The essential Oil spill kit can do more than save you a fine!

For many people and companies one general purpose oil spill kit or oil spill station provides the perfect oil spill responce providing you know what to buy.

To know what absorbent to buy all you need to know is what you spill.

So let’s make a list so you can see how your business stacks up and what sort spill clean up products and oil spill kit you need to cover your spill containment needs properly:

1. Fuels and oils (including cooking oils, hydraulic fluids, ‘kero’ based cleaners)
2. Paints (oil and water based)
3. Detergents and cleaning fluids
4. Acids and Bases (engine coolants, caustic cleaners)
5. Solvents

By no means an extensive list but it is the old 80:20 rule in action i.e. 80% of what is spilled is probably less than 20 percent of the liquids you could name. So we won’t try to list them all. Instead let’s try and build some really useful spill kits using real life examples:

Spill Kit 1:

Small metal workshop or Mechanical / Motor workshop:

In this example you could easily find:

• Fuels and Oils
• Detergents and cleaning fluids
• Solvents

So the question we are often asked is: “Do you need a different spill kit for each product?” In most cases the answer is no you just need to match your spill response to the fluids you are most likely to spill. Sure if you are doing some acid etching or using a particularly corrosive solvent cleaner then you might need a chemical spill kit but as a general rule a properly designed oil spill kit with a good organic absorbent floor sweep or oil spill station, can cover a small workshop very easily. So lets take a look at what you do need in a workshop spill kit:

1. A Tough bag or Wheelie bin: to carry all the bits around in. Makes sense doesn’t it? If you have an oil spill the last thing you want is to have to go and find all the things you need are scattered all over the workshop. Not only does that waste a lot of time it also gives the liquid time to escape down a drain or spread all  over the floor creating an even bigger mess to clean up. Slippery floors are dangerous. Rule of thumb here is to buy a good bag or wheelie bin once and use it again and again.

2. Loose particulate absorbent: that is just a fancy way of saying a dry powder absorbent. Everyone has their own favorite but Organic Absorbents have three advantages over mineral based ‘kitty litter’ products sorbents:

• Organic absorbents actually soak up a liquid and ‘store’ it within the material itself. A mineral type ‘kitty litter’ just clumps it together so it never picks up as much or properly.
• Organic absorbents will soak up almost any liquid spilled (oil spills / Fuel spills / Detergent / water / coolants / the lot).
• Organic absorbents are recycled wastes that compost in landfill. Given we all need to do our bit for the environment go organic!

3. Absorbent Pads these come in three types general purpose, oil spill only (white) and chemical spill (yellow). For most people the oil spill only are fine. If you think you might spill battery acid now and again you can just use your organic absorbent. If you may wish to stand batteries on benches then get 20 chemical pads thrown into the kits or buy a small portable bund just to  be sure.

4. Oil Boom: in terms of a spill a gas is more difficult to deal with than a liquid and a liquid is more difficult to handle than a solid. Most often a gas can’t be seen and it is very difficult when it comes to spill response and secondary containment. An oil spill can be seen, so if you have a ‘sock’ or an ‘oil boom’ (the big sausage things) you spill containment becomes a simple matter of surround the liquid and stop it getting to places you don’t want it to get to (e.g. down a drain).

5. Cleanup and safety gear: Here is a link to a site which has done a great job of discussing Safe Handling Procedures . Have a read if you need some assistance in this area. For most spill kits you need to make sure they contain personal protection items such as gloves, safety glasses and some sort of ‘rubbish bag’ to put the mess into.

One final word or warning: when it comes to disposal there are no hard and fast rules as each local council, state government and federal department has a bit to do with disposal. If you would like some very broad guidelines on the safe disposal of absorbents then please follow the link. But if you are not sure then ask the company or council that collects your rubbish. There are very large fines if you get this wrong so better to be same than sorry.