Chemical Safety at Work - The Podcast

Ep. 17: Safety Insights with Hydro Tasmania WHS partner Adam Rosevear

• Storemasta • Season 2 • Episode 17

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Dive into the complexities of chemical safety in the energy sector with Adam Rosevear, WHS Partner at Hydro Tasmania. In this episode, Adam unpacks Hydro Tasmania’s cutting-edge approach to safety management, from tackling chemical and oil-related risks to navigating the rise of psychosocial hazards in the workplace. Discover the tools, strategies, and cultural shifts driving Hydro Tasmania’s safety success, and learn actionable insights to elevate your organization’s safety practices.

What You’ll Learn:

  • How Hydro Tasmania ensures safety across its operations
  • Adam’s approach to fostering a proactive safety culture
  • Key chemical and oil-related risks unique to the energy sector
  • The role of advanced software systems in managing chemicals
  • Staying ahead of regulatory changes
  • Practical strategies to minimize risks in chemical handling
  • Engaging employees to build a robust safety culture
  • Addressing emerging risks, including psychosocial hazards
  • Building trust to drive team safety and performance

This episode is a must-listen for safety professionals, leaders, and anyone passionate about advancing workplace safety.


👷‍♂️ Find out more about Hydro Tasmania's work here

🤝 Connect with Adam on LinkedIn here

Melissa Hampton:

Welcome to the Chemical Safety at Work podcast. Today we're joined by Adam Rosevear Work Health Safety Partner at Hydro Tasmania.

Patrick Gee:

For those of you who aren't from the island, hydro Tasmania is a state-owned energy company focusing on energy generation, with about 30 power stations, 54 major dams and a raft of other facilities across the state and about 1,400 staff. Sorry in advance if there's any background noise coming through. The factory was in full swing this day and there's not a lot we can do about that, so bear with us.

Melissa Hampton:

Enjoy the podcast. So for any of our interstate or international listeners, what exactly is Hydro Tasmania?

Adam Rosevear:

Well, hydro Tasmania is a state-owned energy company focusing on generation. So from a Tasmanian perspective, we're made up of 30 power stations and 54 major dams and lots of assets, sort of feeding in and out of those assets. We also look after a distribution network on King Island and Flinders Island. We've got the Tamar Valley gas-fired power station in addition to our hydro fleet, and there's a couple of major wind farms in Tasmania that we've, or three major wind farms in Tasmania that we've got an interest in as well. We've also got a consulting business, which is E ntura, and so they operate all over the world selling engineering and environmental management services, and we've got a retailer in Momentum.

Adam Rosevear:

So, they don't operate in Tasmania but on the eastern states of Australia. They retail electricity products.

Melissa Hampton:

Wow, and how many staff is there and how many do you look after in your division?

Adam Rosevear:

Well, the work health and safety function in our business is a corporate function. There's 1,400-ish employees, so that varies a little bit across the business. Our team's made up of 12 and we cover the entire business.

Patrick Gee:

So can you tell us a little bit about the specifics of your role as WHS partner?

Adam Rosevear:

So the work health and safety partner's role is to partner or sit beside with business leaders and help them with excellent safety management. So rather than old-fashioned safety officer-type roles, we'd much rather sort of be in from the beginning on a decision and help business leaders do a good job of managing safety. Yeah, so the downside to the safety officer role is, once you leave, it's over sometimes. So yeah, it's much better, a much more appropriate level of effort given to our business leaders. So that's where we fit in.

Patrick Gee:

Yeah, sure, and you've had a few different roles in the safety industry. So how did you end up in the safety space and eventually where you are now? Well, that's a long story which I won't take you right through the abbreviated version.

Adam Rosevear:

I guess my first leg in was through the Volunteer Fire Brigade, and so I met a business owner at that point and he liked what he saw and employed me into a fire technician role and from there I sort of moved into training high-risk mines, rescue, working at heights type training, fire training, and then on into a health and safety role in a mine and then on into hydro a bit later on. I've been with hydro for 15 years.

Patrick Gee:

And in hydro. Obviously, there's some risks specific to your industry that you would have had to learn and get used to as you shifted industries. What are some of the specific risks that you're dealing with?

