Background
A small local garage that currently offers vehicle repairs and vehicle servicing wants expand its service list to offer to car bodywork repairs to their customers. This will allow them to repair dents and scratches to car body work for their customers. Repairing car body work is a multi-step process and in the final step, isocyanate paint and lacquer is applied to the vehicle using a spray paint gun to match the original colour of the car. This assignment is only focussed on the spray-painting part of the body work repair process.
The company plans to focus on repairing small dents and scratches, so they intend to use a process called SMART (Small and Medium Area Repair Technique) spraying. After preparing the area around the scratch or dent the technician uses a mini-spray gun to apply the paint in an appropriate colour to match the rest of the bodywork. As the jobs undertaken using SMART spraying are small, it usually takes less than a minute to apply each coat of paint, but some jobs will require 3 or 4 coats.
The paint used for SMART spraying is known as 2K Acrylic Paint. This must be mixed with a hardener (2K Air Dry Hardener fast) before spraying. Without the hardener the paint will not dry. After application, the paint is left to dry and harden on exposure to air for several hours. The material safety data sheets for both the 2K Acrylic Paint and the 2K Air Dry Hardener have been provided (see Other Information).
The company does not have a budget to spend on a specialist spray-painting booth, so the workshop manager has suggested that a small room at the back of the workshop is converted into a spray-painting room. The plan is to install a heavy-duty air extraction system to draw fumes out of the room through the back wall and vent them to atmosphere. Before being vented to atmosphere, the extracted air will pass through a filtration system to remove any airborne paint particles. Workers will be advised to wear, overalls, gloves, a respirator before entering the room and to turn on the extractor fans before beginning to apply spray paint. The technical data sheet for the proposed respirator has been provided (see Other Information). Other workers must not enter the spray-painting room while spraying is in progress.
Other information
The Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDSs) for 2K Acrylic Paint and 2K Air Dry Hardener are given as separate pdfs
The Technical Data Sheet (TDS) for the respirator that the workshop manager would like the technicians to wear while spraying is given as a separate pdf
The assignment
Your assignment is to carry out an Environmental Risk Assessment for the proposed spray-painting activity described above and prepare a short report for the workshop manager summarising your findings. A template for this Environmental Risk Assessment Report has been provided. Your task is to complete each section of the report template as follows.
1. Introduction: Write a short introduction to the report to set the scene.
2. Risk Screening: Carry out a risk screening process for the spray-painting activity. You should present your risk screening in Table 1 of the provided template.
3. Event Tree OR Fault Tree Analysis: Choose ONE Source-Pathway-Receptor from your risk screening matrix (i.e., choose one row of Table 1). Prepare EITHER an Event Tree OR a Fault Tree to identify the range of consequences or combination of conditions that lead to a particular undesired outcome. It should be a QUALITATIVE assessment only (i.e., there is no need to put numerical values to each branch of the tree). You should present your Event Tree or Fault Tree as Figure 1 in the provided template.
4. Mitigation Measures: Use Table 2 in the template to:
a. Suggest the mitigation measures that the company could implement to reduce the environmental risks associated with the spray-painting activity.
b. Explain how these mitigation measures will reduce the environmental risks.
c. State which of the mitigation measures you would recommend reducing the risks to an acceptable level.
d. Provide a justification for your recommendations.
5. Discussion: Write up a short analysis of your findings.
6. Recommendations: Summarise the conclusions you have drawn from the study and the recommendations you would make to the workshop manager.
Your report should be no longer than 2000 words, not including references.
Other information
You must complete each section of the template provided (1. Introduction, 2. Risk Screening, 3. Event/Fault Tree, 4. Mitigation Measures, 5. Discussion, 6. Recommendations). Do not change the wording or remove these section headings. You must include your completed Tables 1 & 2 and your completed Figure 1 as described in the template i.e., do not change or remove the column headings in the tables. You may add a title page, contents page, sub-headings, other diagrams or images, and additional tables if you wish, but do not remove any of the elements of the template.
You will be scored on each section of the report (1. Introduction, 2. Risk Screening, 3. Event/Fault Tree, 4. Mitigation Measures, 5. Discussion, 6. Recommendations). If you miss out a section or if you do not include Table 1, Figure 1 and Table 2 as described, you will lose marks. Make sure they are all included!
Submit your assignment as a Word document.
You will need to do your own additional research around the subject in order to fully answer this assignment. Make sure to properly reference any sources that you use.
References should be listed on an extra page at the end of the template. References are excluded from the word count.
