TRI Reporting
Q. An EHS chemical, Sulfuric Acid, exceeds 500 pounds. Therefore aggregation of Sulfuric Acid containing compounds is required in TRI reporting. In that aggregation, are lab chemicals included or exempted?
Category: Chemicals
Today’s workplace uses thousands of chemicals, many of which are hazardous. The resources in this section will help guide you in the safe and legal identification, storage, transport, and use of these chemicals, and in making sure that your employees right to know how to be safe around such substances is provided, as required by law.
Metalworking Fluids: Good for the Work, Bad for the Workers
Some hazardous chemical exposures are easy to identify. When workers are involved in spray-finishing operations, they obviously risk exposure to paint-related aerosols. When workers in a laboratory are pipetting chemical reagents, they obviously need to take precautions against exposure. Some exposures are far less obvious—but that doesn’t necessarily make them any less dangerous.
Flammable Substance Threshold
Q. Would the risk management plan (RMP) flammable substance exemption include warehouses? We will store cans of foam containing isobutane. Will the RMP regulations apply?
There’s no Safety Data Sheet for These Six Chemical Exposures
Workers have been trained to rely on chemical labels and safety data sheets (SDSs) for chemical hazard information—and rightly so, most of the time. However, some chemical hazards don’t come neatly packaged and labeled. That doesn’t make them any less dangerous. Yesterday, we looked at the hazards of vehicle exhaust and flammable vapors. Here are […]
There’s no Safety Data Sheet for These Six Chemical Exposures
Most hazardous chemicals arrive in the workplace with personalized calling cards: the labels and safety data sheets (SDSs) required by law to accompany them. Unfortunately, not all chemicals are so accommodating. Some may slip into the workplace unannounced, unnoticed, and unrecognized. Beware of these chemical hazards that may have crept in under your nose! Exhaust […]
A Welder’s Leak Test Goes Wrong—Watch Out for Incidental Welding Hazards
Welding has a lot of hazards, but they’re not all directly related to the welding equipment or process. California’s Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation (CA-FACE) program recently investigated an incident in which a welder was killed while performing a leak test after completing a welding repair. All welders can learn some valuable lessons from his […]
Hazardous Chemicals, Fire Hazards, Electrical Hazards: Welding’s Got It All
Welding is a hazardous activity that poses a unique combination of both safety and health risks to more than 500,000 workers in a wide variety of industries. Because it is a common operation in many workplaces, its hazards are often underappreciated. The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) reports that more than four deaths […]
No Changes for Proposed Reissuance of Pesticide General Permit
The EPA is proposing to reissue its hotly debated Pesticide General Permit (PGP) under authority of the CWA Section 402—the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES). The existing 5-year PGP expires midnight, October 31, 2016. According to the Agency, the proposed reissued PGP has the same conditions and requirements as the existing PGP. The proposal […]
Microbead Ban Goes into Law
On December 28, 2015, President Obama signed into law the Microbead-Free Waters Act of 2015 (House of Representatives (H.R.) 1321). This law amends the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act by banning the sale of rinse-off cosmetics that contain intentionally added plastic microbeads beginning January 1, 2018, and by banning the manufacture of these cosmetics […]
Tier II Reports Due March 1: Check Your State’s Requirements (Map)
The deadline to submit Tier II reports is March 1. Do you know your state’s reporting requirements?