Adam Rosevear:

Electricity is a big one, yeah, so yeah, high-voltage electricity is definitely on top of the list, but you know it's a big, broad business and that's what keeps me interested. But there's lots of different risks that present themselves in our line of work.

Adam Rosevear:

So if you think about the power stations, there's water, confined spaces, high pressure, large plant, hazchem of course which is why we're here today, and other hazardous substances, so hazardous wastes as well, and then you can sort of move on into sort of psychosocial risk and the risk with travelling interstate and into different countries as well.

Melissa Hampton:

So lots of different risks. There'd be a lot of travel, wouldn't there? For your staff.

Adam Rosevear:

Yeah, that's right In the work health and safety team we need to cover the whole business. So we get around a little bit.

Melissa Hampton:

Yep yeah. So what does chemical safety mean to you?

Adam Rosevear:

It's an important part of our business and keeping our people safe. Although in the world of hydroelectricity generation we don't have lots and lots of super hazardous chemicals, we do have lots of small amounts, a wide sort of variety of hazardous chemicals and lots of oils and lubricants and those sorts of things. So, as an important part of how our business works, it's definitely a focus for our team and for our company.

Melissa Hampton:

And so you mentioned oils and lubricants. Your staff are obviously handling them day to day. What kind of risk does that pose?

Adam Rosevear:

Yeah, well, lubricants in particular. So hydraulic oils and other sorts of oils would be handled on a day-to-day basis. So, yeah, skin contact spills, definitely. The environment is a big focus for our company, of course, being a clean green energy producer. It's definitely something that we want to do well. Take pride in.

Melissa Hampton:

Do you have a process in place to identify and assess risks regarding chemicals dangerous goods?

Adam Rosevear:

We do. We've got a number of work, health and safety system-based processes.

Adam Rosevear:

So we've got a procedure that sort of sits above the manage of chemicals. It explains how we want to go about doing that and what excellent looks like. Mm-hmm, we use ChemAlert as a product to access safety data sheets and do risk assessments and keep track of our quantities and those sorts of things Great. We've also got sort of internal audit check mechanisms so we can make sure that we're doing things well, and we've got a maintenance management system that helps the areas do their own checks on chemicals as well Can you dive into a little bit about ChemAlert.

Patrick Gee:

For any of our listeners who haven't heard of ChemAlert, it's big software and probably one of the most common ones in the industry.

Melissa Hampton:

Well used yeah.

Patrick Gee:

When did you guys adopt ChemAlert? Do you know?

Adam Rosevear:

We moved from another product to ChemAlert, maybe 10 years ago, I think, and so for me that was a really positive change. I find ChemAlert, the platform, very intuitive and easy to operate.

Patrick Gee:

Now.

Adam Rosevear:

I'd just like to say for the record that I've got no interest in the business at all other than we're subscribed to it but yeah, from a user perspective, it really is easy to use. You can find safety data sheets. You can print labels. You can build storage locations, you know per cabinet. It feels like a really good tool for our business, and the employees in our company provide that same feedback generally.

Patrick Gee:

That's great. Yeah, yeah, yeah, great. And how do you stay on top of changing regulations and standards and that sort of thing in your business?

Adam Rosevear:

We've got a few subscriptions that alert us of legislation changes. You're going to have to bear with me a little bit. The name of one of them is the Environment Essentials. I think, and so they notify us regularly. We've also got a pretty high-quality team of professionals that keep an eye on these things as well and sort of try and take steps to understand what they mean for our business and then put action plans in place to implement them. That's great.

Melissa Hampton:

So, adam, tell us a little bit about the strategies you implement or use on a daily basis for minimising risks associated with dangerous goods storage and handling.

Adam Rosevear:

So, from an employee and contractor's perspective, we rely on task risk assessment tools. So in Hydro, we use a take five process for a quick risk assessment and safe work method statements, or SWIMS for a more detailed written risk assessment. Okay, we also have a number of other higher level risk assessment tools, site-based risk assessment tools as well, and we use ChemAlert for large quantities or higher risk assessments on individual products. That's great.

