Chemical Hazards in Alkimos Water Treatment Plant

Running head: CHEMICAL HAZARDS
Chemical Hazards
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................4
Discussion..................................................................................................................................4
Background of the Company.................................................................................................4
Purpose and Scope.................................................................................................................5
Manufacturer’s Safe Handling Instructions...........................................................................5
Safe handling of Bleach.........................................................................................................5
Safe storage of Bleach............................................................................................................6
Task Observation and Risk Assessment................................................................................6
Observations and Findings.....................................................................................................6
Discussions and Results.........................................................................................................7
Interview Result.........................................................................................................................8
Findings of risk assessment........................................................................................................9
Recommendation........................................................................................................................9
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................9
..................................................................................................................................................20

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Executive Summary
This report discusses about the chemical bleach hazards among the workers of Alkimos
Water Treatment Plant in Perth Australia. The main purpose of this report is to assess the
health condition of the cleaners of Alkimos company. Alkimos Waste water Treatment Plant
is Perth based company and it is located in Western Australia. The company is located almost
42 km north west of Perth Central Business District (CBD). The treatment plant was
established in 2011 in order to supply clean water to the Northern to Southern part of the
country. In this regard the safety management was asked to execute an investigation and a
report regarding the skin injuries due to inappropriate use of Bleach to the cleaner would be
given to the higher authorities of the company. The assessment was completed by observing
the cleaning process and by conducting interview among the workers of Alkimos Waste
water Treatment Plant.

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Introduction
The modernization of the society and industry, has encouraged the use of chemicals in
different sectors of the human society and it is reported that, in some industry, the use of
chemicals is totally unavoidable. Thus, it is quite evident that workers involved in the process
of chemical use are quite vulnerable to those chemical exposures. In multiple industries, the
use of chemicals has enhanced in a great manner and thereby the fact of chemical exposure
and related adverse effects have become serious area of concern for the industry players
((Boucherit et al., 2015). According to the study of Aguiar et al. (2018), it is reported that,
the use of chemicals as a part of the cleaning process in the industry or in an organization is
associated with the adverse health condition of the workers using the materials.
This report discusses about the adverse health effect due to the use of bleach by the
cleaners of Alkimos Waste water Treatment Plant of Perth and the assessment was completed
by observing the cleaning process and by conducting interview among the workers of
Alkimos Waste water Treatment Plant.
The first part of the report discusses about the brief description of the company,
location, purpose and opportunity of this assessment and also discusses safe handling and
storage of chemical bleach according to the manufacturers safety data sheet, discussion and
result of task observation. In the next part, the report describes the bad and good practices of
bleach handling by using the interview results. A few recommendations are also suggested in
the last part of the report.
Discussion
Background of the Company
Alkimos Waste water Treatment Plant is Perth based company and it is located in
Western Australia. The company is located almost 42 km north west of Perth Central
Business District (CBD). The treatment plant was established in 2011 in order to supply clean
water to the Northern to Southern part of the country. ACCO Pty Ltd supplies cleaning
materials to the water treatment plant and all of the products supplied to the company are
manufactured by ORTHFORK brand. In the water treatment plant, the cleaning process is
executed by the company itself and there are almost 5 cleaners in the treatment plant who are

CHEMICAL HAZARDS5
responsible for the overall cleaning processes. Chemical bleach is used by the cleaners in the
plant premises in order to execute the daily cleaning processes. Due to the use of this bleach,
there are high chances of having chemical exposures among the cleaners of the company
Purpose and Scope
In order to assess the health condition of the cleaners of Alkimos company, the safety
management was asked to execute an investigation and a report regarding the skin injuries
due to inappropriate use of Bleach to the cleaner would be given to the higher authorities of
the company. The main purpose of this report is to prepare a detail report on the current
practices of chemical bleach use and safe storage of the bleach in the premises of the
organization. The safe storage of the bleach will be analysed as per the safety data sheet
(ACCO, 2018).
Bleach is a mixture of Sodium Hydroxide and Sodium Hypochlorite solution and it is
considered as one of the hazardous chemicals used in the industry. The handling methods of
this chemical will be analysed as well as per the practices of Safe Work Australia (2012).
Manufacturer’s Safe Handling Instructions
According to the data sheet of ACCO Brands Australia PTY LTD version 1.2, bleach
is one of the alkaline cleaning products used in the industry and due to the corrosive nature of
this product, it is highly hazardous to the users (ACCO, 2018). Bleach has a suffocating
odour while reacting with air along with its colourless appearance and it is composed of
composed of <10% of sodium hydroxide and <10% of sodium hypochlorite. Therefore, a
cleaner may face skin burns, irritation in the eyes, respiratory problems as a result of bleach
exposure to the cleaners. There are a few precautions and safe storage practices for using the
bleach in the work places.
Safe handling of Bleach
 The workers must not eat or drink during the use of chemical bleach
 Workers should use Personal protective equipment during the cleaning process
 Any kind of direct contact to the body must be avoided by the workers
 The area of using the bleach must be kept well ventilated and as a part of this use of
exhaust fan is recommended.
 Foods or food utensils must not be avoided from bleach contamination.
 The workers must not enter any hazardous places without proper checking

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 Avoid inhalation of chemical
Safe storage of Bleach
a. Suitable container for storage
 All the materials must be labeled and any kind of leak must be addressed as
soon as possible.
 Proper packing style by the manufacturer must be maintained
 The bleach must be kept in polypropylene containers or polyethylene
containers.
b. Storage incompatibility
 Any type of reaction with the chloroformates, acid chlorides or strong acids
must be avoided.
 Materials such as aluminium , copper and their alloys must not be kept in
close contact with the bleach.
Task Observation and Risk Assessment
The risk assessment program was executed in the morning of 21st August 2019 at 9.30
AM .All the safety equipment and the Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) were carried to
the cleaning location and those were given to the cleaners by the management to prevent any
kind of adverse incidents during the assessment process. Before starting the work, the work
place was examined carefully and then the bleach was sprayed to the area and the area was
left for a few times to initiate the reactions of bleach. After some time, the area was washed
with water. Still there was a strong odour of bleach around that area. From the safety data
sheet of the work place, it was found that, the risks of chlorine inhalation and exposure of
bleach to the skin had high and extreme risks respectively as the likelihood of chlorine
inhalation was almost certain and the consequence was moderate and so the risk was high. On
the other hand, exposure to skin was almost certain as per the likelihood scale and the
consequence was critical. Thereby the risks of this hazards was critical as per the risk matrix
table.
Observations and Findings
The study findings was based on the risk assessment and task observation of the
workers present in the Alkimos Water Treatment plant. The overall work areas of the
Alkimos Water Treatment plant was assessed in a well manner and along with this the
condition of the workers were also analysed. As per the observation of the assessment of this