Excessive noise can cause accidents and hearing loss, so OSHA demands that you control it and protect from it. Here’s what they say.
Construction sites are often walled off to both protect passersby and preserve neighborhood beauty, but it’s obvious they’re there. The sound of roaring generators, pounding power shovels, and all manner of banging, boring, and sometimes blasting can be deafening.
Literally.
This fact was brought home in a recent article by Renee S. Bessette in Occupational Health & Safety magazine. Bessette noted that 500,000 U.S. construction workers are routinely exposed to hazardous noise, both because their work environments are by nature loud, and because, according to a recent study in Washington state, workers use their hearing protection less than 20 percent of the time.
Do you know that you must now pay for virtually all PPE? Learn OSHA’s new rules, now in effect, at BLR’s April 18 special audio conference. Can’t attend? Pre-order the CD. Click for details.
But Bessette noted another problem in protecting these workers: It’s how noise protection is treated in OSHA’s 29 CFR 1926 construction regulation.
“[The reg] states hearing protectors ‘shall be provided and used,’” she wrote. “But there is no mention of dosimetry, audiometry, training, or recordkeeping. Just an acknowledgment that ‘noise happens’ and that you might want to do something about it.”
Not so OSHA’s 29 CFR 1910 regulation for general industry. And in light of its differences from the construction standard, we thought this might be a good time to review, courtesy of BLR’s program, Safety Meeting Repros, what general business is required to do to protect hearing.
First, understand that excessive workplace noise has multiple negative effects. It does cause hearing loss (sometimes so subtly over time that the worker isn’t even aware it’s happening). But it also causes fatigue and stress, both contributors to mistakes and accidents. And even if hearing is intact, high noise levels can prevent workers from hearing important directions or warnings.
To combat these problems, OSHA first defines the threshold level for compliance at a continuous averaged level of 85 dB or more, or about the sound of a belt sander. When that level is present, employers must:
Monitor the noise level on an ongoing basis, and provide each employee with professionally evaluated audiometer testing to measure first, their baseline hearing and then, any hearing loss over time.
Learn OSHA’s new rules on who pays for PPE at BLR’s April 18, 90-minute audio conference. Can’t attend? Pre-order the CD. Click to learn more.
Institute engineering controls, such as soundproofing, to reduce sound levels as much as possible.
Provide personal protective equipment (PPE) to workers, usually in the form of earplugs or similar devices.
Train workers on an ongoing basis in the use of these devices.
If hearing loss is detected, take “corrective action.” This can include further training in the use of PPE, reduction of time the employee spends in the noisy environment and, in the extreme, transfer to a job in a quieter area. These are “administrative controls.”
Experts recommend that you don’t just depend on periodic audiometer testing to reveal hearing loss, but educate your employees on the signs of it.
These include, but aren’t limited to:
—Persistent ringing in the ears
–Difficulty hearing soft sounds, like the ticking of a watch
–Complaints from the family that the worker constantly plays the radio or TV too loudly
Tomorrow, we’ll look in greater detail at several types of hearing PPE available and what to do about workers who refuse to wear it. We’ll also brief you on an important audio conference on changes to the law regarding who pays for PPE.