A coalition of labor and environmental groups is urging OSHA to formally propose its long-delayed heat-danger standard before the start of summer, and to prioritize what they say are key elements for the eventual rule such as requiring employers to craft mandatory written safety programs and allow flexibility only within “careful” limits.
A top official at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) says her team is refocusing their facility-safety resources on the voluntary ChemLock initiative after Congress allowed the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) program to expire, but underlined that it “is not a substitute in any way” for binding regulation.
California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) officials are revising a key proposal to exempt short-term “incidental” exposures from first-time heat safety rules governing indoor worksites, in response to complaints by employer groups that a previous carve-out was much too limited and ahead of a key standards board vote expected in March.
California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) officials are revising a key proposal to exempt short-term “incidental” exposures from first-time heat safety rules governing indoor worksites, in response to complaints by employer groups that a previous carve-out was much too limited and ahead of a key standards board vote expected in March.
An industry law firm is urging companies to be ready to report workplace monitoring data for the five chemicals EPA has targeted for TSCA’s prioritization process, warning that regulators may assume any sectors that have not sent such data will be unable to implement new exposure limits and should have their uses of the substances banned instead.
Jeff Killip is resigning as chief of California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) after less than two years with the agency in order to return to his former home in Washington state, amid a backlog of worker-safety rulemakings and a stubbornly high staff vacancy rate at the Golden State’s worker-safety agency.
The Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) is again urging OSHA to either extend current safety standards to oil and gas drilling operations or craft a new rule for the sector in its report on a fatal 2020 blowout at a Texas oil well.
Trade groups are urging EPA to rewrite not only its proposed TSCA exposure limit for trichloroethylene (TCE) but also its broader approach to crafting existing chemical exposure limits (ECELs) under the toxics law, arguing that the current process is “opaque” and must at minimum go through a public peer review.
Trade groups are urging EPA to rewrite not only its proposed TSCA exposure limit for trichloroethylene (TCE) but also its broader approach to crafting existing chemical exposure limits (ECELs) under the toxics law, arguing that the current process is “opaque” and must at minimum go through a public peer review.
EPA is requiring chemical manufacturers and processors to report all data they possess on “significant adverse human health and environmental effects” from exposure to the industrial chemical 4,4'-Methylene bis(2-chloroaniline) (MBOCA), invoking a little-used power requiring employers to submit information on worker harms gathered as long as 30 years ago.