(Trinidad Guardian) The Occupational Safety and Health Authority (OSHA) yesterday served a prohibition order stopping the operation of NiQuan Energy’s Gas-to-Liquids (GTL) plant in Pointe-a-Pierre, following an incident last Thursday, which led to the death of 35-year-old pipefitter Allanlane Ramkissoon on Sunday.
News of the prohibition order came from Minister of Energy, Stuart Young, during a media conference at his Port-of-Spain offices.
“I am informed, as of today, because I have been in contact with the Minister of Labour (Stephen Mc Clashie), the line minister for OSHA, and he has informed me that as of this moment, a prohibition notice has been served on NiQuan,” Young said.
Section 74 (1) of the OSH Act gives OSH inspectors the ability to serve prohibition notices on an industrial establishment where there is “risk of bodily injury or damage to the environment.”
The law states that if an OSH inspector is of the opinion that the OSH Act has been contravened, or that the contravention will continue or be repeated, he shall, after consultation with the Chief Inspector, serve a prohibition notice “stating that he is of that opinion, giving particulars of the reasons why he is of that opinion.”
The prohibition notice restricts the operations of the industrial establishment “until the existing danger has been removed or the Act complied with,” according to section 74 (1) of the OSH Act.
Young said he assured Mc Clashie that the Ministry of Energy’s teams stand ready to assist with any technical assistance that can be provided to the OSHA.
The Ministry of Energy and the OSHA are conducting investigations into the incident last Thursday, which is the second major event at the NiQuan plant in just over two years.
Yesterday’s prohibition order is the second that the OSHA has served on NiQuan GTL plant. The first followed the April 2021 explosion at the plant, which rocked Pointe-a-Pierre and surrounding areas. The company reported at the time that the facility had suffered a serious equipment failure, resulting in the blowout of its DA-301 system.
Yesterday, Young said one year after the explosion, in April 2022, the Ministry of Energy’s report on the root-cause analysis of the explosion, with observations and recommendations, was completed.
“The executive summary of that report was provided to NiQuan in April of last year,” said Young.
The Energy Minister said he will now be seeking independent, external legal advice on whether the executive summary of the ministry’s report, which was finalised in March 2022, can be made public.
“With reports, especially when you are dealing with third-party or private entities, if you are going to make adverse findings against them, they need to be notified of these findings and given an opportunity to respond,” Young said.
As a result, he said the ministry will write to NiQuan outlining the intention to make the executive summary of the report public, subject to the legal advice the ministry will receive. That letter will give NiQuan the opportunity to be heard and to respond.
“I want to make it abundantly clear, the Ministry of Energy is concerned and is always concerned when there are incidents. In this incident with regard to NiQuan, we are concerned and we will make sure that there is no cover-up and nothing is swept under the rock,” said Young.
Asked what is the ministry’s position if NiQuan refuses the request to make the executive summary public, Young said: “That is why I am seeking the necessary legal advice. The legal advice the ministry is seeking is can we make this executive summary of the report public. I will be guided by that advice.”
Questioned on whether the grounds for making the executive summary public would be based on public interest, Young agreed: “Public interest is definitely the overriding concept.”
He explained that the law was developed to ensure that entities against whom adverse findings are made get an opportunity to respond.
It was put to Young that his comments on adverse findings suggested that the executive summary had adverse findings against NiQuan.
He responded: “Let’s be real: There was an explosion. There must have been something that goes wrong to cause an explosion. So, yes, there were certain adverse findings as to what was the root cause of the explosion. You can also look at the process that was taken thereafter…”
Following the April 2021 explosion, Young said the next step was that the NiQuan plant followed a process of phased commissioning under the Ministry of Energy and the certified verification agent, an independent, mutually agreed upon third-party that provided “the technical assurance to the Ministry of Energy that the design, construction and commissioning of the GTL facility was adequate and it was fit for purpose.”
“Up to last Thursday (when the incident felled Ramkissoon), the plant was still in a commissioning phase. The plant had not been given final approval as yet by the Ministry of Energy. They had reached the stage where they were producing product, but not up to their full daily contractual quantities,” said Young.