EIGAnews - 2020-03-24

Dear Members,

EIGA, with "safety" in its DNA, cannot but cancel the Summer Session, in line with European and Member State recommendations, and in line with our member companies' travel bans and COVID-19-guidelines. See below for more details.

In these exceptional times, EIGA proposes exceptional measures to ensure continuous operations and supply of life saving gases. Read more below.

See also the below sections for publications on information of your specific interest. For easy reference, the news items are numbered and grouped by Council.

(IGC= Industrial Gases Council, MGC=Medical Gases Council, REC= Regulatory Environment Council and SAC=Safety Advisory Council)

Best regards,

Philippe Cornille, Gen.Sec. EIGA

How our industry can continue to save lives

Members with sector-related requests around the COVID-19 pandemic can contact Philippe or Jan (*). Upon discussing the request/matter within the EIGA community, EIGA will take appropriate action (sharing information, setting up a temporary expert group, escalate to the EIGA Board, …) and feedback.

EIGA is driving following initiatives to provide help in this COVID-19 pandemic situation:

Issue a MGC Briefing Note with proposals for temporary derogation measures to support the continuation of supply of all medical gases to healthcare facilities and homecare services. See here (restricted to EIGA Members only, please login first).
EIGA is also working with national transport ministries on temporary derogations to dangerous goods transport regulations. Derogations were proposed to relax the test interval for gas cylinders. Discussions with the authorities are still ongoing.
EIGA starts working on a Briefing Note on how to clean or decontaminate medical cylinders, to assure the safety of operating staff and drivers , but also users and in addition to obtain a sufficient number of empty cylinders to assure the supply to healthcare facilities and homecare services. See also related Doc 222.

EIGA Summer Session in Valencia CANCELLED !

Valencia

Thanks to all of you that registered ! We will automatically refund you in full.

Most of you booked the hotel simultaneously with the Summer Session registration. EIGA will cancel these hotel reservations for you. No action is required from your side.

Please don't forget to cancel flights or other travel arrangement (or hotel if you booked your hotel separately).

A separate mail was addressed to all registrants.

General Assembly

By law, a General Assembly needs to be held. A conference call will therefore be set up at the same time as scheduled in Valencia (May 29th, 10h00-12h00).

EIGA will invite its membership to a virtual General Assembly by separate mail.

Valencia in 2021

It would be a pity not to enjoy the beauty of Valencia. Hence, the 2021 Summer Session will be hosted in Valencia (from 2 to 5 June 2021). More to follow early next year.

COVID-19 and EIGA-meetings

All face-to-face meetings at EIGA had already been changed into conference calls early on, to prevent exposure to member company experts or EIGA staff. This will be maintained until further notice.

While it should not be noticeable externally, EIGA staff has switched to maximum homeworking.

We wish you and your families to be safe and in good health in these difficult times.

IGC

Doc 164/20 - Safe Handling of Liquid Carbon Dioxide Containers that have Lost Pressure (Globally Harmonised Document)

The purpose of this publication is to provide information to personnel to ensure that carbon dioxide containers that have lost pressure and may contain dry ice are safely repressurised before being returned to service.

This publication can be viewed or downloaded on the EIGA Website by clicking here

TP 58/20 - Safe Design and Handling of Filling Connectors

Connectors are used in cylinder filling stations for connecting the filling hose to the cylinder valve outlet. Connectors are complex components that require monitoring, care and maintenance. This Training Package also explains the difference between a filling connector and a filling adaptor because both require close management.

This publication can be viewed or downloaded on the EIGA Website (restricted to EIGA Members only, please login first) by clicking here.

Doc 102.06/20 - Safety Audit / Assessment Tool – Acetylene Plant and Cylinder Filling

The former Appendix 5 of Doc 102 – Safety Audit/Assessment Tool for Acetylene Plant and Cylinder Filling - has been reviewed and published as Doc 102.06.

All annexes of Doc 102 are listed in Doc 102.01.

This publication can be viewed or downloaded on the EIGA Website by clicking here

MGC

BN 25/20- COVID-19 - Emergency measures to maintain continuous supply of medical gases

EIGA member companies that are producing medical gases are deploying significant technical, human and financial resources in order to support the healthcare system to deal, in the most efficient way, the current emergency situation due to the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. This can only be achieved with the cooperation of competent health authorities.

EIGA members propose temporary measures in this Briefing Note, in order to assure continuity of supply of medicinal gases and services, particularly medicinal oxygen to the healthcare system.

This publication can be viewed or downloaded on the EIGA Website (restricted to EIGA Members only, please login first) by clicking here.

