Help

BI’s Article search uses Boolean search capabilities. If you are not familiar with these principles, here are some quick tips.

To search specifically for more than one word, put the search term in quotation marks. For example, “workers compensation”. This will limit your search to that combination of words.

To search for a combination of terms, use quotations and the & symbol. For example, “hurricane” & “loss”.

Login Register Subscribe

OSHA proposes beryllium rule revision

Reprints
OSHA proposes beryllium rule revision

The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration has released a proposed beryllium rule that would modify standards for the construction and shipyard sectors, and announced it will not enforce the current standards on these industries without further notice.

The regulatory requirements featured in the January 2017 rule for the general industry will be unaffected by the proposal, the U.S. Department of Labor said Friday in a statement.

The proposed rule would maintain the permissible exposure limit at 0.2 micrograms per cubic meter and the short-term exposure limit of 2.0 micrograms per cubic meter over a 15-minute sampling period for the construction and shipyard industries. However, it will revise the application of ancillary provisions such as housekeeping and personal protective equipment included in the January rule for these industries.

“OSHA has evidence that exposure in these industries is limited to a few operations and has information suggesting that requiring the ancillary provisions broadly may not improve worker protection and be redundant with overlapping protections in other standards,” the agency said in its statement. “Accordingly, OSHA is seeking comment on, among other things, whether existing standards covering abrasive blasting in construction, abrasive blasting in shipyards and welding in shipyards provide adequate protection for workers engaged in these operations.”

The proposed rule is scheduled to be published in the Federal Register on June 27, and OSHA will conduct a 60-day comment period.

Read Next

  • Another delay proposed for OSHA beryllium rule

    The U.S. Department of Labor has proposed delaying the effective date of the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s beryllium rule again, in keeping with President Donald Trump’s regulatory freeze.