COODE
ISLAND COMMUNITY
CONSULTATIVE
COMMITTEE
Adopted
Minutes
Thursday,
18th March, 2010
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PRESENT
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ITEM 1. WELCOME BY THE CHAIR, APOLOGIES & CONFIRMATION OF DRAFT AGENDA
Robin Welcome to Kerry and Jason.
Apologies: George
Horman, Carlo Fasolino and Bro Sheffield-Brotherton whom is currently making a
presentation on the Copenhagen Climate Change talks.
Confirmation
of draft agenda – adopted
ITEM 2. LICENCE REFORM & CICCC INPUT (EPA: Jason Borg, Acting
Director business Development).
Jason Thanked the committee for
the opportunity of attending the meeting.
Part of my role is to oversee license
reform as the EPA goes through very major changes right from the top.
At this point Anthea Cannon from
the Leader Newspaper entered the meeting.
Robin Welcomed Anthea and asked
if any of the parties had any objections or concerns having the press in
attendance.
No concerns from the committee
were expressed.
Jason One of the changes,
reflecting a change in the governance approach, was the separation of Chair and
CEO positions. Chair is Cheryl Batagol and John Merritt is the CEO of the EPA.
The Chair is independent of the day to day running of the organization and will
bring a higher level of accountability onto the EPA.
Big change in focus of the EPA.
EPA wants to be transparent, consistent and reconnecting with the community.
The number one mandate is to focus environmental outcomes.
The EPA was originally set up to
deal with gross environmental issues. Gross air pollution was the context with
which EPA was brought into being. EPA was very rigid and put in a lot of
restrictions on how the industries ran their business.
Now focus has changed to local
pollution caused by individual entities or small groups of businesses, overuse
of resources and conflicts arising from encroachment of people living next to
industry. Some of the changes the EPA has overseen to adapt to these new
requirements are:
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changed
regulations introduced the EREP program (Environmental Resource Efficiency Program)
which has now been running for a couple of years.
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hazardous
waste regulations and secondary use of waste;
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the
introduction of corporate licencing; and
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a review of
scheduled premises regulations.
We are reforming our approach to
licensing. Approximately 750 licensed sites are grouped by sector (as per
Scheduled Premises Regulations). To assist with the reform we are viewing our
licencees in a couple of ways, low complexity or high complexity. The
fundamentals apply for both groups allowing for consistency across all sectors.
Standard conditions will apply to all industry. More complex sites may have
conditions in licences that may be driven by community requirements. EPA will
sit down with community representatives and the company when it comes time to issue
draft licences. The aim of licence conditions will be consistency, outcome
focus and standardization.
One other change is that an EIP
as part of the licence in general will no longer exist (except for Accredited
Licences). The outcome will be mandated by the license.
Another aspect is annual
reporting of compliance, signed by the Company CEO, and completed by September
for the previous financial year. If there is non-compliance, the company will
be expected to explain. Onus of compliance sits with the owners of the
business. Licenses will be publicly available on website.
We have initially rolled out
approximately 200 licences, which we have deemed do not require community
consultation — many of the other more “complex” licences will require community
consultation. While EIPs will not be a requirement of the licence, they will
still be open to audit. EPA will no longer approve EIPs.
Deborah Isn’t that placing a
great deal of trust in the company?
Jason The company is still
required to report any non compliance to the EPA as they were in the past. The
requirement to report non-compliances has not changed.
Documents that are linked to license
reform are on the EPA website.
1. Licence Management Guidelines
2. License Assessment Guidelines
3. Annual Performance Statement
Guidelines
Comment on these documents is
open until 17 April 2010.
The approach EPA is taking
towards compliance is risk based. Previously we considered risk to the
environment. Now we are adding the risk to non-compliance — such as past
performance, quality of management system, attitude of company, etc.
More officers will be doing
compliance work, drops in’s at sites, and desk top work. EPA has an Annual
Compliance Plan that involves set compliance activities as well as random compliance
inspections and targeted compliance campaigns. We are reviewing the way in
which the EPA handle pollution response calls. It is great that the community
uses the pollution response number and the EPA will be changing their response
to ensure more feedback is given to the person who has called in. Reform has
just commenced in this area.
75% of licenses are to be
reformed by June then 100% by the end of the year, reformed and issued.
Deborah Just a general
observation. If you are relying on companies to report their misdemeanors’
what is to stop them not reporting?
Jason There is no change to the
current situation. They are required to do so under the act. They are obliged
by law to advise of any non compliance.
Michael Is it strong enough?
Jason Having a better compliance
program will hold them more accountable. We expect companies to have a management
plan to reduce their non-compliance.
Andrea Do the penalties go up as
the non compliances increase?
