U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) investigators are set to release preliminary findings from their probe into last year's disastrous explosion of a fertilizer processing plant in West, TX, potentially teeing up recommendations to OSHA on how safety regulators could tighten up federal rules covering such facilities.
Government chemical safety experts are pressuring OSHA to get rid of key exemptions applying to the oil and gas sector in the agency's process safety management (PSM) standard in response to what they call high rates of injuries and fatalities throughout the industry, after an earlier dispute over covering those work sites ended in industry's favor.
Industry groups appear split on the role local emergency planning committees (LEPCs) should play in federal efforts to improve the safety and security of industrial plants, with some industry advocates arguing the groups authorized under the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA) should play a key role and others seeking to largely bypass them – discourse that comes as OSHA seeks to update plant safety policies as a central part of a broad federal push by President Obama on the issue.
A national group of occupational hygiene experts wants OSHA to craft a formal regulatory definition of “recognized and generally accepted good engineering practices” (RAGAGEP) as it explores a range of options for potential revisions to its process safety management (PSM) standard designed to protect workers from chemical disasters, urging OSHA to help clarify an issue that has become the subject of enforcement disputes.
Administration officials working to implement President Obama's executive order on improving safety and security at industrial plants are considering strengthening local emergency planning committees (LEPCs) overseen by the Environmental Protection Agency but are not addressing calls to require controversial new safety requirements at facilities.
Environmental Protection Agency waste chief Mathy Stanislaus declined at a March 6 Senate Environment and Public Works Committee (EPW) hearing to commit the agency to mandating the use of inherently safer technologies (IST) to prevent or reduce the consequences of accidents or attacks at industrial facilities, despite strong urging from several Democratic senators.
Senate environment committee Chair Barbara Boxer (D-CA) has agreed to a GOP request to postpone a planned markup on legislation creating a new Environmental Protection Agency program governing chemical releases from above-ground storage tanks, a delay that senators hope will allow them time to resolve concerns from states and others as they respond to the recent West Virginia chemical spill.
The Obama administration wants Congress to allow OSHA to inspect work sites with 10 or fewer employees that potentially fall under the agency's process safety management (PSM) standard or the Environmental Protection Agency's Risk Management Program (RMP), which would modify a longstanding congressional mandate that precludes OSHA from inspecting such small businesses.
OSHA has decided to extend by three weeks the comment period on its request for data from stakeholders on whether changes are needed to the process safety management (PSM) and related standards, agreeing to stringent industry requests that the original March 10 deadline be delayed to provide more time for research due to complexity of the proposal and supporting analyses.
OSHA says it is partnering with the Agricultural Retailers Association and The Fertilizer Institute to reach more than 7,000 agricultural retailers, distributors, producers and other facilities in the industry to “remind employers of the importance of safely storing and handling” ammonium nitrate. The effort follows the April 2013 ammonium nitrate explosion in West, TX, which killed 15 people, including 12 emergency response personnel, and triggered hearings on Capitol Hill into ammonium nitrate and other chemical safety issues, as well as a presidential order tackling the subject (see related story).
The trade associations will distribute a letter from OSHA chief David Michaels to fertilizer industry employers throughout the country.
“The tragedy in West, Texas, and other incidents underscore the need for employers who store and handle hazardous substances like ammonium nitrate to ensure the safety of those materials – not just for workers at the facility but for the lives and safety of emergency responders and nearby residents,” Michaels says in the letter. “I am calling on you today to take the necessary steps to prevent tragic ammonium nitrate incidents.”