The Health and Safety at Work Act places a duty on employers to protect employee’s health and safety. COSHH (Control of Substances Hazardous to Health) regulations fall under this Act and requires employers and employees to ensure that exposure to hazardous substances is prevented or otherwise adequately controlled.
Industries that produce dust and fumes use a common control method of general or localised Local Exhaust Ventilation (LEV). LEV systems capture and remove air contaminants at the point they are being produced before they escape into the workplace and take various forms:
- Spray Booths
- Exhaust Systems
- Ventilated Workstations
- Mobile extraction points
- Fume hoods / cupboard / cabinets
- Bespoke systems
The 1988 COSHH Regulation – No. 1657 Section 9 requires all control measures used to reduce exposure to hazardous substances be properly maintained and regularly inspected and tested and this includes LEV systems.
Specifically, Section 9 requires LEV systems to be tested at a minimum period of 14 months. This duty is regularly overlooked or ignored, placing employers at risk of HSE enforcement action. All systems operating in the workplace must be checked and maintained. This includes dust extraction systems, spray booths and fume extraction systems. This is to ensure all LEV systems are operating at an adequate level of control. Poorly maintained or defective LEV systems will not adequately protect staff.
To ensure compliance with COSHH, our engineers can undertake full LEV inspections, testing and maintenance:
- Testing – we have a team of engineers that are trained to carry out LEV tests in line with current regulations and give sound solutions to systems not achieving the required benchmark performance.
- Maintenance – up keep of systems to keep them working to the required benchmark performance, including filter changes, arm maintenance, and supply of required documentation.
Furthermore, Defuma can even design and install improvements, additions or replacement systems. In this way Defuma is able to ensuring that whatever your requirements are for LEV & COSHH, we can assist you.
For more information on LEV Testing & COSHH, please contact us
Useful Links:
http://www.hse.gov.uk/coshh/basics.htm
Downloads:
Control Substances Hazardous to health