Industrial hygiene is a science devoted to the identification, evaluation, and

control of occupational
conditions that cause sickness and injury

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and OSHA, to create and enforce regulations.

OSHAct of 1970

Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), which manages and administers
the
government's responsibilities specified in the OSHAct

National Institute for Occupational

Safety and Health (NIOSH), which conducts research and technical assistance
programs

NIOSH develops data and information regarding hazards, and OSHA uses these data to
promulgate standards.

On February 24,1992, OSHA published the final rule "Process Safety Management of
Highly Hazardous Chemicals."

The PSM standard has 14 major sections: employee participation, process safety
information,
process hazard analysis, operating procedures, training, contractors, pre-startup
safety
review, mechanical integrity, hot work permits, management of change, incident
investigations,
emergency planning and response, audits, and trade secrets

The PHA needs to include a method that fits the complexity of the process, a
hazards
and operability (HAZOP) study for a complex process, and for less complex processes
a less
rigorous process, such as what-if scenarios, checklists, failure mode and effects
analysis, or fault
tree

Every PSM process needs an updated PHA at least every five years after the initial
analysis is completed.

the regulation requires emergency planning and response activity for companies with
more than 10 employees

Under the audits section of the PSM standard employers are required to certify that
they
have evaluated their compliance with the standard at least every three years.

On June 20,1996, the EPA published the Risk Management Plan (RMP) as a final rule

The RMP regulation is aimed at decreasing the number and magnitude of accidental
releases
of toxic and flammable substances. Although the RMP is similar to the PSM
regulation
in many respects, the RMP is designed to protect off-site people and the
environment, whereas
PSM is designed to protect on-site people
The RMP is required for plant sites that use more than a specified threshold
quantity of regulated highly hazardous
chemicals. The RMP is a site responsibility (the site may have several processes),
whereas PSM covers every covered process on the site.

The RMP has the following elements:

hazard assessment,
prevention program,
emergency response program,
documentation that is maintained on the site and submitted to federal, state, and
local
authorities. This information is also shared with the local community.

Dispersion model calculations are normally used to estimate downwind concentrations

The RMP requires only an analysis of the consequence and not the probability

The second requirement of the RMP is a prevention program. The prevention program
has 11 elements, compared to the 14 elements of the PSM standard.

Chronic effects, however, arise from repeated exposures to low concentrations,

mostly by
small leaks

Evaluating Exposures to Volatile Toxicants by Monitoring

REFER PAGE NUMBER-79 FOR FORMULAS (CHEMICAL PROCESS SAFETY FUNDAMENTALS WITH
APPLICATION 2ND EDITION)