Outdoor operations conducted in hot weather and direct sun, such as farm work, construction, oil and gas well operations, asbestos removal, landscaping, emergency response operations, and hazardous waste site activities, also increase the risk of heat-related illness in exposed workers.

Every year, thousands of workers become sick from occupational heat exposure, and some even die.

Why is heat a hazard to workers?

When a person works in a hot environment, the body must get rid of excess heat to maintain a stable internal temperature. It does this mainly through circulating blood to the skin and through sweating.

When the air temperature is close to or warmer than normal body temperature, cooling of the body becomes more difficult. Blood circulated to the skin cannot lose its heat. Sweating then becomes the main way the body cools off. But sweating is effective only if the humidity level is low enough to allow evaporation, and if the fluids and salts that are lost are adequately replaced.

If the body cannot get rid of excess heat, it will store it. When this happens, the body’s core temperature rises and the heart rate increases.  As the body continues to store heat, the person begins to lose concentration and has difficulty focusing on a task, may become irritable or sick, and often loses the desire to drink. The next stage is most often fainting and even death if the person is not cooled down.

Excessive exposure to heat can cause a range of heat-related illnesses, from heat rash and heat cramps to heat exhaustion and heat stroke. Heat stroke can result in death and requires immediate medical attention.

Exposure to heat can also increase the risk of injuries because of sweaty palms, fogged-up safety glasses, dizziness, and burns from hot surfaces or steam.

How do I know if it’s too hot?

• The temperature rises
• Humidity increases
• The sun gets stronger
• There is no air movement
• No controls are in place to reduce the impacts of equipment that radiates heat
• Protective clothing or gear is worn
• Work is strenuous

The heat index, which takes both temperature and humidity into account, is a useful tool for outdoor workers and employer.

Acknowledgements to Occupational Safety & Health Administration

http://www.osha.gov/SLTC/heatstress/

Topics:

• Metrics for Safety Performance – Leading and Lagging Indicators, Industry vs. Organization
• Process Safety Career Development and Education
• Engineering for Resilience
• Case Studies – Histories, Lessons Learned, Databases
• Inherently Safer Processes – New Processes, Existing Plants, Man – Machine Interface
• Human Factors – Engineering, Behavioral Safety, Human Error
• Management for Process Safety – PS Engineering, PSM components, PSM with limited resources, Innovative strategies for improvement
• Accident Investigation
• Safety Culture – Relationship to high consequence/low probability events
• Facility Siting – Personnel Siting
• LNG – Design, Experiment Evaluation, Consequence Analysis, Mitigation, Research needs, Regulations
• Control Systems – Unusual Situation Mgmt., Safety Instrumented Systems, Integrity Levels, Reliability analysis, Reliance on SIS, Alarm Mgmt.
• Risk Assessment, Analysis and Management
• Reactive Chemistry – Predicting Reactivity, Role of Contaminants, Catalysts and Inhibitors, Case Histories, Experimental Methods
• Equipment Integrity – Design for Maintenance, Maintenance Hazard Analysis, Monitoring

More information: http://psc.tamu.edu/symposia/2013-sym

PSRG will be an exhibitor at this  event at Houston Marriott West Loop by the Galleria

Location: Houston Marriott West Loop by the Galleria. Marquis Ballroom, Salons A-C. 1750 West Loop South. Houston, TX 77027

Hours: 7:30 AM- 5 PM. Wednesday, May 22

See more information: http://www.socma.com/events/index.cfm?eventCat=2&articleID=3799

Respirators protect the user in two basic ways. The first is by the removal of contaminants from the air. Respirators of this type include particulate respirators, which filter out airborne particles, and air-purifying respirators with cartridges/canisters which filter out chemicals and gases. Other respirators protect by supplying clean respirable air from another source. Respirators that fall into this category include airline respirators, which use compressed air from a remote source, and self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA), which include their own air supply.

OSHA’s Respiratory Protection Standard

The Respiratory Protection standard requires employers to establish and maintain a respiratory protection program to protect their respirator-wearing employees. OSHA revised the original 1971 Respiratory Protection standard in 1998. The new standard incorporates scientific principles and technologies that emerged since 1971. Because of advances in technology, many areas covered by the previous standard had become outdated. The final revision of the Respiratory Protection standard is intended to:

• Enhance the protection of employee health.

• Promote more effective use of respirators.

• Make it easier for you to comply with its provisions.

• Make it easier to understand the policy and procedures you must follow when implementing a respiratory protection program.

• Supersede most respiratory provisions in existing standard.

The Respiratory Protection Program

A respiratory protection program is a cohesive collection of written worksite-specific procedures and policies that, taken together, address all respiratory protection elements required by the standard. For example, a respiratory protection program must contain specific procedures describing how respirators will be selected, fitted, used, maintained and inspected in a particular workplace.

When respirators are used during operations where exposures exceed OSHA’s permissible exposure limit (PEL), use of properly functioning respirators is essential to ensure that employees are not placed at significant risk of material impairment of health. Respiratory protection is necessary in situations where engineering and administrative controls are insufficient to reduce airborne hazards, in emergencies, in situations in which engineering and other controls are being installed or maintained, in oxygen deficient atmospheres, or for internal structural firefighting. The final Respiratory Protection standard establishes the minimum elements of a comprehensive program that are necessary to ensure effective performance of a respirator.

