This guidance is for businesses that produce and process metals. This includes:
- manufacturing ferrous, non-ferrous and precious metals and alloys
- metal forming processes eg metal stamping, deep drawing and metal rolling
- bar, wire and tube drawing
- metal casting.
Environmental impacts of metals production and processing businesses
Metals production and processing businesses can have a number of impacts on the environment. Examples include:
- air emissions from scrap metal processing, furnace fumes, oil mists, dust, mould production and casting and cooling processes
- energy consumption by furnaces, air-handling units, motors and drives
- land contamination from accidental spills of oil and chemicals and, potentially, the past use of the site
- noise pollution from materials handling, rolling mills, billet casting, air extraction equipment and vehicles on your site
- waste disposal, such as off-cuts, refractories, slags, sludges, fluxes, lubricating fluids and baghouse and electrostatic precipitator waste
- water discharges, for example contaminated water from material decontamination, cooling and wet scrubbing processes, cleaning and testing.
How can NetRegs help you?
Our guidance could help you to:
- avoid prosecution and receive fewer visits from environmental regulators
- increase efficiency and productivity
- reduce your operating costs
- be more likely to obtain business from government bodies and large businesses that require their business partners to manage their environmental impacts effectively
- improve your reputation amongst staff, customers and the public
- increase the chance of securing funding to expand your business by demonstrating that your environmental impacts are well managed.
