Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation

Transcription

1 Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation

2 Contents Introduction 1 Consultation responses 1 How to respond 1 Part 1: Context 2 1. Aims and benefits 2 2. Scope of scheme 2 3. Implementation timetable 4 4. Compliance matrix 5 Part 2: Scheme manual 6 5. General guidance 6 6. Quality assurance 7 7. How to assess compliance 7 8. Detailed assessment guidance: 9 Step 1 Identify Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) 9 Step 2 Assess ELC 9 Step 3 Record environmental events 11 Step 4 Overall ELC compliance band 14 Step 5 Assess Environmental Management Conditions (EMCs) attributes 14 Step 6 Overall EMC compliance band 15 Step 7 Overall compliance band 15 Abbreviations and glossary 16 Annexes 18 1 Generic compliance assessment sheet (blank) 18 2 Pollution Prevention and Control Part A and Part B with complex licences 20 3 Pollution Prevention and Control Part B with low risk activities (eg dry cleaners, cement batchers, roadstone coating) 26 4 Pollution Prevention and Control landfills 30 5 Waste management licensing 34 6 Controlled Activity Regulations sewage and trade effluent treatment 37 7 Controlled Activity Regulations marine fish farms 44 8 Controlled Activity Regulations abstraction and/or impoundment 49 9 Radioactive Substances Act registrations Radioactive Substances Act authorisations 56 Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation

3 Introduction The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) is consulting on its plan to introduce a new compliance assessment scheme. Your responses to this consultation will inform the development of the final scheme, which is proposed to be phased in from 1 January This consultation document comprises three parts: Part 1: an introduction to the scheme, explaining why we are introducing a new scheme, its scope, implementation timetable and some background information on the principles of the scheme; Part 2: the scheme manual, intended for SEPA staff and stakeholders using the scheme; Annexes 1 10: assessment sheets for each regulatory regime, containing further staff and stakeholder guidance. Early proposals for the scheme were discussed at a SEPA stakeholder workshop in May 2008, and joint trials between SEPA and operators are ongoing during summer Consultation responses and issues arising from the trials will be taken into account when we finalise the scheme in late Consultation responses It would help us review responses if you could structure your comments according to the list in Table 1. Please be as specific as possible about issues or concerns that you wish to raise. Table 1 How to structure your response Q1 Aims and benefits of the scheme, including publication (page 2) Q2 Scope of scheme (page 2) Q3 Implementation timetable (page 4) Q4 Compliance matrix (page 5) Q5 General guidance (page 6) Q6 Quality control and complaints (page 7) Q7 Environmental Limit Conditions (from page 9) Q8 Environmental Management Conditions (from page 14) Q9 Q10 Compliance assessment sheets and guidance (annexes) Any other comments How to respond The consultation period closes on 3 October Please respond by post or by to: Compliance Assessment Scheme Consultation Scottish Environment Protection Agency Erskine Court Castle Business Park Stirling FK9 4TR SEPAComplianceProject@sepa.org.uk Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 1

4 Part 1: Context 1. Aims and benefits 1.1 As Scotland s environmental regulator, SEPA issues a range of licences designed to control activities that could lead to pollution or environmental damage. Compliance with these licences is important in ensuring that the environment and human health are protected. SEPA believes that the industries and businesses it regulates should find it as easy as possible to understand their responsibilities, to comply with the regulations and to realise the many economic benefits of good environmental practice. For these reasons, SEPA has made a strong commitment in its Corporate Plan to delivering a programme of Better Regulation. As part of this programme, improvements are being made to SEPA s approach to assessing compliance with environmental licences, permits, authorisations and certain registrations (referred to generically as licences in this consultation). This will lead to more effective, transparent and efficient regulation. 1.2 The new compliance assessment scheme will help deliver SEPA s principles for regulation 2 as follows: i. Proportionate Compliance assessments will ensure that SEPA resources are targeted towards activities where there is poor compliance. Compliance assessment results will inform SEPA s resourcing decisions. ii. Consistent, fair and legally correct The new scheme aims to streamline and standardise compliance assessment across SEPA s different regulatory regimes. It will therefore provide a level playing field due to consistent and fair assessments across different activities. iii. Transparent and accountable By using clearly structured and simple assessment sheets, which are available to licence holders and the public, the compliance assessment will be shown to be as transparent and objective as possible. iv. Targeted, efficient and effective By consistently and transparently providing feedback on compliance issues to licence holders within a structured and formal framework, the new scheme will help SEPA to deliver the desired environmental outcomes by working with licence holders. Public scrutiny of published compliance data is intended to encourage environmental improvement. 1.3 It should be noted that the information required to operate the new scheme is already gathered by SEPA through inspections, monitoring, and review of reports, including data submissions and notifications/complaints about incidents. The introduction of the new scheme will not require changes to existing licences nor require additional data that is not currently required by the licence to be collected or reported by licence holders. 1.4 Publication Access to Information legislation 3 requires SEPA to publish information it holds or to make such information available on request. With the exception of licences with national security and/or commercial confidentiality issues, the overall compliance band result for each licence will be made available on SEPA s website. Compliance assessment sheets for specific licences (containing licence number, regulatory regime and licence name) will also be made available to the public on request. 1.5 Enforcement SEPA s compliance scheme will be used, along with other relevant information, to inform SEPA s enforcement activities, in accordance with its enforcement policy Charging In order for companies who perform well to get real benefits from their good practice, SEPA is considering the use of compliance assessment results as the basis for adjustments to subsistence charges. For instance, excellent compliance assessment results could see reduced charges. Conversely, subsistence charges could be increased for very poor sites to reflect the increase in public resources required to deal with the problems. These proposals will be the subject of separate public consultation in the near future. Charging principles and issues are therefore not covered in any further detail in this consultation. 1 SEPA Corporate Plan As explained in Vision for Regulation published by SEPA in The relevant Access to Information legislation includes the Freedom of (Scotland) Information Act 2002 and the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations SEPA s publication scheme can be found at 4 SEPA s enforcement policy can be found on SEPA s website at Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 2