Patrick Gee:

So you mentioned the swimmers there, but can you dive a little bit more into how you ensure that your team members are aware of, and trained to manage, the risks in your industry?

Adam Rosevear:

Well, we've got I mentioned earlier that we've got a procedure that sort of sits above and explains how we want to go about managing chemicals. We've recognised that we need to refresh our training, so we're in the process right now of building a new eLearn which will go right into the basics of chemical handling, so that'll sit nicely beside a refreshed procedure, a revised procedure as well. In addition to that, we've got a number of forms within our work health and safety system that help people transport goods or decant, so that sort of helps them identify and manage risks as well, and along with our ongoing sort of auditing processes.

Patrick Gee:

That's great, and attitudes towards safety I mean safety can be seen as a bit of a dry and often frustrating topic for some people. Is there a way that you try to engage people or keep them committed to safety? How do you manage people's commitment to it?

Adam Rosevear:

I wouldn't say, safety's dry.

Patrick Gee:

I quite like safety To some people.

Adam Rosevear:

Yeah, no, I hear what you're saying. So it's an ongoing focus. In Hydro we work really hard on culture. So, pretty much the whole time I've been at Hydro Tasmania, there's been a push on culture. We've done a range of things to help work on that and, to be totally honest, once the culture is good and people value safety along with quality of work, really a quality job is a safe job, isn't it?

Melissa Hampton:

Yes.

Adam Rosevear:

And so once we sort of build our people into that mindset, everything else follows along quite nicely, yeah.

Melissa Hampton:

So you've spoken a little bit about some current risks, chemicals you're handling on site. What are some of the emerging health and safety risks you're monitoring for the future?

Adam Rosevear:

Well, I guess the safety risk of the moment is psychosocial hazards.

Melissa Hampton:

Yeah, it's a big topic.

Adam Rosevear:

New introduction into the laws and, before that, an introduction into the laws and, before that, an introduction into the international safety standard that we work towards, which is ISO 45001.

Melissa Hampton:

Okay.

Adam Rosevear:

So we have had a focus on that for a few years now, and we started out with just identifying or understanding the legislation and the new standard, identifying risks, and we're now into sort of a management plan.

Patrick Gee:

Yep putting in processes for reporting and identifying potential hazards.

Adam Rosevear:

Yeah, that's right. Yeah, so the psychosocial hazard introduction was a challenge for a lot of industries in Australia, so a new thing. It wasn't a challenge, it was a new thing, so it takes a little while to understand what's in, what's out, what does it mean? So I think we've done that quite well and it'll be interesting to see where industry goes in the future with that as well. Now that we're starting to industry's starting to gather statistics in the world of work, health and safety, it's good, a good change.

Melissa Hampton:

Yeah.

Patrick Gee:

But that it's good, a good change, yeah, but that's probably on the top of our list with emerging risks, right? Yeah, and do you find that the more people feel like they're cared for their safety's, cared for on their, their health, just overall culture and happiness is improved?

Adam Rosevear:

yeah, look that that definitely makes a difference, that feeling of trust between an employee and the business or in their leaders, and that feeling of care. And it's a challenging thing at times because it needs to be professional and, yeah, it can be a little bit challenging at times, I suppose.

Melissa Hampton:

Yeah.

Patrick Gee:

What advice would you give to other organisations that are looking to improve their WHS and their dangerous goods management strategies?

Adam Rosevear:

Well, some of the things that I've really appreciated about working at Hydro Tasmania and I know a lot of other companies that are interested in modern work, health and safety management do the same thing is the introduction of values or intent-based procedures. Yes, so 1,000 rules will give you 1,000 opportunities for non-conformances, so intent-based or values-based procedures will give workers the room that they need to do the good work that they want to do and in a company like ours, where we've got lots of different business areas with lots of different risks, we also sort of need to do it.

Melissa Hampton:

Yeah, lots of moving parts.

Adam Rosevear:

I mentioned, we're reviewing our chemical management procedures at the moment, so of course that's a key value in mind as we go through that, to make it as flexible and as easy to do good work as we can and not tie people up in knots with a thousand rules.

Melissa Hampton:

Yeah, so everyone's well aligned.

