Transportation of dangerous/hazardous goods

• Main Author: Tan, Soon Heng.
• Other Authors: Gopinath Menon
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2010
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/39585
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Dangerous Goods (DGs) refer to substances which are potentially dangerous during transportation. The intermodal transportation of such goods poses a variety of safety and environmental risks. Road transportation increases such risks considerably due to the proximity of other vehicles, the general public and the built environment, especially in urban areas. However, standards and practices on roads vary. This report investigates current practices of DGs transportation by various modes (with emphasis on road) in Singapore. Interviews with national authorities (Singapore Civil Defence Force and National Environmental Agency) and attachments to commercial companies (DHL Global and Richland Logistics) provided insights into the transportation process of DGs. Singapore regulates DGs through a monitoring and control system which uses a two-pronged approach – Preventive and Counter measures. Preventive measures are Legislation, Packaging and Transportation Requirements. The Hazmat Team forms the Countermeasure in events of incidents. This system focuses more on preventive measures as DG accidents are irreversible and hard to recover from. The low accidents rate of less than ten annually, over the last three years, is proof that this system is effective in regulating DGs movements. The findings also suggested that human factor is the greatest pitfall to this system and actions taken by the industrial companies greatly affect the effectiveness of the system.