Making of the Occupational Health and Safety Amendment (Paraquat Dichloride) Regulations 2024

The Governor in Council has now made the Occupational Health and Safety Amendment (Paraquat Dichloride) Regulations 2024 (the Regulations).

 

These new regulations commenced Tuesday 26 November 2024.

 

What has changed

Previously Victoria had not set a specific threshold for paraquat herbicides and given how widely it is now used, it was considered that it required its own independent threshold for the purposes of determining Major Hazard Facility (MHF) obligations. This change will also align Victoria’s threshold amounts to be equivalent to the paraquat thresholds in other jurisdictions.

 

In addition, the previous thresholds for paraquat in the Occupational Health and Safety Regulations 2017 (OHS Regulations) could be seen to impact sites as a result of MHF obligations being triggered. Having more sites deemed as a MHF was an unintended consequence of the previous paraquat thresholds under the OHS Regulations. 

 

Given this, the amendment to the OHS Regulations addresses this by implementing the following changes:

· increasing the threshold quantities for materials containing paraquat dichloride; and 

· specifying two different threshold quantities based on the concentration of paraquat dichloride. 

The following new entries in Table 1 of Schedule 14 will be applied: 

Item¿	Material¿	CAS number	Threshold quantity (tonnes)¿
39A¿	PARAQUAT DICHLORIDE equal to or greater than 10% concentration¿¿	CAS No. 1910-42-5¿	80¿
39B¿	PARAQUAT DICHLORIDE less than 10% concentration¿	CAS No. 1910-42-5	200¿ ¿

 

What this means for stakeholders 

These Regulations relate only to paraquat storage for MHF purposes.

 

Please be advised that these OHS Regulations only relate to the storage of paraquat for MHF purposes; they do not affect any OHS obligations on the use of paraquat.

 

Further information

A copy of the OHS Regulations is available on the Victorian Legislation website. 

 

If you have any questions or require further information, please feel free to email legislation@worksafe.vic.gov.au.