5 2. Scope of scheme 2.1 The scheme will be used to assess compliance with permits, authorisations, certain registrations or licences (referred to generically as licences in this document) for all regimes regulated by SEPA, with a number of exclusions which relate to very low risk activities or activities which are short lived or are not regulated by licence. Assessment of compliance with the Control of Major Accident Hazards (COMAH) regulations is not within the scope of the scheme as no licence is issued. Other exclusions include certain licences which are short lived, such as engineering licences under the Controlled Activities Regulations (CAR). A definitive list of activities to be included within, or excluded from, the scheme is provided in Table The scheme is deliberately restricted to assessing compliance with requirements of licences and any general or specific statutory requirements associated with the relevant licence regime. For example, the use of Best Available Techniques (BAT) under Pollution Prevention and Control (PPC) and the use of Best Practicable Means (BPM) under the Radioactive Substances Act (RSA). 2.3 The scheme is focused on the compliance of a licence holder with their licence and not on the inherent hazard which the activity may present; this will continue to be addressed via the Pollution Hazard Appraisal (PHA) scheme 5 which is normally undertaken on grant of a licence or when the licence is reviewed or varied due to a substantial change. 2.4 The scheme will be applied for each calendar year, with the assessment ongoing thoughout the period. After the end of the calendar year, licence holders will be notified by SEPA of their assessment result and the result will subsequently be finalised during the spring of the following calendar year. 2.5 It should be noted that the scheme will replace the existing Operator Performance Assessments (OPA) which are currently undertaken for Pollution and Prevention Control (PPC), Waste Management Licensing (WML) and Radioactive Substances Act (RSA). 2.6 SEPA s Environmental Risk Assessment manual will be updated once the compliance scheme has been finalised. The new scheme will not affect how SEPA undertakes PHA or risk assessments 5. Table 2 Scope of compliance scheme Regulatory regime Activities Included in scheme Excluded from scheme Pollution Prevention and Control (PPC) Controlled Activity Regulations (CAR) Waste Management Licensing (WML) Regulations 1994 Radioactive Substances Act (RSA) 1993 Control of Major Accident Hazards (COMAH) 1999 Activities permitted under PPC (Scotland) Regulations 2000 Point source activities, including fish farms All activities permitted under PPC (Scotland) Regulations 2000 Complex and simple licences which are monitored by SEPA Those Part B activities considered to be exempt under the regulations and therefore excluded from the PPC regime Registrations and GBRs Water resource activities (ie Complex and simple licences Registrations and GBRs abstractions and/or impoundments) Engineering activities None All Disposal to land activities Waste management activities Licensed nuclear sites and similar facilities, small users (hospitals, universities and industry) and sites using closed sources Companies subject to notification under COMAH and subsequent amendments Complex and simple licences, except those specified in the adjacent column All activities licensed under EPA 1990 Registrations and authorisations under RSA None Agricultural disposal to land already covered by cross-compliance assessments under the Single Farm Payment scheme via Scotland s Environmental and Rural Services (SEARS) WML exemptions, producer responsibility, transfrontier shipments, waste carriers and brokers RSA exemption orders All 5 More information on PHA can be found on SEPA s website at Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 3

