UniSea Inc. has settled with the US Environmental Protection
Agency over alleged violations of the federal Clean Air Act risk management
program at its facilities at Dutch Harbor.
The issue centered on the presence at UniSea’s plant of more
than the 10,000-pound Clean Air Act threshold of anhydrous ammonia and more
than the 2,500 pound threshold of chlorine during an EPA inspection on July 21,
2010.
UniSea, with offices at Dutch Harbor and Redmond,
Washington, has a product line that includes pollock fillets, pollock roe,
surimi, crab, Pacific cod, halibut and black cod, fish meal and oil,
distributed throughout North America, Asia and Europe.
EPA officials said they found several violations of the risk
management plan regulations, and the agreed on settlement included a $142,175
penalty.
Section 112r of the Clean Air Act requires all public and
private facilities that manufacture, process, use, store or otherwise handle
flammable gases and toxic chemicals to develop risk management plans.
Those risk management plans are used by local emergency
planners and responders to protect the public from accidental releases of toxic
gases, including chlorine, propane, sulfur dioxide and formaldehyde.
Companies must also create an emergency response strategy,
evaluate a worst case and probable case chemical release, develop and implement
a prevention program that includes operator training, a review of hazards
associated with using toxic or flammable substances, proper operating
procedures and equipment maintenance.