Member Article

Safety is golden at px Group

A company which operates some of the UK’s most potentially hazardous energy processing and storage facilities has won a string of top safety awards.

The px group, which runs power stations, gas processing plants and fuel storage depots from Aberdeen to Port Talbot has secured seven Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) accolades.

These include a gold medal – recognising five consecutive annual gold awards – for the gas fired, 188 MW Fellside Combined Heat and Power Station - which provides steam and power to the Sellafield site in Cumbria and electricity to the National Grid.

There are a further four gold awards for: The Port Talbot Biomass Power Plant, which burns woodchip to generate sufficient electricity for up to 10,000 homes; the gas fired Stallingborough Combined Heat and Power Plant, near Immingham, which generates 6MW of electricity and provides steam to the adjacent titanium pigment plant; the Bramhall Fuel Terminal, near Stockport, which has an annual throughput of up to 900 million litres of petrol, diesel, oil, gas and kerosene and the company’s office headquarters at Stockton on Tees.

A first time entry by the Inver Energy Fuel Terminal at Cardiff Dock secured a silver award – bypassing the merit and bronze categories. It stores and supplies 300 million litres of petrol, diesel, heavy fuel, kerosene and various additives. If this standard is maintained over successive years, it too can become eligible for a Gold Award.

Finally, the Teesside Gas Processing Plant, which outputs around 6% of the UK’s gas, was the winner of the oil and gas sector award.

Mark Kenrick, Director of Safety, Health, Environment and Risk Management with px group, said: “Our goal is to operate our assets without harming people, environment or indeed the equipment and we put a huge amount of effort into achieving this. It is nice to see that this drive has delivered thousands of hours of incident free work which, in turn, has been recognised by RoSPA.

“Credit for these awards goes to all our employees who, every day, apply the working practices which have kept them and the areas in which they work, safe.”

During RoSPA’s 60th anniversary year, the awards will be presented at a ceremony at the ExCeL, London, on June 21.

Julia Small, Head of Awards and Events, said: “To win an award at such a highly-regarded event is a great achievement for our winners. It recognises their commitment to maintaining an excellent health and safety record and raises the bar for other organisations to aspire to. We offer them our congratulations.”

In addition to the award winning sites, px recently took over the operation of the St. Fergus Gas Processing Terminal, north of Aberdeen, which outputs up to 20% of UK gas. It will also soon commence operations at the world’s largest fat-fuelled power station, in Beckton, East London, generating sufficient electricity for up to 40,000 homes.

As well as operations and maintenance services, the company offers a fully integrated energy infrastructure solutions and trading business and provides energy management and engineering consultancy services. It employs 400 people.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Paul Dobbie .