A practical guide for safety and compliance professionals in New South Wales, on the WHS Act change that took effect 1 July 2026, and the Codes of Practice it now puts beyond argument.
The change: codes of practice are no longer just evidence
From 1 July 2026, the codes of practice that already applied to your dangerous goods site changed status. Under new section 26A of the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (NSW), inserted by the Industrial Relations and Other Legislation Amendment (Workplace Protections) Act 2025, a PCBU now has a duty to either comply with an applicable code of practice or achieve a standard that is equivalent or higher. There is no announced transitional grace period, and officers carry a matching due diligence exposure under section 27.
Before this change, a code of practice was admissible in court as evidence of what was known about a hazard and what was reasonably practicable to do about it, but it stopped short of being a standalone legal obligation. That distinction mattered because it left room to argue that a different approach was reasonably practicable even where it fell short of the code. In NSW, that room has narrowed considerably. SafeWork NSW does not need to prove an incident occurred, a failure to meet the standard in an applicable code can be enough on its own to establish a breach.
For dangerous goods operators, that reframes the relevant codes from good practice you would struggle to argue against into the minimum benchmark you are expected to meet or beat. The rest of this guide sets out which codes apply to a typical storage and handling site, then points you to a companion checklist so you can work through your own site, section by section, and say with confidence whether you meet the standard or not.
A quick scope check
One clarification before the list: "dangerous goods" and "hazardous chemicals" are not governed by the same instrument. Transporting dangerous goods by road or rail sits under the Australian Dangerous Goods (ADG) Code, a separate regime with its own classification, packaging, placarding and documentation rules. Storing and handling those same substances at a fixed workplace sits under the Work Health and Safety Regulations, Chapter 7 (Hazardous chemicals), and it is the WHS codes of practice below, now backed by section 26A, that flesh out how you meet those duties. Most operators do both. This guide, and the new NSW duty, is about the storage and handling side.
The codes now in play for storage and handling
Three model codes do the heavy lifting for anyone with chemicals on site, and are the ones a NSW site is most exposed on if it falls short.
Managing risks of hazardous chemicals in the workplace. The central one. It covers identifying hazardous chemicals, the hazardous chemicals register and manifest, placarding and safety signs, separation and segregation of incompatibles, spill containment, ignition-source control, health monitoring, induction and training, and emergency planning. Most of the practical duties on a storage site trace back to it, often down to specific sections and appendices (for example, spill containment guidance and the manifest and placard content requirements).
Labelling of workplace hazardous chemicals. Sets the format and content of workplace labels, including the rules for decanted and transferred containers and for identifying chemicals in pipework. It is built on GHS 7, which has been mandatory for classification, labels and SDS since 1 January 2023. If your team decants, repackages or runs reticulated chemical lines, this code is directly in scope.
Preparation of safety data sheets for hazardous chemicals. The duty to prepare a compliant SDS sits with manufacturers and importers, so if you are purely a downstream user this code governs what you should expect to receive rather than what you must author. It still matters to you: it tells you what a compliant SDS looks like, which is exactly what you need when you check that a supplier's SDS is current (within five years) and complete before you rely on it.
Depending on what you actually do with the goods, several adjacent codes come into play too. Professionals miss these because they are not filed under "chemicals," and section 26A applies to them just as much.
- Managing risks of plant in the workplace and Managing the work environment and facilities apply where you use pumps, transfer systems, racking, ventilation and bunding. The storage and handling system is plant.
- Confined spaces, where tanks, vessels or pits are entered.
- Welding processes and Spray painting and powder coating, which are specific high-risk chemical activities with their own dedicated codes.
- First aid in the workplace, which drives your eyewash, shower and first-aid provisioning against the chemicals actually held.
- Construction work, if you are building or modifying storage infrastructure.
The test is not "is this a chemical code," it is "does my activity touch this hazard." A warehouse that only stores palletised, packaged goods has a narrow set. A site that decants corrosives, runs a spray booth and enters tanks has a wide one, and a wide one to be measured against.
Now check your site against them
Section 26A makes this a compliance floor, not a reading list. Use the companion DG Codes of Practice site self-check to work through your own site against every duty area above, section by section, so you can say with evidence: we are okay, or we are not.
How to work out what applies to you
Run your operation through four questions before you open the checklist.
What do you hold, and in what quantity?
Compare your inventory against the placard and manifest thresholds in Schedule 11 of the WHS Regulations. Crossing a threshold pulls in placarding, manifest and regulator-notification duties, and the Managing risks code tells you how to discharge them.
What do you do to it?
Storing sealed packages is one profile. Decanting, mixing, heating, spraying or reticulating adds labelling, plant and activity-specific codes.
What is the site like?
Incompatible goods stored together, confined spaces, poor ventilation or shared boundaries with sensitive uses each trigger specific guidance.
Who is exposed and how do they respond?
This drives training, health monitoring, first aid and the emergency plan.
Whatever the four questions surface, the codes translate into a recognisable set of on-site duties: current SDS accessible to workers and responders, an up-to-date hazardous chemicals register, correct GHS labelling including decanted containers, a documented risk assessment reviewed at least every five years or on change, placarding and safety signage where thresholds are met, a manifest where required, spill containment and incompatible-goods separation, protection of containers and pipework from impact, an emergency plan aligned with the local fire authority, and genuine consultation, information, training and supervision for the people doing the work. That is exactly the list the checklist steps you through.
If you operate outside NSW
Section 26A is a NSW-specific change, but the underlying codes are model codes adopted, in some form, in most jurisdictions. Operators outside NSW should still treat them as the benchmark, because the "reasonably practicable" test lands in much the same place under general WHS duties. NSW has simply made the consequence of falling short more direct, and removed some of the room to argue your way around it.
The short version
If you run a dangerous goods site in NSW, section 26A means the codes of practice covering hazardous chemicals are, from 1 July 2026, a legal floor rather than background reading. The three you cannot ignore are Managing risks of hazardous chemicals, Labelling of workplace hazardous chemicals, and Preparation of safety data sheets. Beyond those, let your actual activities decide which adjacent codes apply. Wherever you operate, the question is no longer whether the codes are relevant. It is whether your site currently meets them.
Important: the codes named in this article are those most commonly applicable when you store and handle hazardous chemicals and dangerous goods. They are not the complete set of WHS codes of practice, and depending on your activities others may apply. There is also no longer a standalone "Storage and handling of dangerous goods" code of practice, that older instrument has been superseded, and the duties now sit across the general WHS codes described above. Review the full list and confirm what applies to you here: SafeWork NSW, List of codes of practice.
This article is general guidance for WHS and compliance professionals, not legal advice. Codes of practice are adopted jurisdiction by jurisdiction and titles and currency can vary, verify against the version approved where you operate. Have your controls reviewed by a competent person before relying on them.