Doc 228/20 - Use of Quality Risk Management for Preparation of Validation Protocols for Medicinal Gas Cylinder Filling

This publication is intended to provide guidance on preparing the protocols for performing validation of systems used for filling medicinal gas cylinders, in compliance with Good Manufacturing Practices.

It provides an overall risk assessment to identify and evaluate potential critical steps in the manufacturing processes for filling medicinal gas cylinders.

This publication provides guidance to EIGA members on how to perform the risk assessment of their medicinal gases manufacturing operations at container filling facilities.

This publication can be viewed or downloaded on the EIGA Website by clicking here

REC

ETS State Aid Guidelines

Early March, EIGA provided feedback on the improvement of the State Aid Guidelines (on financial compensation for the cost of indirect emissions under the new EU ETS Directive 2018/410 for Phase IV).

In particular, EIGA welcomed the Commission report, which confirms many of the findings we presented to the Commission last year. Today, EIGA primarily insist for a better Level Playing Field between insourced and outsourced gas production ; see here.

NACE classification of hydrogen

With the ongoing review of the NACE classification of economic activities, EIGA jointly with other sectors have asked to not decide without the sectors concerned being involved. See here for the jont letter.

EU announces, ‘clean hydrogen alliance’ for launch in the summer

On the 10th of March, the formation of an EU-wide hydrogen alliance was announced along the presentation of the EU Industrial Strategy. The Alliance aims to identify technology needs, investment opportunities and regulatory issues.

Link to Euractiv article

EU ETS price slump yet to boost coal plant margins

Coronavirus pandemic has pushed down EU ETS prices close to its deepest month-to-month decline since 2008, due to the decrease of demand of power. This implies a competitiveness boost of coal-fired production of energy across Europe and other CO2 intensive industries.

Link to Argusmedia article

Technical Expert Group (TEG) publishes final “taxonomy” report

The European Commission’s TEG has published its final report, outlining the technical screening criteria – including metrics and thresholds – that will define whether an economic activity can be considered sustainable. In the context of the report’s publication, the TEG emphasises the importance of scaling up green hydrogen, and stressed the importance of carbon capture and sequestration. The European Commission will now need to translate the recommendations of the TEG into technical legislation that sets out the thresholds in EU law.

Link to the full report

SAC

A new Focus Area on Human Factors

Analysis of Lost Time Injuries and Recordable Injuries reported to EIGA shows that 70% are attributed to human factors, of which were classified as 60% human failures, 3% management failures and 7% failures of management systems and procedures. EIGA has been analysing these human errors in more detail by asking members to subdivide human errors as different types of human failure, to better identify and manage these contributing factors.

EIGA has produced a number of Human Factors Information sheets, and a new Focus Area on Human Factors has been added to our website (click here).

Doc 102.01/20 - Listing of Safety Audit Assessment Tools

List of annexes of Doc 102/19.

This publication can be viewed or downloaded on the EIGA Website by clicking here

Doc 102.06/20 - Safety Audit / Assessment Tool – Acetylene Plant and Cylinder Filling

The former Appendix 5 of Doc 102 – Safety Audit/Assessment Tool for Acetylene Plant and Cylinder Filling - has been reviewed and published as Doc 102.06.

All annexes of Doc 102 are listed in Doc 102.01.

This publication can be viewed or downloaded on the EIGA Website by clicking here

Info 38/20/REV (revision of Info 38/20) - Abuse of Nitrous Oxide for Recreational Inhalation

This publication has been revised with more representative information.

Nitrous oxide use as an intoxicating substance and recreational drug, is on the rise particularly at festivals, events and night clubs. The growing popularity may lie in the fact that nitrous oxide is relatively cheap and easy to obtain. Nitrous oxide may appear harmless but can entail serious health risks. This safety information outlines some of those significant risks.

EIGA strongly disapproves of the personal use of gases without medical surveillance and, in particular, disapproves the inhalation of any gases, except those when prescribed and used as medicines, or when specifically produced, sold and used for breathing applications such as diving.

This publication can be viewed or downloaded on the EIGA Website by clicking here

Info TS 12/20 - In Vehicle Distraction Management

Driving a vehicle safely in a fast moving and dynamic environment takes a large amount of concentration by the driver. Anything that distracts the driver to lose their concentration on the road ahead, even for just a few seconds, can have disastrous consequences that puts their life and those of the public at risk. Drivers need to be aware that relatively common actions can cause a distraction and lead to an incident while management need policies, procedures and training in place to recognise these risks and mitigate them.

This Safety Information provides an overview of the types of potential in vehicle distractions and steps that can be taken to reduce them to improve the transport safety performance of gas company and their contractors’ delivery vehicles, for the transportation of industrial and medical gases.

This publication can be viewed or downloaded on the EIGA Website by clicking here