Patrick Gee:

What's the most surprising thing you've learned in your field? What do you think?

Adam Rosevear:

Well, I'm going to put a positive spin on this one for you, but I'm often surprised at how amazing people are. You hear lots of negative stuff around safety, but what I can see when I work in safety is that most of the time, most people are trying really hard to do a good job. Yep, and so I see a work, health and safety function in a business as an important part to unlock that and allow them to do their good work. So, to answer your question directly people amaze me all the time.

Patrick Gee:

Okay, that's great, that's amazing yeah.

Melissa Hampton:

So can you tell us a little bit about your chemical storage, in particular across your sites?

Adam Rosevear:

Yeah, so a business that's spread out across Tasmania and also into the mainland, but from a power station perspective there's 30 of them. Most of them are unmanned, so they're remotely operated, so they're mostly unmanned. So what we do is we minimise the amount of products that we have on site in most power stations, so to minimise the quantities and therefore minimise the risk. So we'll tend to have a flammable goods, a small flammable goods cabinet, a small corrosives cabinet and a small flammable gas cabinet.

Melissa Hampton:

Excellent.

Adam Rosevear:

And an oil store of some description on each location, and then there's a couple of regional stores which will keep larger quantities of products.

Patrick Gee:

That'd be tricky spaces to work in at times as well, wouldn't they? In terms of your sizes, of the storage products that you can put inside, but also trying to work out your locations and safe areas to store.

Adam Rosevear:

Yeah, that's right. You want people to have access to the things that they need to do the work that they want to do but at the same time you don't want thousands of litres of unnecessary products on site that can cause sort of a fire, additional fire and storage risk.

Melissa Hampton:

Yeah, so I guess that comes down to ordering and knowing what quantities you need at the time.

Patrick Gee:

Yeah, that's right yeah. And so can you describe some of those spaces like what it's like inside a dam or a station or yeah for those that wouldn't really understand.

Adam Rosevear:

no, yeah, okay, they're generally not an attractive building. They're a great big square, shed a lot of the time, and so they'll have an assembly bay bay, so a loading bay, I guess and normally off the side of the loading bay, somewhere close, will be a small area where we would have our cabinets some of them are outside as well and then a power station itself is generally made up. I say generally, they're not all like this, but most of them are generally made up of three levels, with the operating floor at the top, so that's where the operators can get to the equipment to turn it off, turn it on, run it up, run it down, those sorts of things. Then there'll be an alternator floor where the generator itself is, and then the lower floor is a turbine floor.

Patrick Gee:

Okay, so what's like the largest quantity sort of tank or container that you deal with with dangerous goods? Do you think Now that's a question I?

Adam Rosevear:

wasn't prepared for. Patrick, ask. Really well, we, king and Flinders Island have a number of different types of generation capability there, with wind and solar and a range of other things, but primarily underpinned by diesel, and so when it comes to large quantities there, we've just a fraction under 100,000 litres, I think of diesel. Yep. I should also point out that Tamar Valley Power Station are connected to the gas line the natural gas line as well. So when it comes to quantities now, I don't know what the exact numbers are there but, that presents some challenges.

Melissa Hampton:

Another risk Interesting. So, adam, tell us a little bit about what makes you passionate about what you do.

Adam Rosevear:

The people. I enjoy talking with people. I enjoy helping people. I've been in safety for a while Now. I spend a lot of time sort of coaching newer people that are new to safety. That's great. So yeah, I enjoy helping people.

Patrick Gee:

Being in the position for a while. How much have attitudes around safety changed?

Adam Rosevear:

Yeah, it's moving in the right direction, but I think there's two sides to that coin, isn't there? There's the way that organisations go about doing safety and you get. You know you reap what you sow, basically, and so I think, as organisations learn how to do it better, I think attitudes to safety are changing in line with that.

Patrick Gee:

Yep, Well, that's everything. Adam. Thanks so much for coming in and joining us and sharing a bit of an insight into an industry perspective and what it's like to manage and deal with safety and dangerous goods from inside an organisation. So thank you very much Great.

Melissa Hampton:

Thank you so much. Thanks very much for having me.

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Mel Hampton

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Pat Gee

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