Environment ministry expands chemical fire response guide to 92 logistics sites nationwide

South Korea's environment ministry said Wednesday it will distribute emergency response guides for hazardous chemical storage and warehouse sites to disaster response departments in 27 cities and counties nationwide.

The Chemical Safety Agency, which operates under the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment, said the guide covers 92 logistics sites across the country, up from a pilot edition issued in April for 69 sites in Gyeonggi Province. In the fire, the guide was used for on-site response and for installing flood-control embankments in advance, blocking runoff into waterways.

The guide combines information responders need when firefighting water mixes with hazardous substances and drains into streams and irrigation channels: site details and the substances handled there, full site layouts, estimated volumes of firefighting water, water flow routes inside and outside the site, likely paths into waterways, and countermeasures at key blocking points. The new edition adds instructions for using response equipment and response techniques, and provides latitude and longitude coordinates for waterway sections such as irrigation channels that are hard to locate by address alone.

The Pyeongtaek fire broke out on Aug. 11 in a hazardous materials storage warehouse at the PJK Pyeongtaek 1 Center in Cheongbuk-eup, Pyeongtaek. The facility was licensed to hold about 1.91 million liters of roughly 100 types of materials, including Class 4 hazardous substances and general chemicals. It took 21 hours to extinguish and prompted a national firefighting mobilization order at one point.

A January 2024 fire at a hazardous materials warehouse in Yanggam-myeon, Hwaseong, sent firefighting water and chemicals into a stream, contaminating a 7.4-kilometer stretch from Hwaseong to the Gwalli Stream in Pyeongtaek. About 250,000 tons of contaminated stream water required treatment.

"When an accident such as a fire occurs at a facility handling hazardous chemicals, swift and accurate initial response is more important than anything else to prevent secondary environmental damage," said Park Bong-kyun, head of the Chemical Safety Agency. "We will continue to expand chemical accident response information that can actually be used in the field, building a dense safety net for chemical accidents."