Nichols Bulk Facility - Executive Summary

| Accident History | Chemicals | Emergency Response | Registration | Source | Executive Summary |

    Scenic Valley Cooperative serves primarily the farm and rural community in the Center Valley, Nichols, and Seymour, WIsconsin area.  We provide a variety of products for both the farm and home.  Among the products we supply you will find propane and anhydrous ammonia.  Propane offers our customers an inexpensive way to heat their homes, cook, and dry grain.  The anhydrous ammonia is used as a fertilizer for efficiently growing corn crops. 
 
    The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) considers these products "hazardous" and requires us to develop a risk management plan to deal with possible releases.  The nature of these products require us to handle them with respect.  Our goal is to provide these valuable products as safely as possible.  In our plan we outline ways to protect the health and property of our surrounding neighbors.  We all share the air, water, and soil around us and we want to do our part to protect  it by responsible use of our products. 
 
    As a guide t 
o safely handling the products we rely on a number of sources.  Primarily, we follow the federal, state, and local regulations governing the storage and delivery of the products.  However, we also stress a strong safety training program and close supervision of employees handling the products.  We also use information on equipment and training from trade associations and vendors.  Lastly, our insurance companies are exposed to real life accident experience.  Through their loss control specialists they forward the lessons they learned to  us. 
 
    Our safety record for these products shows our  concern and care resulted in no reportable accidents in over five years.  The record of our industry shows a strong safety record.  1994 data from the U.S. Department of Transportation reveals only 22 deaths due to transporting all hazardous materials.  Compare this to 1,150 who died of bee stings and 850 bicycle deaths during the same period. 
 
    The EPA required us to complete "worst case an 
d alternate scenarios" for these products in our plan.  We not only completed these scenarios, but we studied the consequences of even small incidents involving these products.  We use this information to help us develop adequate emergency response for both large and very small releases.  The local Fire department is kept informed of our plans and efforts are made to coordinate a response to a large release. 
 
    Our local fire department meets with us annually to review our facility.  In our meetings we share information and try to develop a partnership where the public and the enviroment will benefit. 
 
    Both propane and anhydrous ammonia deserve respect when handling.  Our cooperative encourages employees and customers to treat these products carefully.  This risk management plan identifies the details of our planning and efforts to protect the people and the enviroment surrounding our facility.
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