Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what criteria the Health and Safety Executive uses to designate a location as a Control of Major Accident Hazard site.

COMAH requires dutyholders to take all measures necessary to prevent and mitigate the effects of major accidents involving dangerous substances which can cause serious damage/harm to people and or the environment.

COMAH mainly affects chemical and downstream petrochemical and oil industries, but also includes some storage activities, explosives sites, nuclear sites, and other industries, where quantities of dangerous substances above the thresholds identified in the regulations are kept or used. The COMAH Regulations differ from other Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 relevant statutory provisions, in that they set out to protect both people and the environment from harm. Environmental matters are regulated by the relevant environmental government agencies who work with HSE or Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) to form the relevant COMAH Competent Authority (CA) for each COMAH establishment.

An ‘establishment’ is defined as the whole location (site) under the control of an operator where a dangerous substance is present in a quantity equal to or in excess of the quantity listed in schedule 1 of the regulations. The regulations place legal duties on such an establishment to determine if their site is subject to COMAH based on their inventory. It is the duty of the operator to determine whether the site has COMAH status and if it does, to notify HSE accordingly.