Brighton · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Brighton workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Brighton
Brighton and Hove is a city of around 277,000 whose visitor economy is worth some 886 million pounds a year and supports one job in five.
Brighton's economy leans to services and tourism, but the trades are here - the craft breweries and distilleries, the food producers and bakeries, the welding, fabrication and bodyshops of the Hollingbury and Moulsecoomb estates, the joinery shops, and the fume-cupboard labs of the two universities.
Each of those Brighton processes throws fume, dust, mist or vapour into the workplace air, and COSHH demands it is captured at source - that capture system is local exhaust ventilation, and it must be thoroughly examined and tested at least every fourteen months. We cover the lot, from the Hollingbury units to the one-bench Brighton workshops, taking capture and face-velocity readings and leaving a clear pass or remedial verdict with the hoods labelled.
By sector
Where fume, dust, mist or vapour is pulled away at the point it is made, that is LEV - and for employers in Brighton and across East Sussex it stands as their COSHH evidence.
Steam, CO2 and cleaning-fume extraction across the craft breweries and distilleries, and dust extraction over grain milling.
Flour-dust and steam extraction across the city's food producers and bakeries, where organic dust is a health and a combustion risk.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Hollingbury and Moulsecoomb units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Brighton bodyshops. Two-pack paints release isocyanates - the leading cause of occupational asthma - so booth airflow is examined to its design figure.
Dust extraction on saws, sanders and routers. Hardwood dust is a known carcinogen; ductwork and filters are checked for capture and leakage.
Fume-cupboard face-velocity testing for the University of Sussex, the University of Brighton and the Royal Sussex County Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Brighton
We are out under Brighton's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
An independent craft brewery and distillery in Brighton had the dust-extraction cowl over the malted-grain mill set too high, so fine grain dust was settling on the overhead beams. We measured the hood capture velocity - the fan was fine, but the design was not: we recommended lowering the cowl and adjusting the counterweight suspension. It failed on hood positioning. In a listed building with exposed timber beams, that settled grain dust is a real fire and dust-explosion risk.
The test
Under HSG258 a statutory LEV test is no visual once-over. For a Brighton system it has to answer three things - whether the system is sound, whether it still draws at the hood, and whether that draw holds to what it was designed to deliver.
Ductwork, hoods, filters, fans and dampers checked for damage, blockage and leakage across the Hollingbury units - the faults that quietly kill capture.
Face and capture velocities, static pressures and airflows measured at each hood with calibrated instruments - numbers, not opinion.
Readings compared to the system's commissioning figures, so drift from as-designed is caught before it becomes a failure on a Brighton line.
Where exposure is in question - a breweries and distilleries process, say - sampling confirms whether control is actually protecting the people at the process.
The duty
The duty is written into COSHH Regulation 9: where LEV controls a hazardous substance, the employer must have it thoroughly examined and tested at least every fourteen months and keep the records for five years.
Across most Brighton sites - the Hollingbury plant and the smaller units alike - it is the fourteen-month interval that trips people up, because a lapsed test leaves the system non-compliant from that date whatever its real condition. We run the examination, mark every hood with its result and next-due date, and produce the report your insurer or an HSE inspector will look for, and any failed point comes back with its reading, its cause and the fix rather than a bare red tag.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Brighton site.
Calibrated velocity, pressure and airflow readings at each extraction point.
A COSHH-compliant report: results against benchmark, clear pass or fail, and plain-English actions for the Brighton duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Moulsecoomb floor.
Questions
Under COSHH Regulation 9, most local exhaust ventilation needs a thorough examination and test at least every 14 months, with higher-risk processes more often. A breweries and distilleries bay, a food manufacturing and bakeries bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
Breweries and distilleries, food manufacturing and bakeries, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, woodworking, and the labs of the universities and hospital - the trades clustered around Hollingbury and Moulsecoomb and across the wider East Sussex.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Hollingbury and Moulsecoomb, the university and hospital labs, and the wider East Sussex.
No. LEV testing is a statutory examination of fume and dust control to COSHH and HSG258, with capture and face-velocity readings; TR19 is kitchen grease and fire risk. We do both across Brighton, but a Hollingbury fabrication shop and a Preston Street canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Brighton workshop needs a commissioning test to prove it performs to its design figures before it goes into service - we measure it and document the baseline the 14-month clock then runs from.
A dated report to the HSG258 method, the readings taken, a pass or remedial outcome for each hood, and system labelling - the evidence a duty-holder at Hollingbury or a smaller Brighton workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Yes. We plan testing around production shifts at the Hollingbury units, term-time access at the Brighton university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
Phoenix Duct Clean · by the numbers
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