Chemical risk assessment for storage of hazardous materials in the context of Land Use Planning

Historical technological accidents caused in numerous occasions the major environmentalpollution and the loss of many human lives. Lessons learned from these accidents contributedsignificantly to the development of technological safety in two ways: technological and legislative. Afterthree years from the adherence of Romania to EU, a coherent legislation for land-use planning is stillmissing in the context of Article 12 of Seveso Directive. Nowadays there are more than 200 Seveso-typeeconomical operators in Romania, most of them with major risk, located close to areas highly vulnerablefor population or environment. The elaboration of risk assessment studies for the technological accidentsprevention, land-use planning and emergency planning is necessary and essential for these sites. Basedon these studies the population can be informed, instructed and prepared for accidents, thus savingmany lives. In this paper the development of a risk assessment methodology for land-use andemergency planning is proposed for Seveso-type sites, where large quantities of dangerous, explosive,flammable or toxic substances are stored, handled or processed. Three case studies were consideredwhile elaborating this methodology. These case studies include technological accident scenarios for thestorage of common hazardous substances: propane, chlorine and ammonium nitrate. Severalmethodologies applied in the EU member states were approached and the proposed methodology isbased on the results of this research.