SEPA presentation summary
Background
Colleen Kennedy from the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) gave a presentation at the British Dam Society Supervising Engineers Forum in April 2017 about the implementation of the Reservoirs (Scotland) Act 2011 (the Act) in Scotland since taking over regulatory responsibility from Scottish local authorities in April 2016.
Implementing the Act
SEPA have registered all reservoirs that came under the Reservoirs Act 1975, produced over 800 Reservoir Inundation Maps, issued nearly 700 risk designations, formed the controlled reservoirs register online, set up enforcement procedures and written multiple guidance documents and diagrams to ensure the effective introduction of the Act to Scotland and to support reservoir managers and engineers to comply with it.
SEPA set up the Reservoir Regulatory Unit (RRU) to implement the Act and ensure compliance. The main tasks for the team is to ensure all high and medium risk reservoirs appoint supervising engineers and that supervising engineer written statements are produced and copied to SEPA within statutory timescales, that Section 47 inspections are carried out when, and where, necessary, and the subsequent reports are sent to SEPA on time, the measures in the interest of safety are addressed, and compliance certificates are produced and issued to SEPA within the correct timescales.
SEPA are being proactive by issuing reminders to reservoir managers regarding approaching due dates of inspections, inspection reports, ‘measures in the interest of safety’ and other engineer reports, written statements and certificates. By doing this, it is hoped to minimise the number of reservoir managers being non-compliant with the Act. The addition of more enforcement powers have been a welcome addition to the Act to aid the RRU in ensuring compliance by reservoir managers.
One of the major differences between the 1975 Act and the 2011 Act is to reduce the registration threshold to reservoirs of capacity 10 000 m3 rather than 25 000 m3. There are no firm dates as to when these will be registered at this time.
Key points to highlight
SEPA welcomed the opportunity to have an audience with the supervising engineers to thank them for their continued guidance to reservoir managers and to highlight how much they value their specialism with regards reservoir safety in Scotland. Colleen finished the presentation by highlighting three main points that would make the RRU and the engineer's jobs easier. These are:
To use the templates for inspection reports from the Reservoirs (Scotland) Regulations 2016 such as the Schedule 15 template for annual written statements
To remind the reservoir managers that when supervising engineers are appointed to a reservoir that the reservoir manager should notify SEPA by sending in a notice of appointment form
To update the Scottish Government panel list of any contact detail changes as SEPA won't make changes that differ from the list
Helpful links
SEPA have produced multiple guidance and information documents in order to help implement the Act which can be found on their website at www.sepa.org.ukk/reservoirs and the controlled reservoirs register can be found here http://map.sepa.org.uk/reservoirsfloodmap/Map.htm
