If your business relies on the safe storage of petroleum and other chemicals, industrial spill prevention plans are an essential part of keeping your company compliant with all state and federal regulations. Information about your storage facilities and the chemicals they hold is essential to these plans, but is only part of the information you need when deciding how to prevent and respond to industrial spills. Information about the geology of your storage sites is vital to an industrial spill prevention plan for several reasons.
The permeability of the soil at your site will largely dictate how you prevent and respond to industrial spills. Clay soils, loam soils, and sandy soils may be layered or distributed unevenly throughout your region. Different industrial chemicals will filter and spread differently depending on the soil type. Knowing what soil types are present at each of your sites is vital to developing an effective plan for designing sites, locating any waste reservoirs you need, and developing containment plans.
From seismic activity to underground erosion, a number of potential factors can cause the ground at your site to shift over time. Geotechnical analysis is necessary in determining how likely the ground is to become unstable at your sites, and how severe that shifting will be. Predicting ground movements is essential to planning your sites as well as developing your company’s industrial spill prevention and response plans.
Preventing the contamination of groundwater is a top priority of industrial chemical containment. Knowing the location of aquifers and other forms of groundwater will ensure that your industrial spill prevention plan accounts for this necessity. Because the boundaries of these reserves of water are difficult to locate, and because they have different properties depending on their location (among other factors), advanced geotechnical measurement is frequently required to evaluate the groundwater in your sites’ areas.
The structures and formations we find underground can be a magnificent source of wealth and resources. However, they can also cause unexpected events if they are not carefully studied. Industrial spill prevention plans must account for a number of geological factors at your site, and hydrogeological-geotechnical assessment is the best way to know how these factors affect your company.
ATC is here to help you evaluate your site’s geological-hydrogeological-geotechnical traits and to help you incorporate them into your industrial spill prevention plan.
Feel free to contact us for more information.