Owens Illinois (Spotswood) – Glass Bottle Manufacturing Facility

Owens Illinois (Spotswood) – Glass Bottle Manufacturing Facility – OH&S

Project: Owens Illinois (Spotswood) – Glass Bottle Manufacturing Facility – Occupational Health and Safety.

Role: Project Manager, Inspections and Audits for Lock out Tag out Isolations ( LOTO) and a machine guarding assessment.

Summary

Owens Illinois (OI) Glass Manufacturing Plant in Spotswood, Victoria is the largest of its type in Australia. This plant was to establish a Global Standard for LOTO and Machine guarding.

The newly established standard was to be applied globally upon completion and refinement of the works at the local Australian plant. SPMG was engaged to oversee the implementation of this standard and to put in to place systems that were to be used during their ongoing global rollout.

Works Included

Preparation of master data base of all machines (approx. 300) on the site in order to carry out inspections. This database was prepared from scratch there was no existing asset register.
Inspections and audit of all plant and equipment on the site. Including photos and preparing individual machine Lock out sheets. Make recommendations or identify any potential issues that currently exists (no lock out on electrical isolation for example);
Install appropriate signage for all isolation points including, gas, water, power, compressed air and the like for all plant and equipment on the site.
Assess machine guarding against international risk standards.
Liaising closely with the engineering and maintenance team to ascertain specific equipment lock and tag outs as well as guarding.
Liaising closely with Health and Safety Manager and Managing Director of the factory

Challenges

24 / 7 operational facility.
Very old facility that had no asset registers.
Old and Redundant equipment that was difficult to assess.