Workplace safety apps on the rise

New apps help with occupational health and safety tasks.

As the world keeps changing, so does the world of occupational health and safety.

While technology continues to evolve, workplace safety needs to adapt as well.
That’s why cell-phone apps designed for occupational health and safety functions have become important in the marketplace.

New programs for smartphones and tablets can assist with all kinds of tasks, ranging from safety inspections and incident reports to emergency alerts and contacting remote colleagues when alone and in danger.

“Lives are at stake,” says Matthew Ross, media manager with ProntoForms Corporation, a mobile-solution company based in Kanata, Ontario. “People absolutely need to be able to process these types of info as fast as possible.”

ProntoForms has created an app that sends and receives forms and vital work information quickly.

“With the push of a button, the info is sent to wherever you like,” Ross explains. “You can send to a variety of cloud services.”

Such forms could include inspection checklists, safety lists, data on hazardous materials, action reports and even statements from accident witnesses, he adds.

“We’ve got such incredible positive feedback from clients because the processing is so much faster.”

Apart from increased safety, a side benefit of the ProntoForms app is a sharp reduction in paperwork.

“People are looking to help make their lives easier and make their jobs easier,” says Jason Grouette, business manager of the personal safety division for 3M Canada in London, Ontario.

3M Canada provides a practical new app that assists employees assigned to buy safety equipment for their companies, including distributors, health and safety managers and some end users.

Simply called Safety, the app gives the user instant access to more than 2,400 workplace safety products available from 3M.

Honeywell Safety Products in Morristown, New Jersey offers a similar product, the Media App, which gives users access to product information and learning resources on personal protective equipment available from Honeywell.

So why have workplace safety apps become more prevalent?

“We are in a different world that we were a decade ago,” says Grouette. “People have an expectation of finding answers very quickly and addressing problems quickly.”

“It’s driven by a bunch of things,” explains Ross. “The technology on Smartphones and tablets has gotten stronger and more powerful. So it has enabled us to include better features, time-savings, cost savings, high-productivity features. Another thing is the BYOD trend – bring-your-own-device trend – in businesses, so companies are more comfortable with employees using their own devices.”

Ross points out that the construction and oil and gas industries tend to supply ProntoForms’ biggest customers for health and safety products. But restaurant chains also use the ProntoForms app for information about cleanliness and other oh&s issues, he adds.

“The speed of data collection and processing is something that is invaluable in the industry.”

Grouette lists oil and gas, mining and manufacturing as sectors that benefit highly from 3M’s products, including the Safety app.

Many safety apps, including some of the aforementioned ones, are available to employers and workers for free.

Source: OHS Canada

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Chemical Safety Board plagued by bad news

The Chemical Safety Board is bogged down
by internal troubles and incomplete reports.

The independent agency that investigates chemical accidents is under fire from seemingly every corner of the government—from the White House on down.

The White House is reviewing a damning inspector general report against the head of the Chemical Safety Board, Rafael Moure-Eraso.

Members of Congress also are unhappy, with several committees on the case. And there's a federal investigation into the leaked identity of an agency whistleblower.

It's yet another bit of unwanted attention for the board, which has been beset for years by accelerating internal troubles, shoddy morale, and a backlog of incomplete reports.

A controversial motion passed late in the night at a recent meeting in California has only added fuel to the fire, since it appears to close observers and insiders that it wipes out a number of reforms while consolidating power in the chairman's office.

"It's a stunning turn of events … that has very much upended the staff," said one CSB employee, who spoke under the condition of anonymity to protect their job. "Things are just not getting better."

Moure-Eraso's tenure ends in June, but he may not make it that long. An as-yet unreleased report by the EPA inspector general accuses the chairman and two top agency officials of violating the Federal Records Act by using outside email systems to conduct official government business and not capturing those emails in the agency system.

EPA IG Arthur Elkins Jr. outlined the findings to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee last week. A new subpanel covering environmental and energy issues, along with the House Energy and Commerce Committee and Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, are looking at the CSB.

The findings were referred to the White House, which is reviewing the report.

The IG report—which could be released by the Oversight Committee as early as this week—is the result of a winding investigation in which CSB was accused of stonewalling investigators and refusing to turn over documents.

