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EPR Compliance Assessment Report Report ID: BU5453IY/0451901 This form will report compliance with your permit as determined by an Environment Agency officer Site AG Fluoropolymers, Hillhouse EPR/BU5453IY Permit Ref BU5453IY Operator/ Permit holder AGC CHEMICALS EUROPE LIMITED Date 30/12/2022 Time in 12:00 Out 12:01 What parts of the permit were assessed Assessment Release of R22 and R125_ Reported 19 December 2022, updated on the 21 December 2022 Report/data review EPR Activity: Installation X Waste Op Water Discharge Recipient's name/position Officer's name Date issued 23/02/2023 Section 1 Compliance Assessment Summary This is based on the requirements of the permit under the Environmental Permitting Regulations (EPR). A detailed explanation and any action you may need to take are given in the "Detailed Assessment of Compliance" (section 3). This summary details where we believe any noncompliance with the permit has occurred, the relevant condition and how the noncompliance has been categorised using our Compliance Classification Scheme (CCS). CCS scores can be consolidated or suspended, where appropriate, to reflect the impact of some noncompliances more accurately. For more details of our CCS scheme, contact your local office. Permit Conditions and Compliance Summary Condition(s) breached a) Permitted activities b) Infrastructure c) General management d) Incident management 1. Specified by permit N 1. Engineering for prevention & control of pollution N 2. Closure & decommissioning N 3. Site drainage engineering (clean & foul) N 4. Containment of stored materials N 5. Plant and equipment N 1. Staff competency/ training N 2. Management system & operating procedures C3 1.1.1; 3. Materials acceptance N 4. Storage handling, labelling, segregation N 1. Site security N 2. Accident, emergency & incident planning N e) Emissions 1. Air 2. Land & Groundwater 3. Surface water 4. Sewer 5. Waste C3 3.1.2; N N N N f) Amenity 1. Odour N 2. Noise N 3. Dust/fibres/particulates & litter N 4. Pests, birds & scavengers N 5. Deposits on road N g) Monitoring and records, 1. Monitoring of emissions & environment N maintenance and reporting 2. Records of activity, site diary, journal & events N 3. Maintenance records N 4. Reporting & notification N h) Resource efficiency 1. Efficient use of raw materials N 2. Energy N KEY: C1, C2, C3, C4 = CCS breach category ( * suspended scores are marked with an asterisk), A = Assessed (no evidence of noncompliance), N = Not assessed, NA = Not Applicable, O = Ongoing noncompliance - not scored MSA, MSB, TCM = Management System condition A, Management System Condition B and Technically Competent Manager condition which are environmental permit conditions from Part 3 of schedule9 EPR (see notes in Section 5/6). Number of breaches recorded 2 Total compliance score (see section 5 for scoring scheme) If the Total No Breaches is greater than zero, then please see Section 3 for details of our proposed enforcement response CAR 2 V2.0 8 Page 1 of 5 Section 2 - Compliance Assessment Report Detail This section contains a report of our findings and will usually include information on: the part(s) of the permit that were assessed (e.g. maintenance, training, combustion plant, etc) where the type of assessment was `Data Review' details of the report/results triggering the assessment any noncompliances identified any noncompliances with directly applicable legislation details of any multiple noncompliances information on the compliance score accrued inc. details of suspended or consolidated scores. details of advice given any other areas of concern all actions requested any examples of good practice. a reference to photos taken This report should be clear, comprehensive, unambiguous and normally completed within 14 days of an assessment. The Incident The company notified us on the 19 December 2022, updated on the 21 December 2022 that there had been a breach of emission limits from low boiler A1. The company provided a very thorough investigation of the matter and followed this up in a meeting in February 2023. In summary, the weekly average results for R22 (chlorodifluoromethane) was 458g/hour and R125 ( pentafluoroethane) 280.3g/hour. On the 16 December 2022 the emissions from A1 were within the permitted limits. The schedule 3 limit is 100g/hour, for a period of stable operation, at a weekly frequency. Assessment of the Release to Air (3.1.2) R22 is an ozone depleting substance and a gas that contributes