Safety first: Working together to better rotomoulding practice
Dr Sara Cammarano, Group Executive of the Rotational Moulding Group at the British Plastics Federation (BPF), updates readers on progress relating to health and safety guidelines that will soon be available to the whole industry, as well as why ‘innovation’ is the industry buzzword for 2017.
Following on from the ‘Safety Notice’ relevant to owners, designers and manufacturers of rotational moulding machines issued by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) on 24th July 2014, the BPF Rotational Moulding Group decided to collaborate with the HSE to re-write its draft code of practice in order to bring it up to date.
During 2016, the group continued focusing on health and safety and produced its ‘Health and Safety Guidance’ in collaboration with the HSE. The document tackles health and safety issues in the rotational moulding industry with the aim to provide a list of what-to-assess and what-to-look-for when a rotational moulder is carrying out a risk assessment. This guidance is aimed at employers, supervisors and managers responsible for the safe operation of rotational moulding machines. The guidance gives advice on the safeguarding requirements for foreseeable hazards associated with rotational moulding machines, including whole body entrapment following a fatality in a plastics rotational moulding oven.
The document, in its draft form, is already available to BPF members for comments and it will be available to the wider industry free of charge once it gets the approval of the HSE. The BPF believes good Health and Safety practice should be available to everybody not just to its members; we believe that working together is the way forward to fortify our industry.
As part of the BPF Rotational Moulding Group’s efforts to strengthen the sector, the group is pleased to announce that it will be running its annual seminar on 9th May 2017 in Worcester. The theme of the seminar will be ‘innovation’, in every form, whether it is design, tooling, machines, material or additives. As well as the presentations, there will be table top opportunities for suppliers to exhibit their latest achievements and to engage in productive discussions with the attendees.
The full programme for the event will be available by the beginning of March.
Following the success of the previous BPF rotational moulding events, we expect this seminar to be very popular and to attract an audience of over 100 attendees.
The group strongly believes that knowledge sharing will strengthen the whole industry, thus, it has a dedicated case studies section on its very own webpage within the BPF website, showing examples of rotational moulding technology and innovation. Also, as part of The Affiliation of Rotational Moulding Organisations (ARMO), the group is developing a marketing campaign to engage with designers by illustrating the achievements of the sector.