Update On Rule To Protect Workers From Heat Injury And Illness
On July 2, 2024, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration published a proposed rule designed to protect workers from illness and injury associated with heat exposure. This proposed rule follows an “Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking” that goes back to 2021. This proposed rule has been expected for some time.
Since the ANPRM, OSHA has had a National Emphasis Program on heat injury and illness, and they’ve had materials on their website for several years before that. When the NEP came out and the ANPRM was published, OSHA targeted a few industries for initial enforcement. Two of those were warehousing and agriculture.
In the first couple of years of the NEP, at least 13 gins were “randomly” selected in one region for inspection under the heat NEP. Their association had worked with the gins in the region to get materials in the hands of those gins and raise awareness, and no citations for heat were written.
This begs the question “citations for what?” There was no standard against which to write a citation. They were attempting to write citations on the “General Duty Clause.” We’ve discussed the General Duty Clause several times before, but in short, it means if you know something is a hazard, and there’s a way to mitigate it, you have a duty to fix it — no standard needed.
Employer Requirements
The newly proposed Heat Injury and Illness standard contains a long list of things that employers need to do to comply. These steps are based on trigger levels.
If any employees are required to work in an environment with a heat index of 80 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 min or more, the employer must take certain steps including having a Heat Illness and Injury Prevention Plan (HIIPP). Also required are things like heat index monitoring and employee training. The details of these programs would require way more space than is available here.
A heat index above 90 degrees F would be a “High Heat Trigger.” Additional steps would have to be observed including monitoring the heat index or wet bulb globe temperature, implementing an observation or buddy system and prescribed breaks of 15 min every two hours.
Also included in the standard are acclimatization procedures for getting new or newly returning workers used to working in
the heat. This may limit the duties of new employes for some period until they’re used to the heat.
This proposed rule applies to indoor and outdoor work, and we expect it will apply to agriculture and warehousing as well
Time To Get Started
As of this writing, the rule has not been published in the Federal Register, so we don’t have an effective date or even know when comments can be sent. To prepare and get more information, go to www.osha.gov/heat for the materials you can use today to get started on your program.
There you will find a lot of very good and well written information you can use and share with your employees. Make sure you have someone on staff trained to recognize and treat someone with heat-related illnesses and particularly watch those new employees as they get used to working in the heat.
Yeah, we know we live in the South. We could end up with a heat index above 80 degrees for the vast majority of the year. We still need to pay attention to this proposed rule. Take steps today to get ahead of it and document the things you’re already doing to keep your employees safe from heat injuries and illnesses.
Dusty Findley, CEO of the Southeastern Cotton Ginners Association, contributed this article. Contact him at 706-344-1212 or dusty@southern-southeastern.org.
Donations Are Being Accepted For The Calvin B. Parnell Faculty Fellowship
Dr. Calvin B. Parnell was a professor at Texas A&M for many years. He was a key part of the development of the cotton module builder and the 1D3D cyclone. Dr. Parnell was very
passionate about the cotton ginning industry.
The Wesson Family Foundation has donated $50,000 to establish the Dr. Calvin B. Parnell Faculty Fellowship. They also established the Wesson Family Foundation Matching Fund for $100,000, available until Dec. 31, 2024. Expenditures from this non-endowed fund will be used to match donations of $2,000 and above given to the Dr. Calvin B. Parnell Faculty Fellowship.
To date, about $24,000 of the matching funds have been used, leaving roughly $76,000 in matching funds available to reach the overall goal of $250,000 for the Endowed Fellowship honoring Dr. Parnell. Please help us in achieving this goal by the end of the year.
The intent of the Dr. Calvin B. Parnell Faculty Fellowship is to recognize excellence in performance as a Biological and Agricultural Engineering faculty member, with particular emphasis on mentoring departmental students, as Dr. Calvin B. Parnell effectively did during his years on the Texas A&M faculty.
If you would like to donate an amount lower than $2,000, but still have it be matched, the Cotton Industry Support Group (CISG), is a 501(c)(3) organization for tax purposes, and Kelley is the Chairman of CISG. If your donation is less than $2,000 and you send it to CISG, CISG will pool your funds with other donations and send you a charitable donation receipt for your taxes.
Once CISG receives $2,000 in donations, they will donate to the Texas A&M Foundations for the Dr. Calvin B. Parnell Fellowship so we can maximize our use of the matching funds that the Wesson Family has so graciously provided.
Donations to CISG can be mailed to the TCGA office. Go to https://www.txamfoundation.com to give directly to the Texas A&M Foundation.
TCGA provided this information.