6 3. Implementation timetable 3.1 Following this consultation, the new scheme will be introduced in a phased manner to allow adequate time for thorough preparation for each regime including staff training It is proposed to implement the scheme for Pollution Prevention and Control (PPC) from January 2009, resulting in the first assessments of these licences being produced in spring The scheme will be introduced for the remaining regimes in 2010 and in 2011 as indicated in Table 3. Licence holders will be notified in advance of the scheme being implemented in their respective regimes. Table 3 Timetable Consultation period June August 2008 July October 2008 October November 2008 Late 2008 Implementation dates January 2009 January 2010 January 2011 Partnership trials of scheme with volunteer operators Consultation period Consultation responses and trial issues reviewed Final scheme published PPC - Part A and Part B Waste Management Licensing (WML) Controlled Activity Regulations (CAR) - Point Source Controlled Activity Regulations (CAR) Water Resources Radioactive Substances Act (RSA) 3.2 The timetable for implementation in the first year is challenging, however it should be recognised that SEPA already assesses compliance with licences through inspection and monitoring. The performance of licence holders subject to Operator Performance Assessments (OPA) or Waste Operator Performance Assessments (WOPA) has been assessed by SEPA for some years. The new compliance scheme provides a more consistent framework for this information to be recorded and assessed across all regulatory regimes. For regimes already assessed under OPA, the new scheme will replace it, as and when each regime is phased into the new compliance scheme. 3.3 The implementation timetable for compliance charge factors will be the subject of separate public consultations reviewing the charging scheme for each individual regulatory regime. 3.4 A training programme is currently being developed that will ensure SEPA staff use the new scheme appropriately and consistently. 3.5 Procedures for management sign-off of each assessment and internal auditing are also being developed to ensure quality assurance for compliance assessments. 3.6 The scheme will be reviewed by SEPA every four years. Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 4

7 4. The compliance matrix 4.1 The new scheme deliberately distinguishes between conditions which relate directly to the environment and those which relate to management requirements that ensure appropriate environmental protection: Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) Environmental Management Conditions (EMCs) 4.2 SEPA considers both types of conditions to be equally important and has developed a compliance matrix (Figure 1 at the end of this section), comprising five compliance bands: excellent, good, adequate, poor and very poor. These bands allow the compliance assessment for an activity to be tracked year on year. 4.3 The matrix has been deliberately designed to: provide an excellent result for activities which have both no breaches (ie full compliance with environmental limits) and high performance on environmental management attributes; highlight very poor activities where there are breaches of both environmental limits as well as low management performance; assign activities where environmental management is at a low performance level as poor or very poor, whether or not they have breaches of ELC limits; assign an adequate or good overall band to activities where there are only minor breaches or non-conformances that are unlikely to merit additional SEPA effort or intervention, over and above routine requirements. 4.4 Assessment rules have been developed to determine significant and repeated breaches for ELCs, as well as high, medium and low performance for EMCs. These are explained in the scheme manual (page 6). It should be noted that breaches of ELCs or non-compliances with EMCs do not necessarily translate into any environmental impact. For example, an effluent discharge to a river which exceeded the licensed limits would be counted as a breach, even though it may have caused no environmental impact because the river was in spate. 4.5 The overriding concern in developing these rules has been to promote consistency and fairness across regulatory regimes. For this reason, generic rules for assessing significant breaches and repetitions of a minor breach have been proposed, although some regimes have different or specific additional rules due to fundamental differences in the type of activity, licensing regime or process control expected. 4.6 We have also endeavoured to ensure that occasional minor breaches or non-compliances do not lead to a disproportionate assessment by SEPA, unless the breaches are repeated or management issues become widespread. For this reason, sites can still be classed in the overall good or adequate band, even if an occasional minor breach or non-compliance has been identified. The assessment rules have been developed so as not to penalise larger, complex activities with the potential for multiple minor non-compliances. For example, minor breaches will only be counted as repeated if they occur on the same emission parameter from the same stack in a large chemical plant. 4.7 This scheme will take account of good management practice, whether or not such practices are implemented as part of a formal accredited Environmental Management System (EMS). Figure 1 Compliance matrix No breaches Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) Minor Breach(es) Significant breach(es) or repeated minor breaches Environmental Management Conditions (EMCs) High performance Excellent Good Poor Medium performance Good Adequate Poor Low performance Poor Poor Very Poor Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 5

