A bill filed by Senate Democrats addressing corporate officer accountability for making users aware of defective products could, if someday enacted, address worker safety and health concerns by providing the government a new weapon to wield in ensuring that upstream manufacturers of plant equipment and other products warn of risks to employees in downstream work environments that use those goods in production, sources tell Inside OSHA Online.
September 17, 2026
OSHA has issued more than $816,000 in proposed fines against a manufacturing company that it has wrapped into its controversial Severe Violators Enforcement Program (SVEP) and issued a press release accusing the employer of “providing false documentation and making false representations claiming that previously cited hazards” related to hydraulic presses had been corrected.
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A group of Democratic House and Senate lawmakers has filed legislation to ban the substance bisphenol A (BPA) from food and drink containers -- a major shift in container manufacturing that they argue would reduce exposure to chemicals for food processing workers along with the public.
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The U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) plans to come out Wednesday with findings and initial staff recommendations from its probe of the root causes of a 2010 fatal accident in New Cumberland, WV, blamed on combustible dust, potentially setting up yet another round of formal requests for OSHA to proceed on a rulemaking to tackle the complex issue of explosive dust.
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OSHA has launched a broad compliance assistance effort keyed to reducing hazards in demolition operations, citing several recent high-profile deadly incidents and fast-growing building renovation activities as the economy shows signs of recovery. Industry embraced the initiative in some respects but one source cautions that it does not mean OSHA, by trying to work with employers, is backing off its stringent enforcement stance.
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A key Democratic senator tracking worker health and safety policy has formally asked OSHA for details regarding its handling of a Pennsylvania case in which a temporary worker was buried alive in sugar, raising questions about the fine amounts issued after the employer's compliance with safety measures and potential broader issues about the agency's decisions on when to penalize employers and cite alleged “willful” violations.
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OSHA standards officials recently met with communication tower industry representatives regarding details of the agency's plan to devise new regulations on safety in construction and maintenance of cellular towers that are rapidly sprouting up around the country to keep pace with mobile networks, but at the same time the industry is crafting its own consensus standard that is expected to come out long before OSHA even approaches a final rule, sources close to the issue tell Inside OSHA Online.
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Chemical Safety Board (CSB) Chairman Rafael Moure-Eraso tells Inside OSHA Online he will defy vocal calls by a cluster of Republican lawmakers for President Obama to ask for his resignation just weeks after a House oversight committee hearing in which he took bipartisan fire over allegations of mismanagement and charges that he attempted to block an Office of Inspector General (OIG) probe of the board's operations -- with some going as far as to accuse him of trying to retaliate against a CSB whistleblower and deflect questions about the incident.
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Cal/OSHA is pushing fall protection in construction as part of a broader campaign on building sector safety, in a possible bid to distinguish its own compliance activities as federal OSHA pursues its own high-profile effort to increase worker safety protections in the building sector especially in the hazardous and active summer months.
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A new federally backed study showing an apparent a link between breast cancer risk and women's work exposure to solvents prior to first childbirth could compound longstanding worries by NIOSH and OSHA about the long-term health effects of occupational exposure to cleaning chemicals, an area the two agencies have worked as a co-branded initiative.
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Industry consultants are preparing for publication an updated epidemiological study of hexavalent chromium's (Cr6) inhalation risks, with a goal of providing more information about the effects of exposure to the element at low levels Americans may encounter in the environment -- which could influence ongoing Cr6 risk assessments as OSHA continues tough enforcement on Cr6, most prominently in building inspections.
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A potentially groundbreaking new study by National Institutes of Health (NIH) scientists that finds an apparent link between breast cancer risk and workplace solvent exposures to women before birth of their first child could add further urgency to stakeholder calls for OSHA to update worker exposure limits to the chemicals, which are ubiquitous in a wide range of occupational settings.
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OSHA's mid-Atlantic region has begun a new initiative in which compliance officers will fan out across the construction industry and look for possible violations in high-risk areas including falls, crushing, electrocution, and caught-between hazards, a program that closely follows one by the region two years ago in which the agency conducted more than 500 no-notice inspections and issued more than 200 citations.
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A key advocacy group in Washington is calling on state and local entities to consider legislation mandating accident inquiries following worker deaths that would mirror coroner's inquests held in British countries when the circumstances surrounding fatalities are unclear -- changes the group says could lead to informed recommendations to occupational safety and health officials to increase protections based on individual case outcomes.
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OSHA's chemical hazard experts are crafting a database that will cull data from published peer-reviewed research on potential effects of exposures to nanomaterials in order to give workers and employers “better information” for predicting possible hazards, according to OSHA -- a project that is emerging from the agency's participation in a government-wide task force that for years has been studying the impacts of nanotechnology.
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OSHA standards officials have launched an effort to craft a new rule the agency hopes will reduce the soaring rates of injuries and fatalities in the risky communication tower construction and maintenance industry, with key aspects being to clamp down on what the agency views as a dangerous practice of hoisting employees with equipment mounted on trucks and to ensure fall protection.
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The Environmental Protection Agency has clarified and strengthened its risk assessment for trichloroethylene (TCE), the first such assessment the agency had conducted as part of a novel effort to evaluate and possibly regulate "existing" chemicals under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), a move that comes as some stakeholders want OSHA to revisit the workplace permissible exposure limit for the substance.
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OSHA has delayed by almost four months the compliance deadline for its new rule revising electrical power standards in general industry and construction, issuing a “temporary citation policy” pushing back the enforcement date to Oct. 31, 2014 in what reportedly is an effort to give industry more time to understand the complexities of the rule, as well as ensure that OSHA has the field resources more fully in place to enforce the new standards.
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NIOSH experts are forging ahead with a “Prevention through Design” concept that they say would design out hazards from the outset of construction of buildings -- an initiative that stakeholders have long considered and that could form the basis of future recommendations on OSHA policy.
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OSHA has launched a national information campaign aimed at protecting workers in the tree care industry, saying data show a necessity for increased emphasis in the area, and in at least one region, based in Philadelphia, the agency has kicked off a targeted enforcement initiative related to the issue.
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