Garage owner finally sees the light after 3 years

By Brian Baker

On 5th December, the UK saw the Dangerous Substances & Explosive Atmospheres 2002 (S.I. 2776:2002) (DSEAR) came into effect that provide a parallel to the existing legislative controls on Petrol Filling Stations. More recently, LACORS have revised standard petroleum licensing conditions that have reduced many of the former conditions that provides more functional requirements than prescriptive ones. It is expected that these new licensing conditions will have a limited life span.

Consequently the Association for Petroleum & Explosives Administration (APEA) have been looking to introduce a new one course specifically to cover these new regulations. I am pleased to announce that details are almost complete and a list of dates and locations are published in this issue of The Bulletin

The course is aimed at Regulators, Enforcers, Auditors, Contractors, Oil Companies in fact anyone that is impacted by DSEAR. Of one day duration, the course takes you through where DSEAR has come from and why, what each of the 17 Regulations and 7 Schedules mean, its application to a petrol filing station, the types and methods of risk assessment and a practical desk top study is then applied.

This provides for 6 hours Continued Professional Development (CPD) and Course Certificates issued

It is expected demand will be heavy for this course so why not book now. Contact Jane Mardell, APEABusiness Manager on 01799 502929 or even book on line.

Discounts available on bespoke courses.

Petrol Filling Stations and DSEAR

30 September 2004 Milton Keynes

7 October 2004 Swindon 14 October 2004 Derby

21 October 2004 Bournemouth

28 October 2004 Manchester

4 November 2004 Sheffield

11 November 2004 Dundee

18 November 2004 Canterbury

25 November 2004 Cardiff

2 December 2004 Glasgow

9 December 2004 Durham

16 December 2004 Birmingham

By Jamie Thompson

On March 23 the Association held its first training course in Castlebar county Mayo in Ireland, the course was a Petrol Station Audit and Inspection course.

16 people attended from 6 Fire Brigades, Donegal, Galway, Leitrim, Dublin, Sligo and Mayo.

The law is of course different from UK law and is covered by the Dangerous Substances (Retail & Private Petroleum Stores) Regulations 1979, which calls for the issuing of a petroleum licence similar to that used in the UK.

The Irish Fire Authorities have until recently been somewhat starved of resources and have not had the manpower to issue licences or inspect the petrol stations. With a retained fire service the full time officers are required to cover building control work and other fire safety inspection and it is recognised now with more resources being provided that first licences need to be issued and petrol stations inspected.

Castlebar in Co Mayo is situated in a beautiful but remote area to the west of Ireland and the course was held at the new training centre of Co Mayo that had excellent facilities.

The thirst for knowledge with questions coming thick and fast was soon apparent as Paul Craven and J a m i e Thompson presented the subjects.

The course was not without its incidents with one officer leaving to be with his wife who was having their baby (we hope all went well), and another officer while bending down to lift a manhole split his trousers apart, visitors to the petrol station being treated to one man trying to cover up with the remainder laughing and pointing to his misfortune!

The site inspection was carried out at a Statoil petrol filling station in

Castlebar, and thanks to Mike

Nyland of Statoil for arranging this venue.The inspection went well and it was clear from the outset that the manageress was well trained.

She also operated the site well and impressed the trainers. On completion of the inspection the group discussed the option had a licence been issued and also discussed how to issue the licence.

At the end of the course the Chairman Tony Jenner came to discuss the future of the Irish branch of the APEA, it is clear that the Irish branch now has a chance to regenerate itself with interest from the officers of the Irish fire brigades to go with the oil company people and the contractors.

The course went well and thanks to Noel O'Reilly who made the arrangements and ferried the trainers around. The course certificates were unable to be presented at the time due to a postal strike in Ireland but delegates will be receiving these in due course.

The course review forms were very good with the only complaint being there was too much food!

Two more courses have been arranged for Cork and Wexford and tentative arrangements are being made to hold a meeting of the Irish branch later in the year.