8 Part 2: Scheme manual 5. General guidance 5.1. Calendar year and overall bands The assessment will be undertaken on a calendar year basis (ie January to December) and each licence will be assessed and allocated into one of the following overall compliance bands for that year: excellent, good, adequate, poor, very poor Assessment The scheme will be applied throughout the calendar year by the inspecting officer, who will record, explain and comment on any breaches or non-compliances on the licence compliance assessment sheet. Information on this sheet will be used to determine the annual overall compliance band early the following year. SEPA officers will communicate, in a timely manner, the findings of inspections, monitoring reviews or investigations to licence holders In-year improvements Performance improvements during the calendar year, in response to any breaches or non-compliances, will not prevent these breaches or non-compliances being taken into account in the relevant year s assessment. However, where a licence condition has been changed by variation during the assessment year in order to correct any irregularity that resulted in a breach or non-compliance, those previous breaches or non-compliances during the assessment year may be discounted Multi-licence sites Sites which hold more than one licence (in one or more media) will be assessed individually against each licence held. Licences with more than one activity (eg a discharge and an abstraction) will be assessed and allocated a single overall compliance band for the calendar year Multiple inspectors Where a complex licence requires assessment by more than one SEPA inspector for a single regulatory regime, the assessment will be undertaken and agreed jointly by the inspecting officers Surrendered, revoked, suspended, cancelled and transferred licences An assessment will be carried out for an activity undertaken during the year in question, for whatever period the activity was licensed for during that year. Where a licence is transferred during the year, a separate assessment will be carried out for each licence holder Infrequent inspections There are certain licensed activities which are considered to be low risk and, as a result, are not routinely inspected on an annual basis. The overall compliance band allocated to such activities will be carried forward over years in which no inspection is carried out. However, the assessment may be revised between routine inspections on receipt of new information or reported data. Where the previous calendar year assessment was poor/very poor, SEPA may also carry out additional inspections or sampling, to follow up previously identified breaches or non-compliances and subsequently reassess compliance. Similarly, where the scope and complexity of activities at larger sites means that in any one compliance year not all aspects of a licence have been assessed in detail, and provided that any Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) or Environmental Management Conditions (EMCs) attribute was compliant in the previous year, then that assessment can be carried forward. For example in the first year, maintenance activities at a site were assessed to be compliant. In the second year, due to inspections focusing on other attributes, maintenance activities were not assessed in detail and no new information came to light regarding maintenance (ie no incidents attributed to poor maintenance) Licence holder responsibility Assessment of breaches will not take licence holder responsibility into account. Breaches will be recorded even if the licence holder was not responsible for the breach, eg where a sewage treatment works receives unauthorised effluent. However, if a force majeure condition is included in the licence and applies in a particular situation, then the breach will not be included in the overall ELC or EMC assessment Avoiding double counting The structure of the compliance scheme aims to avoid double counting of the same non-compliance issue. However, a breach may be recorded under a specific ELC, while the cause of the breach may be due to a specific management problem (which will also be recorded as a non-compliance with an EMC). For example, an emission limit value may have been exceeded (recorded as a breach of an ELC) because a spare part was not available (recorded as a non-compliance of an EMC). Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 6

9 6. Quality assurance 6.1. Inspection reports Any breaches or non-compliances identified during an inspection will be clearly stated in the inspection report and communicated in an appropriate and timely manner to the licence holder Sign off The appropriate SEPA manager will sign off draft annual assessment results prior to issuing them to the licence holder for checking Internal audits SEPA will carry out a programme of internal audits of assessments to monitor and improve consistency across sectors and areas. The results of these audits will inform SEPA s ongoing staff training programme Licence holder checks Draft annual assessments will be forwarded to licence holders as they are completed. Licence holders will be requested to contact SEPA regarding any factual errors in the assessment within a defined period The timetable for finalising the assessments will depend on applicability of charges: i. For licences subject to a compliance charge factor (to be consulted upon separately), draft annual assessments will be notified to licence holders by no later than the end of February following the end of the assessment year. Licence holders will have until late March to contact SEPA with any factual errors in assessments. ii. For licences not subject to compliance charge factor, draft annual assessments will be notified to licence holders by the end of April following the end of the assessment year. Licence holders will have up to one month to contact SEPA with any factual errors in assessments Disputed assessments Licence holders should discuss any concerns relating to the assessment with the relevant local SEPA officer in the first instance. If agreement is not reached, then it will be escalated through SEPA s normal line management channels. In the event that issues are unresolved to the satisfaction of the licence holder with SEPA s line management, then the dispute may be raised under the SEPA Customer Service Complaints Procedure 6. However, the assessment result will stand, pending the outcome of such a complaint. 7. How to assess compliance The scheme consists of seven steps to assess compliance against licence conditions. The seven steps are shown in Table 4 and then in more detail in section 8: Detailed assessment guidance. 7.1 Available data All data available to SEPA will be used to inform the assessment results, including SEPA sampling/monitoring data, licence holder sampling/monitoring data, information returns to SEPA by the licence holder, findings of SEPA inspections (including data obtained from licence holder records) and environmental incidents or events. 7.2 Assessment sheet Information relating to the assessment will be recorded within the licence compliance assessment sheet and assessed against the overall compliance matrix (Figure 1). 7.3 A generic assessment sheet is provided in Annex 1. This has been developed into a number of templates for different groups of activities, depending on activity, relevance and complexity. These templates can be found in Annexes The templates contain additional guidance relevant to these activities, however reference will always be made to the specific conditions in the licence being assessed. 6 Further information can be obtained from the SEPA website at Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 7

