According to the Danish Working Environment Act work must be planned and executed in a way that it provides a safe and healthy work environment for all. The Danish Work Environment Force participates in ensuring that the law is respected. This is done by inspecting the department on a regular basis, normally without prior notice. If they find that anybody is violating these obligations, the department or individuals can be fined.

Responsabilities

• Head of department has the formal as well as the legal responsability for health and safety at the department. On a daily basis solving practical issues can be delegated to the work environment manager.
• Work environment representatives and staff are responsible for providing information and instruction to relevant persons (i.e. guests and students).
• Everybody working at the department has a responsability to follow rules and guidelines. Especially users of workshops and laboratories are obliged to follow the instructions given by the technical staff. It is expected that you always contact work environment leaders or NAT building services in case of errors or problems with infrastructure (buildings, lifts, electricity, water, heat etc.).
• NAT building services are responsible for:
  • fixing minor technical defects.
  • maintain infrastructure (i.e. ventilation).
  • take care of mandatory service checks of equipment (i.e. lifts).
  • call professionel craftsmen when necessary.

If you do not follow rules and regulations (or intentionally violate the department safety instructions) you can be given a written warning and you may also be suspended.

Supplementing qualifications

Some tasks requires that you are able to document your qualifications to be able to perform them at the Department of Geoscience. Among others the following:

• Epoxy-work (requires a 2-day safety course: "Personlig sikkerhed ved arbejde med epoxy og isocyanater"- danish only)
• How to operate a truck/pallet truck (requires a 7-day course, providing you with a B certificate for trucks)
• Members of the health and safety organisation (requires the mandatory initial 3-day work environment education + 2 day supplements each year)
• Drivers who transport hazardous goods in official AU cars, including pressurized containers, flammable fluids, explosives etc. (requires "chapter 1.3 education" according to the ADR convention)
• Chemical waste responsability (requires "chapter 1.3 education" according to the ADR convention)
• Diving (requires certificate for professional diving)
• Operating a drone (requires drone certificate for the category which the size of the drone belongs to, as well as a valid liability insurance for professional use)

Other relevant certificates could be first aid course, firefighting course, etc.

The employer must be able to document when staff members that carry out work that requires a certain qualification or educational background test have the relevant certificate. Therefore all certificates/proofs of educations must be forwarded to the secretariat who will archive the document according to the GDPR regulations.