Acknowledgements to Occupational Safety & Health Administration

http://www.osha.gov/SLTC/respiratoryprotection/index.html

PSRG Inc. is pleased to announce that we will hold our next PSM Forum luncheon on March 20, 2013 at Brady’s Landing Restaurant in Houston, Texas from 11:00 AM to 1:30 PM. You are cordially invited to attend. There is no fee to attend this event. A complimentary buffet lunch will be provided.

Guest Speaker will be Mr. John Bresland, past Chairman of the U.S. Chemical Safety & Hazard Investigation Board. In 2002,  Mr. Bresland was nominated by President George W. Bush and confirmed by the U.S. Senate to serve a 5 year term on the board of the U.S. CSB. In July 2008, he became Chairman. He served as Chairman from 2008 until 2010. Mr. Bresland resigned from the Chemical Safety Board in August 2012. Today, Mr. John Bresland works as an independent consultant and serves as Research Fellow at the Mary Kay O’Connor Process Safety Center of Texas A&M University.
From 1966 to 2000, Mr. Bresland worked for Honeywell International Inc. (formerly AlliedSignal Inc.) in various locations. He held positions in plant management, process engineering, environmental compliance, project management and manufacturing. He has been Chairman of the Community Awareness and Emergency Response (CAER) Task Group of the American Chemistry Council and Chairman of the Federation of State Chemical Associations. He is a member of the AIChE, ACS, IChE, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. He graduated in chemistry from Londonderry Technical College, Northern Ireland and from Salford University, England.
At the PSRG PSM Forum, Mr. Bresland will discuss his experiences in the chemical industry and his 10+ years with the CSB.
During his tenure at the CSB, he was involved with the BP Texas City refinery incident, several combustible dust explosions, the Bayer CropScience explosion in Institute, West Virginia and many others. Mr. Bresland’s presentation will discuss such low probability/high consequence accidents and what should be done to reduce the likelihood of their occurrence. The presentation will review lessons learned from such accidents. He will also discuss best practices in the refining and chemical industries which are designed to prevent such catastrophic accidents. In addition, he will have comments on the interaction between the CSB and other environmental and safety agencies in Washington DC.

Presentation will commence about NOON following a complimentary buffet lunch. Buffet lunch will be available starting at approximately 11:15 AM. Q&A will follow Mr. Bresland’s presentation. Doors open at 11:00 AM.

Lunch and presentation will take place at Brady’s Landing Restaurant, located on the Houston Ship Channel at 8505 Cypress Street, near I-610 and Highway 225 in SE Houston (Tel. 713-923-9488). For directions, see http://www.bradyslandingrestaurant.com/bradyslanding/directions.aspx , or contact PSRG at 713-532-8800.
Since 2001, PSRG has organized and hosted this PSM Forum as a venue for facility owners/operators to learn and exchange industry best practices and lessons learned with industry colleagues and their facilities.  If you and/or others in your company would like to attend this PSM Forum, please RSVP with names and contact information NLT March 19, 2013. To RSVP and/or for additional information, please do not hesitate to contact PSRG at 713-532-8800; OR via Email) psrghouston@psrg.com.

We look forward to seeing you there.

Petrochemicals are used to manufacture just about everything not made from rocks, plants, other living things or metal. These products include everything made of plastic, medicines and medical devices, cosmetics, furniture, appliances, TVs and radios, computers, parts used in every mode of transportation, solar power panels and wind turbines.

2013 National Occupational & Process Safety Conference

Tuesday, May 14 – Wednesday, May 15, 2013

The Woodlands Waterway Marriott Hotel & Convention Center
1601 Lake Robbins Drive
The Woodlands, TX 77380

http://www.afpm.org/about-afpm/

The TCC/ACIT & LCA/LCIA Environmental, Health & Safety Seminar Committee is soliciting presentation ideas and presenters for our 26^th Annual Seminar June 3 – 6, 2013 at Moody Gardens Convention Center in Galveston.

http://ehs-seminar.com

NIOSH recommends that all worker exposures to noise should be controlled below a level equivalent to 85 dBA for eight hours to minimize occupational noise induced hearing loss. NIOSH also recommends a 3 dBA exchange rate so that every increase by 3 dBA doubles the amount of the noise and halves the recommended amount of exposure time.

Facts and Statistics

• Four million workers go to work each day in damaging noise. Ten million people in the U.S. have a noise-related hearing loss. Twenty-two million workers are exposed to potentially damaging noise each year.
• In 2008, approximately 2 million U.S. workers were exposed to noise levels at work that put them at risk of hearing loss.
• In 2007, approximately 23,000 cases were reported of occupational hearing loss that was great enough to cause hearing impairment.
  Reported cases of hearing loss accounted for 14% of occupational illness in 2007.
• In 2007, approximately 82% of the cases involving oc¬cupational hearing loss were reported among workers in the manufacturing sector.

 Hearing Loss Prevention Programs

Over the past few decades, much has been learned about the implementation of hearing loss prevention programs. The eight components of a successful hearing loss prevention program include: 1) noise exposure monitoring, 2) engineering and administrative controls, 3) audiometric evaluation, 4) use of hearing protection devices, 5) education and motivation 6) record keeping, 7) program evaluation, and 8) program audit.

Acknowledgments to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention  http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/noise/