Chemical Giants Fined
Scotish Chemical giants have been fined £100,000 following an uncontrolled release of crude oil at their Grangemouth refinery.
The incident happened when a pipeline containing crude oil became over pressurised as a result of a process known as thermal expansion. The failure of the pipeline caused extremely flammable crude oil to spray out across a nearby pumphouse and adjacent pipelines containing other dangerous substances.
An HSE's investigation found that the company was aware of the risks from thermal expansion and the needed to install and use engineering controls, but instead they chose to rely on staff to manually drain crude oil from the pipeline. The crude oil that drained from the pipeline was stored in a metal skip, not designed for the safe storage of an extremely flammable substance, so the risk of fire and explosion was increased.
The Chemical giant was fined £100,000 after pleading guilty at court.
After the hearing HSE's Investigating Inspector Brian Kennedy said: "The crude oil involved in this incident was extremely flammable and had the potential to result in serious injury had there been a fire or explosion.
Updated on 9/13/2011