Harrogate · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Harrogate workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Harrogate
Harrogate is a Victorian spa town in North Yorkshire of around 74,000, famous for its Turkish Baths, the Stray parkland and Bettys and Taylors of Harrogate.
The work is food and events - the tea and coffee manufacturing and food and drink production, the conference and hospitality plant of the Convention Centre, and the ventilation and engineering manufacturing - across the Hornbeam Park and Cardale Park estates, with the bodyshops between them.
Each of those Harrogate 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 Hornbeam Park units to the one-bench Harrogate workshops, taking capture and face-velocity readings and leaving a clear pass or remedial verdict with the hoods labelled.
By sector
If a process captures fume, dust, mist or vapour at source, that capture system is LEV - and across Harrogate and the wider North Yorkshire it is your evidence under COSHH.
Steam, dust and mist extraction across the tea, coffee and food producers, a trade anchored by the town's Bettys and Taylors heritage, where organic dust needs capture at source.
Kitchen-extract, steam and fume-cupboard extraction across the Convention Centre and hotel plant, where cooking vapour and dust need capture proven.
Machining, grinding and fume extraction across the ventilation and engineering-manufacturing units, where metal dust and mist need capture at source.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Hornbeam Park and Cardale Park units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Harrogate bodyshops. Two-pack paints release isocyanates - the leading cause of occupational asthma - so booth airflow is examined to its design figure.
Fume-cupboard face-velocity testing for Harrogate College and Harrogate District Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Harrogate
We are out under Harrogate's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
A cosmetic and perfume blending lab in Harrogate had a benchtop powder-containment hood with fluctuating face velocities from strong cross-drafts off a nearby open door. We closed the door, adjusted the ceiling supply-air grilles and ran a full multi-point anemometer grid. It passed once the drafts were gone, with the face velocity steady at 0.50 metres per second. Delicate botanical oils were in production, so the test-equipment cases were sanitised with alcohol wipes before entry.
The test
A statutory LEV test under HSG258 is not a visual once-over. On a Harrogate system it answers three things: is the system intact, does it still capture, and does that capture match what it was designed to do.
Ductwork, hoods, filters, fans and dampers checked for damage, blockage and leakage across the Hornbeam Park 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 Harrogate line.
Where exposure is in question - a food and drink manufacturing process, say - sampling confirms whether control is actually protecting the people at the process.
The duty
Under Regulation 9 of COSHH the obligation sits squarely with the employer - any LEV that controls a hazardous substance needs a thorough examination and test at least every fourteen months, and the records held for five years.
For the great majority of Harrogate sites, from the Hornbeam Park units to the one-man workshops, the fourteen-month deadline is what catches people out: once it passes the system is non-compliant regardless of its actual state. We carry out the examination, label every hood with its status and next-due date, and issue the report an HSE inspector or your insurer expects to see - and if a point fails, you get the number, the cause and the fix rather than a bare fail.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Harrogate 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 Harrogate duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Cardale Park 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 food and drink manufacturing bay, a conference and hospitality plant bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Harrogate 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.
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 Harrogate, but a Hornbeam Park fabrication shop and a Montpellier Quarter canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
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 Hornbeam Park or a smaller Harrogate workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Yes. We plan testing around production shifts at the Hornbeam Park units, term-time access at the Harrogate university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Hornbeam Park and Cardale Park, the university and hospital labs, and the wider North Yorkshire.
Food and drink manufacturing, conference and hospitality plant, engineering and manufacturing, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, and the labs of the college and hospital - the trades clustered around Hornbeam Park and Cardale Park and across the wider North Yorkshire.
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