Airborne Hazards Emergency Response
Service
Background
The Civil Contingencies Act 2004 and the
Contingency Planning (Scotland) Regulations 2005 identified SEPA as
a Category 1 responder. This places a duty on SEPA to have in place
arrangements to prepare for and respond to various emergencies and
other disruptive challenges. Although SEPA has always had a role in
dealing with some emergencies such as flooding, this legislation
has opened up a range of new responsibilities for us.
Following the Buncefield incident in December
2005, the UK Government recognised the need for the provision of
co-ordinated data and advice on airborne hazards during significant
incidents. The Environment Agency were subsequently funded by
Government to set up an appropriate service for England and Wales
and in December 2009 the Scottish Government confirmed that they
wanted SEPA to take the lead in setting up an equivalent service
for Scotland. More than £2 million over three years was approved,
with a substantial proportion of this spent on purchasing vehicles,
equipment and related apparatus needed to set up the service.
The main aim of the service is to protect the
public in the event of a significant air pollution incident by
providing interpreted and informed scientific advice on airborne
hazards to Health Protection Scotland (HPS). In the event of a
significant incident this information will enable them to quickly
assess the potential risks to human health in order that the
appropriate steps are taken to mitigate them.
The Airborne Hazard Emergency Response (AHER)
service will provide the capability for SEPA, HPS and other
agencies to carry out high quality public health and environmental
risk assessments based on monitoring and modelling data from the
scene of an incident.
The service will build on existing resilience
arrangements in Scotland (in support of Team Scotland) and within
SEPA, including communications with SEPA Operations; Scottish
Detection, Identification and Monitoring Vehicles with the Fire and
Rescue Service; and SEPA’s existing scientific capability.
What does the service involve?
In the event of a significant incident that
may result in airborne hazards for example a chemical fire,
explosion, or release of gases, SEPA’s field response team will be
deployed to the incident (if there is deemed to be a significant
risk to human health). Once at the site, officers will begin to
monitor for potential harmful substances in the air and their
concentration levels.
This information is then relayed back to a
local SEPA office, where SEPA staff will collate and assess all the
available data relating to the incident and provide this to HPS for
them to make a determination on the possible impact to human
health.
During the incident we will take appropriate
samples for further analysis at its laboratory during the incident
and will continue to monitor the air onsite, until the significant
threat from the incident has passed.
What partners are involved in the delivery of the
service?
The project was led by SEPA, in partnership
with a range of agencies, the principal partners being Health
Protection Scotland (HPS) and Fire & Rescue Services. Other
partners include the Met Office, the Police, Scottish Government,
Health Boards, Food Standards Agency Scotland, Local Authorities,
Health & Safety Laboratory and the Environment Agency in
England and Wales.