OSHA has cited a refinery for 11 safety violations, with proposed penalties totaling $43,400, mainly for exposing workers to chemical hazards. The inspection, which began in July 2013 after a referral from the Environmental Protection Agency, focused on the refinery’s process safety management program for handling flammable liquids in excess of 10,000 pounds. The majority of violations relate...

EPA REGION 10 RISK MANAGEMENT PROGRAM 1 DAY Training Tuesday, June 10, 2014 TIME: 9 am – 5 pm Portland, Oregon CLICK HERE for flyer from EPA and details

OSHA’s inspection found several deficiencies in the plant’s process safety management program to identify, address and eliminate hazards associated with processes using, storing, manufacturing, handling or moving of large amounts of highly hazardous chemicals onsite. In this case, the hazardous chemical is the flammable liquid, vinyl acetate, which is used in large amounts at the company’s...

Recently OSHA has “requested information” regarding certain aspects of their Process Safety Management standard. In this effort, OSHA has suggested that the standard is revised to clarify certain aspects and to include some items they feel are needed. In the public posting, OSHA stated they are considering adopting management-system elements from safety standards that other federal agencies...

If you ever wondered if the “inventory” in your railcars or tank trucks that are NOT attached to their mode of transportation (i.e. locomotive or tractor) is part of your threshold calculation, here’s your answer, eight railcars of Chlorine sitting on the property was tallied by EPA to establish the amount of the EHS on site. Respondent is the owner of a ferric chloride manufacturing...

  MANY THANKS to my NEWEST and RENEWING Partners in Safety since 2014 since 2013 since 2009   2014 Fatality Tracker Electrical 4 (2013 = 32) (2012 = 68) Forklift/Manlift 3 (2013=62) (2012 = 52) Mining* 3 2013=87*) (2012 = 92*) *no longer includes China accidents Explosions 15 (2013=194) (2012 = 241) Cranes 1 (2013=51) (2012 = 52) Falls 7 (2013=106) (2012 = 99) Work Zone 0 (2013=42) (2012...

Anyone that is “into” fire protection has seen the videos of the airplane hanger foam systems discharging.  They are quite amazing to watch; however, now we have a fatality as a result of a discharge.  Results are sketchy right now and investigators are trying to determine what caused the tragic incident that killed one man and injured three other people in King Hangar...

 

This video is a bit slanted for a lawsuit, but the video footage does demonstrate the significant impact a simple flame arrestor makes in flammable liquids safety!  I need to state that a gas container in and of itself is NOT a hazard, but the fuel inside the gas container is a HAZARD.  Although I would NEVER recommend the use of these plastic containers for fuel, to state the container itself is the...

We have all heard the complaints about the evil OSHA inspectors and how much power their reign over USA businesses.  We also hear statistics that there are only enough OSHA Compliance Safety and Health Officers (CSHO) to visit each US business every 99 years.  So I had to ask the question… should OSHA just get out of the pre-accident inspection business?  How many times have we heard this…...

This Federal Register Notice contains the regulatory flexibility agenda. In addition, the Department’s Regulatory Plan, a subset of the Department’s regulatory agenda, is being published in the Federal Register. The Regulatory Plan contains a statement of the Department’s regulatory priorities and the regulatory actions the Department wants to highlight as its most important and significant....