OSHA issued the Process Safety Management of Highly Hazardous Chemicals Standard (PSM) (29 CFR 1910.119) which contains requirements for the safe management of chemicals for companies that exceed OSHA’s threshold quantities for highly hazardous substances. This standard requires the establishment of a management program that includes conducting process hazard analyses, establishing detailed operating procedures, and includes other important requirements to mitigate the possibility of a serious, chemical related incident occurring at the facility.
Suppose you are a safety manager at a chemical manufacturing facility that manufactures concentrated nitric acid. You have heard that employees who load nitric acid into rail tank cars have been checking the pre-inspection checklist from the rail shipping office instead of actually inspecting the vehicles with the checklist in hand as required by the operating procedure. This has not been the first time the shipping crew has been lax about process safety related work rules. Based on this scenario, please compose a research paper which includes the following information:
Identify the chemical properties, uses, and primary hazards associated with common oxidizers including concentrated nitric acid.
Identify important occupational exposure limits (OELs) associated with at least 3 common oxidizers.
Identify PSM requirements that would be useful for preventing or minimizing the consequences of a significant oxidizer related incident.
Using the OSHA Standard and your own experience, justify and validate the importance of the PSM standard to your facility (if it stores and processes highly hazardous materials) or a facility that may impact your community or a near-by community. Examples might include a water treatment facility that utilizes liquefied chlorine gas, a coal fired power plant that utilizes liquefied chlorine gas for water treatment, a food processing plant with a large ammonia refrigeration system, a fertilizer manufacturing or storage facility, a chemical manufacturing facility, etc..