In a statement, CSB spokesman Hillary Cohen said the latest report related to emails sent before 2013 that were transferred to a federal records system 18 months ago. Cohen said CSB would be "providing guidance to all employees on the use of personal email that might relate to CSB business, since it appears this has been a common practice among various current and former CSB board members and staff."

The use of personal email is not necessarily a violation if the emails are forwarded and stored on an official system, which makes them searchable by inspectors and subject to the Freedom of Information Act (every agency crafts their own compliance plans for the Federal Records Act).

But the use of personal emails for official business can raise red flags and feeds into a deeper concern about CSB management's penchant for consolidating power at the expense of other staff and board members.

The latest and most egregious move by senior officials, critics say, was a 22-page motion passed by board member Manuel Ehrlich just weeks into his new position.

Late last month, the board presented its long-awaited final findings and safety recommendations from a 2012 Chevron refinery fire in Richmond, Calif., and took public comments at an evening meeting there for four hours.

Near the end of the meeting, Ehrlich introduced a motion that would, in essence, consolidate power with Moure-Eraso and wipe out a number of reforms made under a Justice Department order.

Mark Griffon—the third member on the short-handed board—tried to table the unexpected motion in order to at least give him more time to read it (it had not been announced in any public documents).

With no one to second the motion, Griffon was outvoted and quickly saw his share of power in the agency drop.

The "California coup," as one observer called it, scrubs a number of reforms meant to balance power between the chairman and other board members, such as requirements that the chairman consult on hiring decisions, designations to the Senior Executive Service, and expenditures over $50,000.

Some staff members don't see the motion as simple housecleaning, saying it consolidates power with Moure-Eraso and two top officials, general counsel Richard Loeb and managing director Daniel Horowitz.

The Ehrlich order also ended investigations into a pair of accidents at the Silver Eagle refinery in Utah, releases of hydrofluoric acid from the CITGO Corpus Christi refinery that began in 2009, and a 2010 zinc fire at a Horsehead facility in Pennsylvania.

The board had issued technical reports and recommendations in the Silver Eagle and CITGO cases, while the Horsehead facility in question has closed. Ehrlich said in California that there was "no realistic opportunity" for a more comprehensive agency report.

The agency currently has 12 investigations listed as open and its investigative backlog has long been a sore point.

All that, said a former staff member familiar with the board motion, adds up to an agency where "productivity is poor, attrition is high and work just doesn't get done." The three closed cases, the staffer said, were just more proof of CSB coming up short in its mission.

Source: National Journal. Please note that the original text has been edited for length.

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Chemical companies back new laws but less regulation

Chemical giants want stronger federal law

Chemicals used in products need to
be regulated more, experts say.

The powerful chemical industry is putting its lobbying muscle behind legislation that would establish standards for chemicals used in products from household goods to cellphones and plastic water bottles – but also make it tougher for states to enact their own regulations.

Many states already have acted on their own.

“Rather than be picked apart on a state-by-state basis, with different regulations, we needed to have a coherent and cohesive federal system,” said Anne Kolton, spokeswoman for the American Chemistry Council.

The group, which represents Dow, DuPont, BASF Corp. and 3M, spent nearly $6 million on lobbying in the first half of the year, the most recent reporting period.

There’s widespread agreement that the current law needs an overhaul.

Chemical manufacturers aren’t required to develop new data on toxicity and exposure, which has led to products containing chemicals that haven’t been screened for safety.

The President’s Cancer Panel said in 2010 that act “may be the most egregious example of ineffective regulation of environmental contaminants.”

But a big sticking point is the role of the states in regulating chemicals.

Regulation of chemicals took on new urgency after a crippling spill in West Virginia last January contaminated drinking water for 300,000 residents. The chemical in the January spill, crude MCHM, is one of thousands not regulated under current law.

West Virginia, which has not aggressively regulated chemicals, supports the Senate bill. It would require safety evaluations for all chemicals and give the Environmental Protection Agency authority to take action against chemicals deemed unsafe – ranging from labeling requirements to a ban. It would also overtake some state regulations – primarily when EPA takes action to regulate a chemical.

California, by comparison, has some of the toughest chemical regulations in the country.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, is fighting to preserve state regulations. She said under the bill, states “face sweeping pre-emption even when there is no meaningful action by the federal government.”

In a letter to Congress last year, California EPA Secretary Matt Rodriquez said dozens of California laws and regulations would be at risk if the bill passes, including those regulating greenhouse gases and safe drinking water.

