Waterville - Executive Summary |
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The farmer owners, managment and employees of the Beattie Farmers Union Cooperative Association are committed and dedicated to the prevention of any accidental releases of anhydrous ammonia. If an accidental release should occur, the facility is prepared to work with local fire department, or other authorities, to mitigate any release and minimize the impact of the release to the communities in which we operate. The primary activity at this facility is the unlaoding from truck, anhydrous ammonia, into our storage tanks and then to transfer from storage tanks into nurse tanks. These nurse tanks are used by our farmer customers to apply nitrogen to their crops. The maximum quanity stored in our storage tanks is 189,928 pounds of anhydrous ammonia. The worst-case scenario would be the release of the total contents of a storage tank as a gas over 10 minutes. The maximum quanity released would be 79000 pounds, which represents the volume of our largest tank at 85% capacity, as limited by design standards. The distance to the endpoint (point of dispersion to 200 ppm) is 1.89 miles. The alternative release scenario based on industry records and the most likely potentail incident is a release from a break in a transfer hose. The distance to endpoint (point of dispersion to 200ppm) is .83 miles. Because our firm handels anhydrous ammonia, we are regulated by DOT, EPA, OSHA, and The Kansas Department of Agriculture, who inspects our facilities on an annual basis. These regulation along with the extensive training and standards our company uses, has led us to an excellent safety record. We have had reportable accidents with annhydrous ammonia in the last five years. We are very proud of this record. In the event we would have an ammonia release we have an emergency response plan which discusses what our personnel are to do. In addition the training our employees are required to have , addresses ammonia accidents and proper procedures we must take to mitigate any accidental release. Each year we report to the state, LEPC and to the local fire department what kinds of hazardous materials we are keeping on this site. In addition we have employees at our facility who are on the volunteer fire departmet which futher helps coordination of our response efforts. |