to climate change; R125 contributes to climate change. The emissions are above the limits allowed by the permit and are non-trivial. The harm caused by both gases is not harm to human health, therefore the total cumulative mass, rather than the weekly release is of more significance. However the company demonstrated in a meeting in February 2023 that the annual mass, if averaged out was well below the permitted limits. This does add some context to my decision as to the seriousness of this incident. Nevertheless, it is a breach of the permit limit and may have been avoided. Condition 3.1.2 states that the limits in schedule 3 shall not be exceeded. The company have exceeded the limits and therefore breached the permit. I consider this to be a minor non-compliance and therefore have scored a CCS3. Assessment of the Management Systems (1.1.1) Condition 1.1.1 states that the operators shall manage and operate the activities in accordance with a written management system that identifies and minimises risks of pollution [...] The incident occurred during a very cold snap in December 2022. While this was very cold it was not unprecedented and similar temperatures occurred in 2010/11. Also, climate change is predicted to give more extreme weather in the UK. In this instance, the company management systems were not sufficiently robust to identify and manage the associated risks of very cold weather and therefore the company has not complied with condition 1.1.1. For the record, I have also treat the incident of 19 December 2022 in this report as pertinent and deal with it here. I consider that the company did not comply with condition 1.1.1 and this is a minor breach of the permit. For this reason I have scored a minor non-compliance as CCS3. Action: I have asked the company to start to consider resilience for climate change. I have notified the company of our intention to carry out some sort of audit or compliance work around this in 2023. This report was writen in February 2023, although the incident occured in December 2022 CAR 2 V2.0 Page 2 of 5 Report Summary from AGC The environmental permit limit for both Chlorodifluoromethane (R22) and Pentafluoroethane (R125) for emission point A1 Low Boiler Stack is 100g/hr (weekly average). During the week commencing 12 December 2022 the weekly R22 and R125 average for the Low Boiler Stack was exceeded due to a higher than normal result on the 16 December. This resulted in the weekly average results being: 458.0 g/hour for R22 280.3 g/hour for R125 All other daily R22 and R125 results for the Low Boiler Stack, for the w/c 12 December were within environmental permit limits On the 15 December there had been issues with freezing. Steam is used to control the temperature of the distillation columns. Due to the extreme cold weather, it is believed condensate in the instrument impulse line to the steam supply instruments froze, this resulted in abnormal steam supply rates and insufficient heating was provided to the distillation column (2A still). The impulse lines associated with the steam flow control to 2A still are in an open area of the plant The insufficient heating of the distillation column led to excess impurities being fed forward (including R22 and R125) causing abnormal operating conditions and increasing levels of R22 and R125 being discharged to the low boiler stack. During the extreme cold weather, the AGCCE operations team worked to ensure temperature control within the distillation process was maintained. Once the problem with 2A still the steam flow was identified this impulse line was defrosted and 2A still temperature brought back up to normal levels. Following this, normal operating conditions were established preventing further abnormal emissions. Since the breach on 16 December the Low Boiler Stack has demonstrated results within environmental permit limits. Measures taken, or intended to be taken, to rectify, limit or prevent any pollution of the environment which has been or may be caused by the emission In addition to this the lagging around the impulse lines will be reviewed to ensure this is sufficient to prevent further issues associated with freezing condensate in impulse lines. The weekly average R22 and R125 for the Low Boiler Stack have been within permitted limits as follows: w/c 19 December 26.2 g/hour for R22 0 g/hour for R125 w/c 26 December 0 g/hour for R22 0 g/hour for R125 w/c 02 Janruary 6.5 g/hour for R22 0 g/hour for R125 w/c 09 Janruary 0 g/hour for R22 CAR 2 V2.0 Page 3 of 5