SOCIO-ECONOMIC ANALYSIS Public Version
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SOCIO-ECONOMIC ANALYSIS Public version Legal name of applicant: Grupa Azoty S.A. Submitted by: Grupa Azoty S.A. Substance: Trichloroethylene Use title: Industrial use as a process chemical in caprolactam purification Use number: 1 Disclaimer This report has been prepared by Risk & Policy Analysts Ltd, with reasonable skill, care and diligence under a contract to the client and in accordance with the terms and provisions of the contract. Risk & Policy Analysis Ltd will accept no responsibility towards the client and third parties in respect of any matters outside the scope of the contract. This report has been prepared for the client and we accept no liability for any loss or damage arising out of the provision of the report to third parties. Any such party relies on the report at their own risk. Table of contents 1 Summary of socio-economic analysis ....................................................................................1 1.1 Description of the use and importance of TCE ...............................................................................1 1.2 Requested review period................................................................................................................1 1.3 Human health impacts from the continued use of TCE..................................................................1 1.4 Economic and social benefits from the continued use of TCE........................................................2 2 Aims and scope of the SEA....................................................................................................3 2.1 Aims and scope of the SEA..............................................................................................................3 2.2 Definition of “Applied for use” Scenario.......................................................................................47 2.3 Definition of “Non-use” Scenarios................................................................................................49 2.4 Information on the length of the review period...........................................................................57 3 Analysis of Impacts............................................................................................................. 61 3.1 Human health impacts..................................................................................................................61 3.2 Environmental impacts .................................................................................................................69 3.3 Economic impacts .........................................................................................................................70 3.4 Social impacts................................................................................................................................78 3.5 Wider economic impacts ..............................................................................................................85 4 Combined assessment of impacts........................................................................................ 89 4.1 Comparison of impacts .................................................................................................................89 4.2 Distributional impacts...................................................................................................................90 4.3 Uncertainty analysis......................................................................................................................92 5 Conclusions ........................................................................................................................ 93 5.1 Socio-economic benefits of continued use...................................................................................93 5.2 Residual risks to human health and the environment of continued use......................................93 5.3 Factors concerning operating conditions, risks management measures and monitoring arrangements........................................................................................................................................94 5.4 Factors relating to the duration of the review period..................................................................94 6 Annex 1 – Grupa Azoty S.A. PA6 Products............................................................................ 97 7 Annex 2 – Justification for confidentiality claims ............................................................... 101 8 Appendix 1 - References ................................................................................................... 109 1 Summary of socio-economic analysis 1.1 Description of the use and importance of TCE Trichloroethylene (TCE) (EC number: 201-61-04, CAS number: 79-01-6) is a process chemical used in caprolactam purification at Grupa Azoty S.A.’s Tarnów site in Poland. Grupa Azoty S.A. is the parent company within ‘the Grupa Azoty Group’ and its operations are inextricably linked to those of other companies within the Group, namely Grupa Azoty Puławy, based in Puławy, Poland and Grupa Azoty ATT Polymers, based in Guben, Germany. The production and sales of all three companies would be significantly affected by a refused Authorisation for TCE (see Section 2.1.2). At Tarnów, Grupa Azoty S.A. manufactures considerable quantities of caprolactam, polyamide-6, modified grades of the polyamide, polyoxymethylene polymers as well as several fertiliser products such as high-quality ammonium sulphate, ammonium sulphate nitrate and calcium ammonium nitrate. The integration of production at the Tarnów site (caprolactam is used internally to make polyamide-6, while ammonium sulphate fertiliser is generated as by-product of the manufacture of caprolactam and then used to make value-added ammonium sulphate nitrate) drives the profitability of Grupa Azoty S.A. and underpins the importance of the use of TCE (see Section 2.1.5). 1.2 Requested review period Grupa Azoty S.A has selected toluene as its preferred replacement for TCE, as discussed in the AoA document. However, this alternative is not technically and economically feasible at present. If new facilities were constructed and further R&D was carried out in the hope of improving the technical feasibility of the toluene-based extraction process, the substance would have the potential to become a technically feasible alternative in the future. The practical steps required to make the technology technically feasible would require a minimum of 12-15 years from 2016, assuming R&D does not identify further issues with the technology under investigation and without considering the time required for securing the needed finance for such a transition. Therefore, the applicant submits this Application for Authorisation with a request for a review period of 12-15 years that would allow a viable replacement of TCE with toluene (see Section 2.4). 1.3 Human health impacts from the continued use of TCE Grupa Azoty S.A. is capable of producing significant tonnages of caprolactam while employing only 15 permanent and five back-up workers on its production plant. All processes at the plant involving TCE are closed, automated processes and all workers involved use appropriate personal protective equipment. The CSR stipulates that the dermal pathway is negligible in the context of the total exposure, thus inhalation exposure is the only pathway considered in this SEA (see Section 3.1.1). Both air monitoring and bio-monitoring data are available from recent testing and the latter have been used as most appropriate and reliable. The maximum exposure level varies by job title with the highest being 7.2 mg/m3 for the five operators (this is also assumed to apply to back-up workers), 4.2 mg/m3 for the five lab staff and 2.3 mg/m3 for the five co-ordinators (see Table 3-4). Using both the RAC-published exposure-risk relationship for the carcinogenic kidney effects of TCE and the one that the applicant has generated and documented in the CSR, the number of estimated kidney cancer cases over an assessment period of 12 years is <0.0003 and over an assessment period Use number: 1 Legal name of applicant: Grupa Azoty S.A. 1 of 15 years is <0.0004. These estimates are based on very conservative assumptions. Therefore, there is very low statistical probability of the development of such cancers among the exposed worker population, as a result of the combination of very low numbers of affected workers and very tightly controlled exposure (see Table 3-12). Monetisation of these human health impacts results in annualised costs of <€40 and present value costs (discounted at 4%) of <€500 over a period of 12-15 years, when the RAC-published exposure- risk relationship is used. These are clearly insignificant figures, in comparison to the costs that would be associated with a refused Authorisation (see Table 3-13). 1.4 Economic and social benefits from the continued use of TCE Having considered all options available following the loss of the 100 kt/y of caprolactam production capacity at Tarnów as a result of a refused Authorisation, the option that would make best ‘business sense’ would be the outright closure the entire production site at Tarnów while maintaining operations at the other two linked plants in Puławy and Guben. Any other course of action would mean that Tarnów would operate at a significant loss and sooner or later would have to be shut down as unviable (see Sections 2.3.2-2.3.3 and Table 2-29). Consequently, the continued use of TCE would allow the following benefits