OSHA Lab Safety Standards

Occupational Safety and Health Administration otherwise known as OSHA is an organization that ensures safe and healthy working conditions by enforcing standards of and providing safety within the work place. The first major component is the General Duty Clause. The General Duty Clause provides a guideline for employers; it states that each employee and a place of employment are free from recognized hazards. This clause also states that each employer should comply with the OSHA standards of health and safety. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health goals are to conduct research to reduce worker illness and injury and to advance workers overall well-being. Another goal is to promote safe and healthy workers through interventions, recommendations and capacity building. The last goal is to enhance international worker safety and health through global collaborations. NIOSH is part of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, it is to assure safe and healthy working conditions to our nation.

Emergency Temporary Standards is an authorized set of standards that take effect immediately and are in effect until superseded by a permanent standard. OSHA is in charge of determining if workers are in grave danger due to exposure to toxic substances or agents determined to be toxic or physically harmful or to new hazards and that an emergency standard is needed to protect them. Another major component of OSHA’s Lab Safety are complaints and referrals. Complaints are one notices of an alleged hazard given by past or present employee, a representative of the employee or a concerned citizen. Complaints can be either formal or informal, and if it is a serious complaint OSHA must inspect it within 30 days of filing.  If the complaints are not as serious they will be inspected within 120 days of filing. A referral is when someone notices an alleged hazard or violation of the Act given by any source.

Another main component is information and training. Information and training is a continuous process when working for an organization. This component is important because it provides information on hazard communication which is how to talk about hazards in the lab. The training is very frequent, it happens prior to beginning work, prior to new exposures and periodically throughout the year as a refresher. Training items include: hazard recognition methods, physical/ health hazards in the lab, use of protective personal equipment and hazard control, and lastly covering the content of chemical hygiene plans. The primary elements of CPH include, minimizing exposure to chemicals by establishing standard operating procedures, requirements for personal protective equipment engineering controls and waste disposal procedures. For some chemicals, the work environment must be monitored for levels that require action or medical attention. The last major component is elements of laboratory standard. This is the standard that applies to employers engaged in laboratory use of hazardous chemicals. Laboratory means a facility where the use of hazardous chemical used on a non-production basis. Lab use of hazardous chemicals is the handling or use of such chemicals in which, chemical manipulations can be carried out on a lab scale , multiple procedures are used, and the procedures involved are not part of a production process, nor do they stimulate the production process.

https://www.osha.gov/SLTC/laboratories/standards.html
https://www.osha.gov/Publications/laboratory/OSHAfactsheet-laboratory-safety-chemical-hygiene-plan.pdf
http://www.nsta.org/safety/