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Driving Hazardous Waste

By Tim Frederikson

Over the past year, drivers transporting hazardous substances by road have been required to obtain an endorsement on their licences. The endorsement recognises that the drivers have completed a training course on the subject of hazardous substances.

Upon successful completion of the course, a driver is judged to be able to safely manage the loading, transportation, unloading and emergency procedures associated with such an operation. Now, a driver is a driver -- not a chemist -- but they do need to understand the system.

We have nine classes of hazardous substances in this country:

  • Explosives -- ammunition, fireworks
  • Gases -- flammable, poisonous
  • Flammable liquids -- fuels, solvents
  • Flammable solids
  • Oxidisers and organic peroxides
  • Poisons, harmful substances and infectious materials
  • Radioactives
  • Corrosives
  • Miscellaneous hazardous substances -- asbestos fibres

These are the broad classes, although several have sub-groups because their hazard is more definable. Each class is identified by a diamond shaped label, an appropriate graphic, a colour code and the class number.

The important thing for drivers to understand is that certain classes and substances are incompatible with each other to varying degrees. For transportation purposes, such substances may be moved together, moved if they are separated by a minimum of one metre, or not transported in the same vehicle.

So, how can a driver tell which of those options applies to the substances being transported? Every driver who attends the course receives a small chart showing what transportation requirement, if any, apply to the different substances.

Transportation of anything is really only "mobile storage". The same standards may be applied to storage of hazardous substances with a suitable weighting for the amounts being stored. Clearly, if you are working for a major chemical company which holds 50 tonnes of hydrogen peroxide and 400 tonnes of formic acid, you would store them further apart than one metre. If you are responsible for storage within a laboratory holding 500 grams of acetic acid and 100 grams of chloroform, the separation between these two could be the minimum distance required.

The hazard class system has its problems. Many substances have multiple risks in more than one hazard class. Some hazards are not within the system at all -- magnetism is one that immediately comes to mind. But overall, it's a good system and one that can be easily instituted wherever hazardous substances are to be found.

Many drivers are, as a result of obtaining the licence endorsement, more aware of the safety and health aspects of handling hazardous substances than those persons using such materials. And that is not a bad thing at all...

Tim Frederikson is a chemical safety consultant.