10 Table 4 How to assess compliance seven steps Step Description Page Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) Step 1 Identify ELCs Identify or confirm the list of ELCs contained within the licence. These will be individually listed in the assessment sheet. 9 Step 2 Step 3 Step 4 Assess ELCs Assess compliance with each ELC and assign one of the following to each ELC: No breaches; Minor breach; Repeated minor breaches; Significant breach. Record environmental events Record any environmental events attributed to the licensed activity but not already recorded under a specific ELC as minor, repeated minor or significant (including major) events. Overall ELC compliance band Derive and record an overall ELC compliance band, which will be the lowest assessment recorded for any individual ELC, as follows: No breaches; Minor breach(es); Significant breach(es) or Repeated minor breaches Environmental Management Conditions (EMCs) Step 5 Assess EMC attributes A list of regime-specific attributes will be used to assess the remaining conditions in the licence, referred to as EMCs. Each attribute will be assessed as being one of the following: 14 Step 6 Compliant; Minor non-compliance; Major non-compliance. Overall EMC compliance band The overall EMC assessment band is derived by counting the number of minor and major noncompliances against EMC attributes. The overall EMC compliance band will be one of the following: High performance; Medium performance; Low performance. 15 Overall compliance band Step 7 Overall compliance band A matrix (Figure 1) is then used to consider both the overall Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) compliance band and the overall EMCs compliance band to give an overall compliance band, which will be one of the following: Excellent; Good; Adequate; Poor; Very poor. 15 Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 8

11 8. Detailed assessment guidance Step1 Identify Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) 8.1 Listing ELCs Each licence may have one or more ELCs, which will be identified either through the standard licence template or for each unique licence. Example ELCs have been identified in regime guidance (see annexes) and these will be used as far as possible, supplemented where necessary by licence-specific ELCs. 8.2 Types of ELCs The scheme distinguishes between the following types of ELCs: i) Scope Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) related to the location or dimensions of structures specified under the licence (eg location of discharge or abstraction points, dimensions of weir, height of stack, type of fish pass/weir, number of paint spray booths), or in terms of production/processing conditions which may be expressed numerically (eg waste volumes, storage limits). This may also include types or timing (eg waste types, prohibited wastes, nature of discharge, seasonal period of abstraction). ii) Absolute ELCs related to presence or absence in the environment (eg conditions relating to offensive odour, litter outwith the boundary, dark smoke, burning of waste, noise/vibration). iii)numerical ELCs, with a single licensed threshold value, eg air or water emission limit values (ELV), discharge of radioactive gas/liquid waste, abstraction rate, compensation flow etc). iv) Numerical ELCs, licensed according to a specified statistical distribution, eg two-tier point source discharge licence conditions or compliance levels for a lower/upper air ELV specified under the Waste Incineration Directive. 8.3 Minimisation Licence conditions which require licence holders to minimise an impact (eg mud, dust, vermin) have not been included in ELCs but will be considered under the relevant Environmental Management Conditions (EMCs) attribute. 8.4 Multiple parameter conditions In some licences, a single condition can refer to multiple parameters. In such cases each parameter monitored separately will be assessed separately for compliance (ie will have its own line in the assessment sheet). 8.5 Multiple sources ELCs will be separately identified for each individual parameter for each emission/discharge point. Step 2 Assess Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) 8.6 ELCs will be assessed using all available data, including SEPA monitoring data, licence holder monitoring data, environmental events and SEPA inspections. The ELC assessment rules are described below and summarised in Table 5 which can be found on page 11. Guidance relating to specific ELCs can be found in Annexes 2 to 10. In particular, it should be noted that there is additional specific guidance for some ELCs included in fish farm licences (Annex 7) and RSA registrations (Annex 9) which may differ from the generic rules described here. i) No breaches the ELCs specified in the licence are complied with. ii) Significant breach for numerical limits, a significant breach is an exceedance of the licensed limit by X%, where X is either specified as an upper threshold in the licence or, where not specified in the licence, is determined according to the relevant environmental media: a) For air and effluent, a generic approach of two times the licensed limit has been chosen as being one which can be applied across all media for emissions. The limits set within licences are based on what are safe limits for the environment or human health or, in accordance with the principles of Best Available Techniques (BAT)/Best Practicable Means (BPM) or, according to European Directive requirements, to ensure that all appropriate preventative measures are taken against pollution. For many parameters it is difficult to identify at what level a demonstrable impact on the environment or human health will occur, as many pollutants have cumulative effects. An exceedance of twice the licensed limit is likely to be the result of a systems failure which is considered to be a significant issue and therefore a significant breach. b) For water resources, a significant breach is equal to or greater than 20% of the abstraction or compensation flow rate. The difference in significance threshold is due to the specific nature of the water resources environment which fluctuates in terms of volume, flow and levels. Many water resource licence conditions are set in terms of low water levels or flows therefore there may be little ecological resilience to further reductions. Although licensed water levels may be based on ecological considerations, it should be noted that the 20% significant breach limit is based on what is reasonable to measure with simple technology (eg weirs, where textbook accuracy at the 95% level may vary from 1% to 10% depending upon the type of weir) and is not therefore directly related to any potential or actual ecological impact. Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 9

