Environmental guidance for your business in Northern Ireland & Scotland
Your business will use various techniques and equipment to cut and shape fabricated metal products, such as slitting, cutting, forming, bending, machining, pressing, punching, drawing, milling and welding.
If you have a permit, licence or registered exemption you must comply with its conditions. Your permit may contain conditions that control your noise, vibration, or dust emissions. You can be fined or even sent to prison if you do not comply with conditions.
Your metal fabrication operations could cause odour and noise problems. You may produce odour from welding gases and cutting oils. You may produce noise by:
If your process creates levels of noise, dust, grit, fumes or smoke that could cause a nuisance or harm the health of the surrounding community, your local council can issue an abatement notice that:
Anyone who is affected by the nuisance, such as your neighbours, can apply to the court in Northern Ireland or sheriff in Scotland to issue you with an abatement notice.
You can be fined if you do not comply with an abatement notice, and the local council can take steps to stop the nuisance itself and charge you for its costs.
Noise, odour and other nuisances
When you make up metal-cutting fluids, top up cooling fluids or use direct water cooling, do not discharge to public sewers, surface waters or ground waters without consulting your regulator. You may need a discharge consent or other authorisation. For further information, see our guidance on discharges to water and sewer.
You must store any pesticides, such as fungicides and anti-bacterial agents, in a locked, bunded area that can contain 110% of the volume of pesticide you store.
If you store pesticides in a sensitive area, such as a groundwater protection zone or upstream of a water supply catchment, your bund must be able to contain 185% of the volume of pesticide you store. For further information, see our guidance on pesticides and biocides.
If you store oil you may need to comply with the Oil Storage Regulations. For further information, see our guidance on oil storage.
You must comply with your duty of care responsibilities when you manage your waste. Your metal fabricating operations will produce waste materials, including:
You may need to deal with some of your waste as hazardous/special waste, including:
For further information, see our guidance on hazardous/special waste.
Groundwater in Northern Ireland, DAERA have produced a leaflet to raise awareness about this untapped resource
EU Exit, EU Exit useful information
View our latest videos & subscribe to our channel.
Free monthly email newsletter with environmental updates for Northern Ireland and Scotland