Printing Ink Mixing & Colour Matching SWMS

Ink mixing and colour-matching operations expose printing workers to a complex cocktail of organic solvents, fine pigment dusts, and reactive resin systems during tinting, dispensing, viscosity adjustment, and waste handling tasks. These activities routinely involve decanting flammable liquids with flash points below 60°C, manually weighing pigment powders containing heavy metals or carbon black, and handling spent ink and solvent-soaked rags that constitute hazardous waste under the Environment Protection regulations. WHS Regulation 2025 Chapter 7 (Hazardous Chemicals) imposes mandatory duties on PCBUs to assess, control, and document exposures to airborne contaminants, dermal sensitisers, and Dangerous Goods Class 3 flammables present in virtually every ink room. A Safe Work Method Statement is mandatory because this work simultaneously involves the manual handling of hazardous chemicals at quantities requiring manifest, the generation of atmospheric contaminants requiring exposure monitoring under Schedule 14, and the foreseeable risk of fire or explosion in confined mixing areas. This SWMS establishes the consultation, control, and verification framework required before any worker enters the ink kitchen.

Hazards identified

7 hazards covered, sorted by priority.

Control measures

Hierarchy-of-controls order: elimination → substitution → isolation → engineering → administrative → PPE.

1. 1Elimination — Replace manual solvent-based tinting with closed-loop automated ink dispensing systems that eliminate operator contact with raw solvents and pigment powders entirely.
2. 2Elimination — Remove ignition sources from the mixing area by relocating non-rated electrical equipment, mobile phones, and hot work outside the hazardous zone boundary.
3. 3Substitution — Substitute high-VOC solvent inks with vegetable-oil or UV-curable formulations where print specification permits, reducing flash point hazards and atmospheric contaminant load.
4. 4Substitution — Replace powdered pigments with pre-dispersed liquid concentrates or paste systems to eliminate respirable dust generation during weighing operations.
5. 5Engineering — Install local exhaust ventilation (LEV) capture hoods at all mixing stations designed to AS 1668.2 with minimum 0.5 m/s face velocity verified by annual airflow testing.
6. 6Engineering — Bond and earth all conductive containers during solvent transfer per AS/NZS 1020, and install intrinsically safe (Ex) electrical fittings throughout the zoned hazardous area.
7. 7Administrative — Conduct pre-start SWMS briefing referencing current SDS for each ink and solvent in use, with documented sign-on and verification of WES compliance from atmospheric monitoring records.
8. 8Administrative — Enforce two-person rule for drum decanting, restrict ink room access to trained personnel, and maintain hazardous chemicals manifest and register per WHS Reg 2025 r346.
9. 9PPE — Provide chemical-resistant nitrile or laminated film gloves (selected per SDS breakthrough data), splash-rated safety goggles to AS/NZS 1337.1, and chemical apron for all decanting and weighing tasks.
10. 10PPE — Issue half-face respirators with A2-P2 combination cartridges per AS/NZS 1715/1716, fit-tested annually, with cartridge change-out schedule based on solvent loading calculations.

Applicable Codes of Practice

Worked example

At a mid-sized flexographic label printery, the ink room leading hand opens the morning pre-start brief by walking three operators through this SWMS before a batch of solvent-based magenta is tinted for a 50,000-metre run. The brief identifies that today's job requires manual addition of 2kg of carbon black dispersion and 5L of ethyl acetate viscosity reducer — both flagged in the hazards section. The leading hand confirms the LEV hood face velocity reading from yesterday's log (0.6 m/s, compliant), verifies the bonding strap is connected to the 20L solvent jerry can, and issues A2-P2 respirators after checking each operator's fit-test currency on the training matrix. One operator flags that the nitrile gloves on the shelf are the thinner disposable type, not the laminated film specified in the control measures — the leading hand stops the task, retrieves the correct gloves from the chemical store, and amends the sign-on sheet. During mixing, a viscosity reading drifts and an operator proposes adding extra solvent; the SWMS administrative control requiring two-person verification for any deviation triggers a call to the supervisor, who authorises the change in writing and updates the batch record. At shift end, solvent-soaked rags are placed in the self-closing metal bin per the waste handling control, and the SWMS sign-off page is filed with the production record.

Related legislation

• WHS Act 2011 (model)
• WHS Regulation 2025
• Managing Risks of Hazardous Chemicals CoP; AS/NZS 4024

Frequently asked questions