12 iii)minor breach a breach of an ELC which does not constitute a significant breach as defined above. It should be noted that: a) For scope conditions, a minor breach may not be applicable. For example, an exceedance in the quantities of waste accepted at a landfill facility above the licensed quantity, will be considered significant, not minor. b) For point source licences with two tier thresholds, there cannot be any individual minor breaches. Exceeding the number of lower tier failures (as indicated the look-up table in Table 6) will constitute a repeated minor breach, as described below. c) For numerical limits with single threshold values measured continuously, it is proposed that any breach during a 24 hour period will be counted as one minor breach. iv) Repeated minor breaches This identifies sites which have repeated minor breaches of the same ELC for each individual parameter at the same emission/discharge point. This may apply to both numerical and absolute limits where minor breaches are observed. It should be noted that: a) A repeated minor breach may arise due to exceeding a statistical compliance requirement specified in the licence (for example, two tier point source licences). b) A repeated minor breach may arise where an absolute limit is breached 4 or more times during the assessment period. c) Where the licence specifies a single numerical limit with no statistical basis for excluding excursions, a simple look-up table (Table 6) will be used to ensure proportionality. Table 6 can be found on page 12. d) Where a licensed site is inspected (or sampled) only once per year and a minor breach of an Environmental Limit Condition (ELC) is identified, follow-up inspections or samples may be considered to establish whether the issue is ongoing and could lead to repeated minor breaches being identified. Where the ELC refers to an annual limit (eg annual volumes) then no repeated minor breaches will be identified but the breach would still be assessed to be a minor breach on the assessment sheet. e) There will be a presumption that a minor breach occuring over a period greater than 24 hours will be counted as an additional minor breach rather than just one breach. However, this may be extended at SEPA s discretion to take into account reasonable courses of action and timescales. Some examples which could justify extending the duration of the minor breach are: Requirements have been agreed to complete a rendering process batch in order to minimise further environmental odour impact. Arrangements have been agreed for radioactive sources to be disposed of/transferred legally to another user if they exceed the licensed limit, which may take weeks to accomplish. 8.7 Accuracy Recorded values will be taken at face value, unless the licence specifies or references an agreed measurement accuracy which will be taken into account. In these cases, a breach will only occur once correction has been made for measurement accuracy and any calibration, span or zero checks have been undertaken. 8.8 Operator data returns Most SEPA licences generally require licence holder data returns to be submitted by one calendar month after the end of the period. In this case, for annual assessments, this deadline is normally 31 January. Any data required on an annual basis and received after the annual deadline specified in the licence will not be taken into account in compliance assessment. Where data reports, which are required to assess a particular Environmental Limit Condition (ELC), have not been submitted, then a significant breach will be noted against the relevant ELC, unless SEPA has agreed in writing and in advance to an alternative monitoring period or timetable. Late returns (eg late quarterly returns) received before 31 January or those of poor quality will be assessed at face value in respect of ELC compliance but will also be assessed under the reporting attribute under Environmental Management Conditions (EMCs). 8.9 Fish farm bi-annual monitoring Marine cage fish farms generally operate on a two year production cycle and therefore are usually only required to carry out monitoring in the second year of production. Where such monitoring is not required to be carried out during the assessment year, the result of the most recent monitoring will be considered for the purposes of assessment. However given the cyclical nature of the fish production and associated impact on the seabed, SEPA will assume (unless there is other information to the contrary) that there will have been some recovery of the seabed. Therefore, for a survey carried out in the year previous to the assessment year and providing there is no other information to the contrary, an unsatisfactory monitoring resulting from the survey will be considered to have recovered adequately to be considered a borderline result in the assessment year, which will be classified as a minor breach. Likewise, if the survey the previous year was borderline, this will be considered to have recovered sufficiently by the assessment year to be not considered a breach. Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 10

