautions in place for work to be carried out safely. This latest edition brings the document up-to-date with regulatory and other changes. The guidance has been simplified to make the understanding and use of the document easier, particularly with clarifying the definition of a confined space. New features includes: • A flowchart to help in the decision-making process • Additional examples including new workplace risks such as specifically created hypoxic environments, fire suppression systems etc • Amendments relating to the need to check, examine and test equipment Leigh Greenham, director of trade association Council of Gas Detection & Environmental Monitoring (CoGDEM), says that when it comes to confined spaces it is all about air quality. "You could talk about harnesses, ladders and going into flooded pits but it's also about making sure that the air is safe to breathe." Greenham continues: "This is across all utilities, and all industries. Most industries somewhere or other are going to have space where there could be a gas risk which is unventilated and therefore would be classed as a confined space. It might be a cellar room where they store gas bottles. Even a pub cellar, which is a working environment, is a confined space." He says a pub cellar can be quite a large affair with lots of air in there but if it is not properly ventilated then that air can get displaced if bottles start to leak, as carbon dioxide is produced as a result of the fizz in certain drinks. Biological processes One of the worst areas for confined space air quality is in the wastewater sector because there is methane, hydrogen sulphide, oxygen being consumed by the biological processes. "The wastewater and sewerage industry is the one that suffers the worst problem amongst the utilities, and gas has got its specific problems because the gas in the pipes is obviously hazardous. Clean water has a similar issue in that they use nasty chemicals to clean the water and they're o˜en stored in a confined space," says Greenham. The utilities are the people who probably know the ways to operate. Some of that has come about over the decades because of high profile incidents people have learnt from. It's what utilities do. "They send people into places where the utilities and the pipes are hidden away or the processes are not out in the open. It goes with the territory, as it were." The while the utilities are very good, says Greenham, they should be sharing best practice. If the gas industry is using a particular technique or instrument because of the hazards it experiences, the wastewater sector may have a News+ Most industries are going to have space that is unventilated and would be classed as a confined space "They send people into places where the utilities and the pipes are hidden away or the processes are not out in the open. It goes with the territory, as it were" Leigh Greenham APRIL 2015 weT News 7 similar issue where that instrument of technology could apply. "They might learn there's an instrument that they could be using which the gas industry has used for a while or is developing as part of the partnership. "The rules try to take that into account, saying confined spaces can vary, but if you're monitoring generically air quality then you should be safe. You shouldn't be sending somebody in when there is any kind of air quality hazard when you enter." n n 'Gas Detection and analysis in confined spaces' will be among the topics discussed at this year's Utility Week Live, incorporating Iwex, being held at the NEC on April 21-23. The session takes place on April 23. CoGDEM's Leigh Greenham will be exploring the new HSE guidance along with JMS principal consultant Jeff Regan, and GMI product manager Ken McDermott.