I have recently had a response to a long running saga concerning Rhodia’s 2009 Trinity street fire where a mixture of phosphine and white phosphorus vapour released into the air formed associated breakdown products. Toxic gas WAS released from the site into the Langley/Oldbury area.
The seven year HSE investigation finally ended with a conviction for the company now known as “Solvay Solutions Limited”. I had throughout the wait tried to get hold of the report into the incident, which had been refused due to the investigation being ongoing.
Once complete, the HSE then refused another request on the basis that it was too costly to reproduce all the report– which basically they were just trying to stall me on.
I then further narrowed down the request, given that the Investigator Kay Brookes who replied to the request had previously stated on the HSE website press release
“HSE inspector Kay Brookes, said: “This was a long and complex case, but at the heart of it lay the fact that this company’s actions caused an incident that affected the public and workers.
“The loss of containment and failure in Solvay’s systems caused huge disruption and the outcomes could have been far worse. “
Picture Express and Star
The 125 page report has been so redacted that it makes for nearly impossible reading. The most bizarre redactions however are at the very heart of Brookes’ case- the amounts of dangerous chemicals released!
These have been redacted under section 12 (5) (a) of the Environmental Information Regulations which in short
EIR Guidance set out by the ICO
12. – (5) For the purposes of paragraph (1)(a) a public authority may refuse to disclose information to the extent that its disclosure would adversely affect –
(a) international relations, defence, national security or public safety.
THIS IS UTTERLY LUDICROUS AND IS NOT IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST.
I have of course challenged the redactions decision in an internal review. It is further bizarre that some of the figures are already available and were reported in the press at the time- for example the blank of phosphoric acid released we know to be 564 kilos.
From The Express and Star article
In the pages it is possible to see that
*Rhodia tried to con the HSE with calculations about the amount of phosphine released but the HSE did not accept their figure. This too has been redacted, and it would be interesting to see how far they were out. A similar scenario unfolded with this dishonest company concerning the “small amounts” of white phosphorus that had been found in dead birds at Rattlechain, which was not the amount that they had swallowed. You can see the games that the chemical industry play unravelling here.
*Their systems were basically crap
* They failed to trigger the emergency toxic gas alarm on the basis that they treated the incident as a fire.
*They stalled for time prolonging the investigation with excuses and tried to shield their staff from any blame.
*Some of their statements were contradictory in nature, questioning the integrity of those making them.
*Some of the statements are ingenious spinning of the worst deceitful order.
*They lied to the HSE about never having had similar incidents at the site.
Their toxic gas emergency plan was none existant
There are large sections of the report which make it impossible to read.
Well that’s helpful
We will have to wait and see what comes out of the internal review, but I can see it having to go to the Information Commissioner to extract any more “secrets” out of the supposed regulator.
This is the same regulator who offered next to no comment on Rhodia’s hazardous substance consent increases in years gone by– including for the storage of phosphine!
We will have to see what transpires here, but in years gone by previous assessments were made by independent people concerning the potential release of chemicals at this site, and more specifically the folly of building more houses ever nearer to a major hazard factory.
Mr Gordon Nonhebel considered the following risks associated with such an application. His Key observations
“Undesirability of building hazardous factories near large centres of population”
“When phosphorus manufacture was started over 100 years ago, Oldbury was sparsely populated. It is today accepted that new factories involving risks such as fires and escape of dangerous gases, should be built away from large centres of population- this has been mentioned in reports by The Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution and in the annual reports by the alkali inspector”
smoke clouds
“Any phosphorus fire would emit large quantities of phosphoric oxide P205, fume of which could blanket large areas of the town, leading to confusion and panic among the inhabitants, especially in low wind conditions and at night. The smoke from a large fire would be equivalent to the release of smoke from thousands of bombs.”
“phosphorus fires
Although phosphorus fires should be readily quenched by water, an uncontrolled fire would emit large volumes of P. vapour into a cloud of air in which most of the oxygen had been consumed. Incoming gusts of fresh air into this vapour cloud might then cause a mild explosion. This is a potential risk which should be considered by HSC hazard branch.”
His words would be quite prophetic some 31 years later when almost exactly the scenario he suggests occurred at the Trinity Street site!
Some times you have to fill in the blanks yourself, when someone else fires them. So much for section 12 (5) (a) HSE 🙂 😆 😈
They certainly do challenge boundaries and cross them with toxic gas!