13 8.10 Assessment sheet information To maintain up-to-date compliance records, SEPA will aim to record ELC breaches in the assessment sheet as soon as possible after their confirmation by inspection or sample data. The source of information relating to breaches will be specified in the assessment sheet and comments added to refer to the date(s) of breaches. Repeated minor breaches will be assessed at the end of the calendar year, taking into account all available information Where a condition does not require an ELC to be assessed during the calendar year, not assessed will be entered in the comments cell for the condition. In this case, the ELC would be considered to be compliant unless SEPA monitoring during the period demonstrates otherwise. Table 5 Environmental Limit Conditions (ELCs) breaches Type of ELC condition and monitoring method Scope ELCs Relating to scope specified in the licence (eg minimum height of chimney, waste volumes, waste types) Minor breach Repeated minor breach Significant breach N/A N/A Fails to comply with scope condition Absolute ELCs Absolute ELCs - relating to presence or absence in the environment (eg litter, offensive odour, noise) Any breach of licence condition Four or more minor breaches N/A Numerical ELCs with a single licensed threshold value a) Numerical limits for air or effluent b) Numerical limits for water resources Any breach of licensed limit Number of planned and unplanned measurements breaching the licensed limit is greater than the maximum number specified in the look-up table (see Table 6 which follows) a) More than twice the limit specified in licence b) More than 20% the limit specified in licence c) Numerical limits on fish stock (based on monthly returns) Any breach of licensed limit Four or more minor breaches c) More than 10% the limit specified in licence d) Numerical limits on number of radioactive sources refer to Annex 9 Numerical ELCs, licensed according to a specified statistical distribution Air ELVs with licensed upper/lower limits, eg licences under the Waste Incineration Directive N/A Number of allowable exceedances of the lower limit is greater than that specified in the licence Aqueous effluent with two tier consent N/A Environmental events (classed according to Table 7 on page 13) Any environmental event attributed to the licence holder and not already counted under a specific ELC Minor (category 3) environmental event Number of planned samples breaching the lower tier limit is greater than the maximum number of exceedances allowed in the look-up table (as specified in the licence and summarised in Table 6) Four or more minor environmental events Any breach of upper limit (typically with 100% compliance level) Any breach of upper tier limit specified in licence Significant (category 2) or major (category 1) environmental event Note: Where particular data assessment requirements are specified, the licence condition will always take precedence over any compliance rules described in this manual. Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 11

14 Table 6 Look-up table for repeated minor breaches Number of measurements* in a 12 month period Number of minor breaches not constituting a repeated minor breach** The look-up table continues up to 365 measurements, where more than 25 minor breaches will constitute a repeated minor breach. *A measurement refers to a numerical value obtained by sampling or monitoring undertaken by SEPA and/or the licence holder or third party. **Repeated minor breaches are counted on each individual parameter at the same emission/discharge point. Step 3 Record environmental events 8.12 SEPA s classification for environmental events for air, water and land is provided in Table 7 which can be found on page 13. Events classed as major, significant or minor (categories 1, 2 and 3 respectively) and attributed to the licence holder will be included in the compliance assessment sheet. SEPA is intending to extend this classification scheme for events involving radioactive substances Where possible, the event will be related to a specific ELC. However, where the event cannot be related to a specific ELC (for example a release to controlled waters causes a fish kill attributable to the activity but no sample results are available to compare with the ELC), then an additional line will be added to the bottom of the ELC section to record a minor or significant (including major) event in the assessment sheet Assessment of events Where possible, any actual environmental events attributed to the licensed activity will be recorded against the relevant Environmental Limit Condition (ELC). However, where the event cannot be related to a specific ELC, it will be recorded in an additional line in the ELC section of the assessment sheet. This may be labelled as environmental harm if this condition exists in the licence or environmental event where it does not. A major or significant environmental event (category 1 or 2 in SEPA s event classification system respectively) will be assigned as a significant breach under ELC; A minor environmental event (category 3 in SEPA s event classification system) will be assigned as a minor breach under ELC; Repeated minor events will be considered to be repeated minor breaches where any minor event has occurred four or more times (refer to Table 5 on page 11) Where an environmental event arises from multiple sources on the same licence (eg odour), the event will be aggregated since the odour condition relates to the whole site, regardless of the source Note that where an event does not relate to the licensed activity (eg an oil spill at a Radioactive Substances Act (RSA) authorised site), then it will be taken up as enforcement action outwith the licence, where appropriate. It will not therefore be included in the compliance assessment for that site unless the incident shows up some failing in the operational procedures which are regulated by the licence Assessment sheet information To maintain up to date compliance records, it is recommended that events are recorded in the assessment sheet as soon as possible after their confirmation. Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 12