Jason There will be a more
structured escalation to the enforcement action. As an example, depending on
the actual situation a company may receive a notice, then a PIN, and then
potentially court action. We will look at the reason why they did not comply.
Robin There was an incident with
Terminals at Geelong where there was a license limit of a certain amount that
could be discharged. Terminals knew that their existing equipment would be
exceeding the license limits due to a significant increase in throughput. EPA
more or less said “we understand why and approve of your proposed actions to
improve the situation”. The license breach was not notified to the community
until a year later, which caused some loss of trust by the community in both
the company and in EPA. How would that be handled under the new EPA regime?
Jason Change in focus. We would
need to be informed of the non compliance. EPA would take some ownership of
that issue. EPA should have required a license amendment.
Kerry A 30A variation to a
licence under the Act allows the EPA to have an interim approval change to the
license. License reform won’t change emissions or changes to things companies
have to do. They may need to have a works approval before that.
Ian How did the community find
out?
Robin The community found out
through the annual report.
Presently company annual reports
go first to EPA, and are for the calendar year. Carlo’s advice is that the 2009
Coode Island report had been submitted to the EPA. What is going to be the
norm for these reports in the future? Will they be made public at the same time
as going to the EPA?
ACTION ITEM
EPA to report on whether they will make these reports public at the
same time as given to EPA.
Ian Expressed concern whether the
desired level of openness from EPA would be achieved. Ian cited John Merritt’s
commitment at a conference to working towards making Safety Cases available to
the public, and lack of progress on the matter.
There has been a spate of
incidents in the Western suburbs.
Kerry John Merritt has put the
industry in the western suburbs, particularly in the Brooklyn area on notice.
Made it very clear that there will be no second chances.
Robin There can be a real dilemma
for EPA being tough on pollution and avoiding industry leave the state.
Deborah Can you give an example
of how a provision of an EIP now becomes an outcome?
Jason Depends if the EIP was
directing a company to do something. Being an accredited license is different
as EIPs are still required as part of being an accredited licencee. In
instances where e require then to do something (other than achieve an outcome),
the company will be given a notice to carry out that work.
Kerry The license Coode has
already is a very modern license. Most modern day companies included things
that weren’t applicable to the EPA. EIP’s are still great catalysts to getting
community involvement.
Deborah If you specify in EIP
conditions it makes the company more likely to take responsibility.
Jason Companies will still be
required to have a management and monitoring system to demonstrate that they
can and do comply with their licence.
Faye When risk is growing to what
level will you let it go. At what point do you weigh a company is a failing
company and the environmental risk is greater.
Jason Previously EPA looked at predominantly
environmental risk. Now risk of non-compliance will also be taken into account
to inform the compliance “risk”. The higher the risk rating the higher the
attention they receive from the EPA. Compliance inspection verifies that the company
is complying with license.
Ian I encourage companies to make
public the actions proposed to achieve objectives in an Environment Action
Plan. Here the CICCC model is working well.
Faye When will the company be too
high a risk?
Jason There will be a set
escalation on risk. The likelihood of failure, severity, etc based on risk and
performance. The company still has to be able to demonstrate compliance for
example preventative maintenance program, ground water monitoring. Will have to
show EPA how they prove compliance.
Robin So EPA will put it on the
company to meet a performance standard. EPA will keep pushing the company
until EPA gets a satisfactory answer.
Deborah What concerns me is that
it would be easy for government to say that because we have now put onus on
businesses there will be less need for staff at the EPA.
Jason Definitely not. We will
have more field officers to support our reformed compliance program to ensure
greater transparency and outcomes.
Col The ten year inspection
reports are conducted by an external source. Water testing again sent to an
independent 3rd party source.
Peter Regarding the Geelong
incident Geelong worked in partnership with the EPA. We did calculation and
moved straight away to notify EPA and EPA worked alongside Terminals.
Andrea With those new risk
categories would a company cutting down some of its site staff as well as
production, would that company’s risk be higher?
Jason The EPA would monitor risk
based on the activities being conducted at that site.
Kerry This site is one of our
more complex sites. We would not be moving on this license until June/July
2010. I have asked Cheryl Batagol to attend the next CICCC meeting.
Robin Noted that the CICCC had
invited Cheryl to attend a meeting when it wrote to her congratulating her on
her appointment. At the December meeting the matter of her invitation to a
specific meeting was addressed, and the Chair contacted her personal assistant
in late December with the result that the May 2010 meeting of CICCC was
penciled in her diary. That date was confirmed a few days ago.
How much effort does EPA put
into monitoring and how much are companies required to use approved auditors
(as is the case with accredited licences).
Jason Our plan at this stage is
to not use a mandatory auditor.
Peter I think it is good to use
an external auditor.
Robin Thanked Jason for
attending.
