On February 6, 2014, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration cited Solvay Specialty Polymers for 12 violations, and proposed $77,000 in fines for said violations. These violations centered around exposing workers to chemical hazards from solvents and came after an investigation of the company’s plant in Marietta, Ohio.

“The plant needs to ensure all equipment and processes receive the proper evaluation and scrutiny before the use of these highly hazardous chemicals. Workers must be trained to handle these chemicals safely,” said Deborah Zubaty, OSHA’s area director in Columbus. “Process safety management programs are designed to prevent the catastrophic release of highly hazardous chemicals and to prevent workers from being exposed to these harmful chemicals.”

Eleven serious and one repeat violation were issued. The repeat violation was issued for failing to follow recognized good engineering practices. The eleven serious violations were all related to OSHA’s Process Safety Management Standard. The Process Safety Management Standard is a detailed set of requirements and procedures which address hazards that are associated with hazardous chemicals.

If you own a company that uses hazardous chemicals and you have not recently ensured you are up to code with the safety management standard, it might be a good time to have your safety and health management system audited by a professional third party auditing firm. OSHA is constantly auditing companies, searching for violations; third party audits can go a long way in protecting your company.

If you have any questions about OSHA’s Process Safety Management Standard or about third party audits, please contact us. If you have anything to add about either of these topics, please leave a comment.