15 Table 7 SEPA s environmental event classification Category 1 - Major Media Water Air, land Length of watercourse/area impacted Environmental damage to the ecosystem over a length greater than 1 km or an area greater than 1 km 2 Environmental impact Fish kill in excess of 100 and/or Contamination is more than 10 times the Environmental Quality Standard (EQS) Amenity impact Extensive visible pollution or littering of watercourse and/or Any loss or closure of a designated bathing/shellfish water or drinking water source Economic impact Extensive damage to and/or closure of agricultural or other commercial activities Category 2 - Significant Media Water Air, land Length of watercourse/area impacted Environmental damage to the ecosystem over a length less than 1 km or an area less than 1 km 2 Environmental impact Fish kill between and/or Contamination is more than two times the EQS Amenity impact Significant visible pollution or littering of watercourse and/or Significant reduction in amenity value (ie urgent notification of downstream abstractors) Widespread and long-term harm to the environment Substantial harm to human health Substantial impairment of amenity for a prolonged period Extensive damage to and/or closure of commercial activities Long-term but localised harm to the environment or widespread but short-term harm to the environment Minor or no harm to human health Substantial impairment of amenity for a short period or lesser impairment of amenity for a prolonged period Economic impact Significant damage to agricultural or other commercial activities Significant damage to commercial activities Category 3 - Minor Media Water Air, land Length of watercourse/area impacted Localised and limited environmental damage to the ecosystem Environmental impact Fish kill less than 10 and/or Contamination exceeds the Environmental Quality Standard Amenity impact Minor visible pollution or littering of watercourse and/or Reduction in amenity value (ie routine (non-urgent) notification of downstream abstractors) Short-term and localised harm to the environment No harm to human health Minor impairment of amenity for a short period or not at all Economic impact Agricultural or other commercial activities affected Minor or no damage to commercial activities Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 13

16 Step 4 Overall ELCs compliance band 8.18 Overall ELC assessment The overall ELC assessment is the lowest assessment recorded for any individual ELC, as follows: No breaches; Minor breach(es); Repeated minor OR significant breach(es) Assessment sheet information At the end of the calendar year, the overall ELCs compliance band will be recorded in the assessment sheet. Step 5 Assess Environmental Management Conditions (EMCs) attributes Relevant EMCs attributes 8.20 A standard list of attributes will be used to assess the remaining conditions in the licence, referred to as Environmental Management Conditions (EMCs). These attributes relate to three important aspects of environmental management: management, plant/infrastructure and reporting; and are presented this way in the assessment sheet (see the generic assessment sheet in Annex 1) Attributes will be selected for inclusion in the EMCs assessment if they are specifically referred to in the licence or are required under Best Available Techniques (BAT) or Best Practicable Means (BPM). For Pollution Prevention and Control (PPC), consideration will be given to requirements from BAT under all relevant attributes Regime-specific guidance has been developed (Annexes 2-10) which indicates which EMCs attributes are considered relevant for particular activities or complexity of licences For simple licences and in certain regulatory regimes, some EMCs attributes will not be applicable since there are no licence conditions relating to the attribute. In this case, not applicable will be recorded in the comments cell for that attribute. For example, if there is no licence condition requiring reports to be sent to SEPA, then this attribute would be considered not applicable Where it has not been possible or appropriate to assess a particular EMC attribute during the calendar year, not assessed will be entered in the comments cell for the attribute Where any aspect has been inspected in the previous calendar year, a compliance assessment for this attribute can be rolled forward for a maximum of two years. A minor or major non-compliance of an attribute in a previous year will be reassessed and not rolled forward The list of EMCs will be determined according to the assessment sheet developed for each regulatory regime (Annexes 2-10). No additional EMC attributes will be added to the assessment sheet. Assessing EMC attributes 8.27 Specific regime guidance is provided in this manual (see annexes) for assessing non-compliances against different attributes During inspections, non-compliances against specific licence conditions will be listed in the inspection report and assessed as major or minor. Any disagreements should be dealt with through the relevant SEPA officer and escalated through SEPA line management where appropriate Using inspection reports and the regime guidance in the annexes to this manual, each attribute will be assessed as being one of the following: Compliant; Minor non-compliance; Major non-compliance In complex licences, there are a large number of conditions which relate to one or more of the Environmental Management Conditions (EMC) attributes. The assessment for each attribute will therefore reflect overall compliance with all of these conditions established during inspections throughout the year SEPA will take account of proportionality in assessing EMC requirements. For example management systems are expected to be less developed for low risk activities than for high risk activities Plans required under licence Plans which are required and referred to under the licence, such as working plans required under Waste Management Licensing (WML), monitoring plans under water resources [the Water Environment (Controlled Activites) (Scotland) Regulations (CAR)] and improvement/upgrade plans under Pollution Prevention and Control (PPC)/Radioactive Substances Act (RSA) will be included in compliance assessments, in terms of their submission, adequacy and implementation as required by the licence. Compliance Assessment Scheme Public consultation 14