ITEM 3. CONFIRM DRAFT MINUTES FOR THE MEETING ON 10 DECEMBER 2009, AND
REVIEW ACTION ITEM LIST
Robin Draft Minutes of the 10th
December, 2009 adopted without change.
Action Items
09/07-2 DP World has been charged with
causing air pollution – Completed 10/12/09
06/08-1 PoMC to send results of 2006 –
2008 groundwater testing.
Robin I feel we are unlikely to hear any thing more on the item so
therefore it should just be deleted from the Action Summary Sheet.
09/09-2 Copy of EPA license once it has
been approved to be uploaded onto the CICCC website. We will get to that later
as Carlo has given me a hard copy and will in the next few days he will scan
and I will circulate and put on website – Completed 14/12/09
12/09-1 Robin to send Terminals letter to EPA re
Combustor Low Fire at Night, and the Preheating Liquid injection to the
Combustor to CICCC members – Completed 27/12/09
12/09-2 Kerry to send Robin a copy of
the EPA structure electronically – Completed 14/12/09
12/09-3 Kerry to clarify what is meant by “the
Authority” – please refer to EPA report given out at the 18-3-10 meeting
for explanation. Item completed 18 March 2010
12/09-4 Robin to advise the Advisory
Committee reviewing Planning controls for Victorian Ports of the interest of
the CICCC in making submission – Completed 14/12/09
12/09-5 Carlo to liaise with WorkSafe
and enquire if the Buncefield vapor cloud explosion scenario need to be
included in future reviews of the Safety Case.
12/09-6 Robin to write to PoMC
expressing concern that community members were turned away from Operation
Island – Completed 21/12/09
ITEM 4. REPORTS FROM AGENCIES AND TERMINALS
TERMINALS PTY LTD
Col Went through the Operations
Report covering such topics as Shipping, Road Transport, Injuries and explained
the incidents.
ENVIRONMENT PROTECTION AUTHORITY
Kerry Handed out Activity Report
December 2009 – March 2010 (See Attachment)
Action item from previous
meeting was to clarify what is meant by “the Authority”. Explanation given in
Activity Report section “Action Items for EPA” Section C). In essence, “the
Authority” is the Chairman.
ACTION ITEM
Kerry to send a copy of the Activity Report December 2009 – March
2010 to Robin via email.
CITY OF MARIBYRNONG
Theo Handed out “Project Update
8” regarding the Emergency Alert and maps from the SES showing the extent of
the damaged caused by the hail storm.
Deborah Maribyrnong City Council was
instrumental in instigating the Emergency Alert System and in all the papers
there was no mention of this.
Theo The VCAT appeal Lot B 200
Steven Street near Mobil tank farm is still at VCAT. Will keep you updated as
I find out more.
ITEM 5 OTHER BUSINESS
Item 1
Kerry As Cheryl is to attend the
next meeting is there any other information you wish to have brought to the
meeting?
Faye risk compliance –
personnel and wider community
Item 2
Robin The issue with regards to
the Annual Reports that Terminals issue.
Reports come through slowly. We
need to have a careful look at those reports as it is very much part of our
business. It is incumbent on us as a committee to look at those reports.
Would like the reports issued to committee at the same time as they as issued
to the EPA. Just to alert you all to the increased significance and importance
of the annual reports.
ACTION ITEM
Put item on Agenda
for next meeting to have annual report circulated one month prior to next
meeting. Have someone from Terminals present it and followed by discussion.
NEXT SCHEDULED MEETINGS:
Proposed meetings for 2010
– 13 May, 19 August, 18 November, 2010
MEETING CLOSED 8:40 PM
ATTACHMENT EPA ACTIVITY
REPORT December 2009 – march 2010
Terminals
Pty.Ltd – coode island
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cLIENT RELATIONSHIP MANAGER: Marc cassanet |
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sTATUTORY ACTIVITIES |
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pOLLUTION iNCIDENTS AND rEPORTS |
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Community Reports to EPA Pollution Watch for § Dec 2009 – March |
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ACTION ITEMS FOR EPA |
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A) EPA presentation on licence reform – B) C) Kerry to clarify what is meant by “the Authority Ÿ Part II S5 (1) Ÿ S6(1) The Ÿ S13 (1) Lists Ÿ The Authority |
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OTHER LOCAL AND EPA NEWS |
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EPA Chief Executive John Merritt has been appointed into the Chief Executive position and Spill at P&O Coode Island 09/03/2010 – EPA Petrol leak – Mobil Refinery At approx 11.45pm Monday 8 February, Mobil detected a leak in an SITA Brooklyn prosecution SITA Australia Pty Ltd was found guilty of breaching their licence by SITA was ordered to pay $40,000 to fund a Brooklyn |