Industrial Hygiene in Hazardous Environments

Employee safety should be the top priority of every company, but many focus more on profits than protection. However, failing to adequately protect employees from work hazards is illegal and can cost your company lots of money. If you’re trying to improve your company, especially in employee safety, then you need to improve industrial hygiene practices. Industrial hygiene is the science of controlling hazardous workplace conditions and is especially important in environments that work with hazardous materials and waste. Keep reading to learn how you can improve industrial hygiene for your workers.

Provide Proper PPE

PPE refers to personal protective equipment, which is equipment that employees wear to protect themselves from specific hazards around the workplace. Many companies allow workers to wear PPE as they see fit since they trust their adult employees to make mature, smart decisions. However, some employees may not understand all the potential risks within your facility and choose to leave some PPE off. For example, construction employees may understand the need for steel-toed boots but may think a respiratory mask is unnecessary unless they’re cutting something. Dust from cutting wood or metal can travel several feet away from the cutting location, which can cause respiratory problems for people within the vicinity. Provide respiratory masks and stress the importance of all employees wearing them when cutting or near cutting machinery so that they stay safe.

Label Hazardous Materials

Maybe your employees aren’t wearing the proper PPE because they don’t fully understand the hazardous materials within your facility. Using proper labels and storage and posting warning signs around the storage area can help your employees better understand the dangers of the materials they work with. If employees continue to lack awareness of potential risks, then take time to educate them on what specific labels and verbiage mean. Teach them the nine classes of hazardous waste they should know and what waste or materials are present at your facility, and how they can protect themselves from these hazards. Provide regular training for new and veteran employees so that everyone stays up-to-date on this important information.

Hire an Industrial Hygienist

Providing proper PPE and educating your employees on hazardous labels are two of the biggest ways to improve safety in the workplace. However, your company may have specific growth areas that you need help addressing. Industrial hygiene in hazardous environments is complex, and hiring an industrial hygienist can help you navigate that complexity more effectively.

An industrial hygienist will provide a consultation that identifies the hazards within your workplace. They will then help you create a plan to eliminate those hazards. Industrial hygiene hazards take one of these five forms: environmental, chemical, biological, physical, and ergonomic. You can examine these areas within your facility first and then let the industrial hygienist know where potential problems are to give them a head start.

Making your company a safer place to work is necessary if you want to protect and retain your employees. While the initiatives we’ve described above will cost money and may eat away at profits, it’s better to spend this money to keep your facility safe than allow your facility and its employees to crumble.