Sunderland · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Sunderland workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Sunderland
Sunderland is home to Nissan's plant, the UK's largest car factory, now anchoring a 1 billion pound electric-vehicle and battery hub.
The heavy work is automotive - the Nissan plant and its paint and body shops, the Envision AESC battery manufacturing on the advanced-manufacturing park, and the supply-chain press and fabrication units - alongside the glass and engineering heritage, the food producers, and the fume-cupboard labs, across Washington and Pallion.
Wherever a Sunderland process releases fume, dust, mist or vapour, COSHH puts the duty on you to control it at source, and the extraction that does so is LEV - subject to a thorough examination and test at least every fourteen months. We work across the range, from the Washington units down to the smallest Sunderland workshop, measuring capture and face velocity and issuing a plain pass-or-remedial result with every hood tagged.
By sector
Any system that draws fume, dust, mist or vapour off at source counts as LEV, and across Sunderland and the rest of Tyne and Wear it is the evidence COSHH expects you to hold.
Spray-booth, prep-bay and weld-fume extraction across the automotive and supply-chain units. Two-pack paints release isocyanates - the leading cause of occupational asthma - so booth airflow is examined to its design figure.
Fume and particulate extraction on the battery-manufacturing lines, where solvent vapour and process fume need capture proven from the start.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the fabrication and press units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Grinding, cutting and fume extraction on the glass and engineering lines that carry the city's heavy-industry heritage.
Flour-dust, steam and mist extraction across the city's food producers, where organic dust is a health and a combustion risk.
Fume-cupboard face-velocity testing for the University of Sunderland and Sunderland Royal Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Sunderland
We are out under Sunderland's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
An EV battery manufacturing plant in Sunderland had the lip extraction on an electrolyte filling station running at only 40% - a fan frequency-inverter fault. We logged the fan RPM through the building management system, measured the slot velocity across the extraction lip and checked the static pressure. It failed on insufficient flow to capture the volatile solvent vapours. It was an ultra-dry cleanroom - under 1% relative humidity - so it was static-dissipative clothing throughout.
The test
An HSG258 statutory LEV test goes well beyond a walk-round look. On a Sunderland system it has to establish three things - that the plant and ductwork are sound, that the hoods still capture, and that the capture still meets the figure the system was designed around.
Ductwork, hoods, filters, fans and dampers checked for damage, blockage and leakage across the Washington 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 Sunderland line.
Where exposure is in question - an automotive body and paint 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.
On most Sunderland sites - the Washington units and the smaller workshops alike - it is the fourteen-month clock that bites: let it lapse and the system is non-compliant that day, however well it seems to run. We examine it, tag each hood with its status and next-due date, and hand over the report an HSE inspector or insurer will want. Where something fails you get the reading, the cause and the remedy - never just a red sticker.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Sunderland 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 Sunderland duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Pallion 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. An automotive body and paint bay, a battery and advanced materials bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
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 Sunderland, but a Washington fabrication shop and a Holmeside canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Sunderland 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.
Automotive body and paint, battery and advanced materials, welding and fabrication, glass and heavy engineering, food and drink manufacturing, and the labs of the university and hospital - the trades clustered around Washington and Pallion and across the wider Tyne and Wear.
Yes. Each hood is labelled with its status and next-due date, and you get the HSG258 report and system schematic for your COSHH file - the record an HSE inspector visiting a Washington unit will ask to see.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Washington and Pallion, the university and hospital labs, and the wider Tyne and Wear.
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 Washington or a smaller Sunderland workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Phoenix Duct Clean · by the numbers
Stay compliant with COSHH and HSG258. No-obligation quote, UK-wide.