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ICL-5

Polyethylene Piping Research

ICL Inquiry · The ICL Inquiry Report: Explosion at Grovepark Mills, Maryhill, Glasgow, 11 May 2004 · Issued 16 July 2009 · Addressed to: Health and Safety Executive

Government responseDepartment for Work and Pensions: Accepted (Mar 2010)

DeliveryHealth and Safety Executive says in progress (Aug 2016)

Recommendation, verbatim from the inquiry

●Inquiry recommendation

Research into the safety of polyethylene piping should be conducted to ensure long-term reliability.

ICL Inquiry, The ICL Inquiry Report: Explosion at Grovepark Mills, Maryhill, Glasgow, 11 May 2004 · 16 Jul 2009 Source PDF →

Published evidence summary

AI-generated evidence summary

The Inquiry recommended research into the safety and long-term reliability of polyethylene piping. In August 2016, UKLPG and the Health and Safety Executive reported that a review of literature and consultations with manufacturers had been unable to provide an adequate assessment of pipework lifetime under liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) use (UKLPG and Health and Safety Executive, Aug 2016). It stated that research assessing pipe samples that had carried LPG remained ongoing to inform future replacement and maintenance strategies (UKLPG and Health and Safety Executive, Aug 2016). HM Government had accepted the recommendation in March 2010, agreeing that sufficient knowledge of replacement materials was necessary (Department for Work and Pensions response, Mar 2010).

AI-generated summary of the record on this page, checked by a second model and automatic checks, 1 Oct 2026.

Government response

●Department for Work and Pensions · Accepted · 18 Mar 2010

Words of: HM Government (Department for Work and Pensions), The Government response to the ICL Inquiry Report (Cm 7849), March 2010

The Government accepts this recommendation. The replacement of buried metallic service pipework will have a substantial impact on the risk at LPG installations. However, the Government agrees with Lord Gill that we must have sufficient knowledge about the replacement material to be confident that a similar situation will not arise again and that we know if and what further action may be required in the future.

Extract from: The Government response to the ICL Inquiry Report: Explosion at Grovepark Mills, Maryhill, Glasgow, 11 May 2004

Site note: The Government's response to the ICL Inquiry report (Cm 7849), presented by the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. The paper is dated March 2010; the day, 18 March 2010, is from her written statement of that day, which says the response "has been laid before Parliament and will be published later today".

Delivery

●Health and Safety Executive says in progress · 4 Aug 2016

The Inquiry report indicated that polyethylene pipework was thought to have a safe working life of around 50 years but there had been insufficient experience of long term use with LPG. To investigate polyethylene lifetime under LPG use HSE has undertaken a review of the literature and consulted manufacturers20. This work has been unable to provide a sufficiently robust assessment. Industry are committed to supporting further work that among other things will assess a range of polyethylene pipe samples that have carried LPG for a number of years. This on-going research will provide a more definitive assessment of the lifetime of polyethylene pipework use with LPG and will therefore provide a better evidence base on which to inform the future industry replacement and maintenance strategy.

From: Safety changes in the industrial and commercial use of LPG: 2009-2015

Site note: "Safety changes in the industrial and commercial use of LPG: 2009-2015", a joint report by UKLPG and the Health and Safety Executive closing the pipework replacement programme. The same report records that the 2015 deadline for replacing all buried metallic pipework was judged in 2011 "not justifiable in terms of additional costs and resource implications", and that resistant or difficult customers remained outstanding at the end. No recommendation is recorded as delivered on this site for that reason. UKLPG, the trade association for the LPG industry, and the Health and Safety Executive wrote it together; the site files it under the Health and Safety Executive, the body the recommendations are addressed to. The report prints no date: the site dates it 4 August 2016, the date its PDF was created, and its references were last accessed on 16 February 2016.

How this page is built

The recommendation and the government responses are verbatim from primary documents. Delivery statements and other bodies' findings are shown in their own words, each with its source. The summary is written by this site and labelled as such. The Index does not paraphrase sources or characterise intent; it records what has been published.