New York’s attorney general has raised similar concerns. Regulation by states such as California and New York can have a national impact because of their large markets.

Several of ACC’s larger members, including Bayer Corp., DuPont and Dow Chemical, lobbied on the Senate bill in the first half of the year. Connie Deford, Dow’s director of product sustainability and compliance, said the company supports the framework of the Senate bill.

“We believe it’s critical for our industry that we have a stronger federal chemical management system than where we sit today,” Deford said.

Outgunned financially, environmentalists have sometimes used star power to help illuminate their cause, but that hasn’t been enough to overcome industry opposition. The Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families coalition had teamed up with actress Jessica Alba to promote different legislation. The bill never got a vote in Congress.

In an interview, Alba said she can’t compete with lobbyists.

“You can have certain public figures go in and advocate and raise a red flag and put a spotlight on an issue, but at the end of the day, it’s people that are there day in and day out, that are pounding the pavement,” Alba said.

Source: The Journal Gazette

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Chemical exposure and brain development: Researchers set to study effects

EPA awards more than $3 million to researchers

The goal of the studies is to improve
chemical safety: EPA

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced over $3 million in grants to research institutions to better understand how chemicals interact with biological processes and how these interactions may lead to altered brain development.

The studies are focused on improving EPA’s ability to predict the potential health effects of chemical exposures.

“This research will transform our understanding of how exposure to chemicals during sensitive lifestages affects the development of the brain,” said Lek Kadeli, acting assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Research and Development.

“By better predicting whether chemicals have the potential to impact health and human development, these grants will not only advance the science necessary to improve chemical safety but protect the well being and futures of children in this nation.”

These grants focus on developing better adverse outcome pathways (AOPs), which are models that predict the connection between exposures and the chain of events that lead to an unwanted health effect.

AOPs combine vast amounts of data from different sources to depict the complex interactions of chemicals with biological processes, and then extend this information to explain an adverse health effect.

EPA expects to use the knowledge gained from this research to develop efficient and cost-effective models to better predict if and how exposure to environmental chemicals may lead to developmental neurotoxicity.

Recipients of EPA’s funding for developmental neurotoxicity adverse outcome pathway research include:

1. North Carolina State University, Raleigh, N.C.
2. The University of Georgia, Athens, Ga.
3. University of California, Davis, Calif.
4. Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute, La Jolla, Calif.

These awards are advancing the science and technological capability to model and predict how chemicals behave when they come into contact with biological systems.

This improved understanding supports the Agency’s mission of protecting human health and the environment and amplifies the impact of its chemical safety research efforts.

EPA’s chemical safety research is accelerating the pace of chemical screening, helping to protect vulnerable populations and species, developing solutions for more sustainable chemicals and using computational science to understand the relationship between chemical exposures and health outcomes.

Source: EPA

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Chemical safety taken on by OSHA and fertilizer industry

OSHA partners with fertilizer industry to get message out on chemical safety

The new safety tips may help avoid
harmful accidents and exposure.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration 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 fertilizer industry to remind employers of the importance of safely storing and handling ammonium nitrate.

This effort follows the devastating April 2013 ammonium nitrate explosion in West, Texas, which killed 15 including 12 emergency response personnel.

OSHA cited the owners of the West Fertilizer Company with 24 serious safety violations for exposing workers to fire/explosion hazards of ammonium nitrate and chemical burn and inhalation hazards from anhydrous ammonia storage.

The trade associations will distribute a letter from Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health Dr. David Michaels to fertilizer industry employers throughout the country.

In the letter, Dr. Michaels says, "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. I am calling on you today to take the necessary steps to prevent tragic ammonium nitrate incidents."

In the letter, OSHA provides employers with legal requirements and best practice recommendations for safely storing and handling ammonium nitrate. Employers can view the letter online and read up on ammonium nitrate safety resources.

Following the tragedy that struck West, Texas, in April 2013, the President issued Executive Order 13650, Improving Chemical Facility Safety and Security, on August 1, 2013, to improve chemical facility safety and security in coordination with owners and operators. For more information, click here.

Under the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, employers are responsible for providing safe and healthful workplaces for their employees. OSHA's role is to ensure these conditions for America's working men and women by setting and enforcing standards, and providing training, education and assistance.

Source: OSHA

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