Practical EHS Tips, News & Advice. Updated Daily.
As today’s workplace becomes more complex, regulation of that workplace increases. In this section, you’ll find the practical advice you need to understand exactly what OSHA, other federal agencies, and their state counterparts, require of you, and to comply in the ways that best satisfy both your and their needs. Look also for important court decisions, advice on how to handle enforcement actions, and news of upcoming changes in workplace health and safety law.
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The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has resumed regular enforcement in 18 Florida counties affected by Hurricane Ian, the agency announced January 24. In the hurricane’s aftermath, the agency suspended most programmed enforcement actions in Brevard, Charlotte, Collier, DeSoto, Flagler, Hardee, Hendry, Highlands, Lake, Lee, Manatee, Okeechobee, Orange, Osceola, Polk, Sarasota, Seminole, and Volusia […]
The EPA unveiled new website tools, the PFAS Analytic Tools, this month. Designed to help the “public, researchers, and other stakeholders better understand potential PFAS sources in their communities,” the tools provide “multiple sources of information in one spot with mapping, charting, and filtering functions,” which allows the public to see where testing has been […]
An Alabama plastics manufacturing company has pleaded guilty in federal court to violations of Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) safety requirements that led to a worker’s death, the agency announced January 24. ABC Polymer Industries LLC agreed to pay $242,928 in restitution, plus funeral expenses, to the worker’s estate. The company also must pay […]
Discount retailer Dollar General is facing $395,717 in new Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) fines for five repeat workplace safety violations, the agency announced January 23. In an inspection of a West Lafayette, Ohio, location, federal investigators found workers exposed to blocked emergency exits and electrical panels and boxes of merchandise stacked at unsafe […]
Six safety lapses led to an April 2018 refinery explosion and fire at the Husky Superior Refinery in Superior, Wisconsin, that injured 36 workers, caused roughly $550 million in damage to the facility, and released 39,000 pounds of flammable hydrocarbon vapor into the air, according to a final report released December 29 by the U.S. […]
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) cited workplace safety and health violations at three Amazon warehouses in Deltona, Florida; Waukegan, Illinois; and New Windsor, New York, the agency announced January 18. OSHA also issued hazard alert letters to all three warehouses after finding workers exposed to ergonomic hazards. Amazon faces new proposed penalties totaling […]
Underground Utilities, an Ohio excavation contractor, is facing Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) fines totaling $251,517 for violations at three trenching worksites following the death of a 33-year-old worker in Columbus, the agency announced January 17. The worker was pinned between the “spreader” bars of a trench box and the wall of a 7-foot-deep […]
Nearly a decade after the EPA called for additional soil sampling at the Vertac Inc. Superfund Site in Jacksonville, Arkansas, tests have not yet been performed, reports a December 18, 2021, Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette article. Superfund is the more commonly known name for the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), a law enacted […]
A Trenton, New Jersey, roofing contractor faces Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) penalties totaling $584,333 for fall protection and other violations at a Toll Brothers Inc. residential construction project, the agency announced January 12. The agency cited Guelsin Lima, operating as Extreme Roofing and Siding LLC, for nine willful and three serious violations. During […]
Thirty Big Oil companies, including Chevron Corp., Citgo Petroleum Corp., Exxon Mobile Corp., and Shell Oil Products Co., have petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) to ask for its review of a combined group of climate change liability cases led by San Mateo County, California. The question presented to SCOTUS “encompasses a threshold issue that […]