The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) announced on Sept. 25 that it will launch a new program to address hazards from exposure to fertilizer-grade ammonium nitrate and agricultural anhydrous ammonia. The Regional Emphasis Program (REP) starts on Oct. 1, and will be effective in the states of Arkansas, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Texas.
OSHA said the program will begin with a three-month period of education and prevention outreach to encourage employers to bring their facilities into compliance with existing OSHA standards. Enforcement activities will begin after the outreach period and run through Sept. 30, 2019, unless extended.
“This program is an enforcement tool to emphasize the obligations under existing OSHA standards,” said Kimberly Stille, OSHA regional administrator in Kansas City, Mo. “The 90-day outreach period is an opportunity for employers to proactively seek compliance assistance to ensure they are adequately protecting workers.”
OSHA said workers employed in the storage, mixing/blending, and distribution of fertilizer face multiple hazards that can lead to serious injury, illness, and death, including fire and explosions, as well as exposure to toxic gases and hazardous chemicals.
OSHA said it offers compliance assistance to all employers at no charge. Each state has an On-Site Consultation Program, a free and confidential program to help small- and medium-sized employers learn about potential hazards at their workplace and improve safety and health programs.
OSHA’s website contains standards and guidance for the storage and handling of both anhydrous ammonia and ammonium nitrate, based on a list of practices and codes developed by the federal government and various industry groups. These include OSHA 1910.111 – Storage and Handling of Anhydrous Ammonia; OSHA 29 CFR 1910.109(i) – Storage of Ammonium Nitrate; Joint EPA-OSHA-ATF guidance – Chemical Advisory: Safe Storage, Handling, and Management of Ammonium Nitrate; Joint Institute of Makers of Explosives and National Stone, Sand, and Gravel Association guidance – Safety and Security Guidelines for Ammonium Nitrate; and The National Fire Protection Association Hazardous Materials Code (NFPA 400) chapter 11 on ammonium nitrate.
“The goal is to improve worker safety and reduce the potential for catastrophic incidents,” said Eric Harbin, OSHA’s acting regional administrator in Dallas. “At the end of the day, we want to ensure workers go home safely to their families.”
The new program comes exactly two years after OSHA attempted to expand its Process Safety Management (PSM) standard to cover retail facilities that handle anhydrous ammonia. In response to the West Fertilizer Co. tragedy, OSHA in 2015 issued a revised interpretation of the PSM’s retail exemption that more narrowly defined the term “retail facility,” and, as a result, required an estimated 3,800 anhydrous ammonia dealers who had previously claimed the exemption to come into PSM compliance.
The revised PSM was slated to take effect at the end of September 2016, but was challenged (GM Sept. 21, 2015) by The Fertilizer Institute (TFI) and the Agricultural Retailers Association (ARA), and also opposed by a number of farm-state legislators and state departments of agriculture (GM May 20, 2016). The revised PSM was ultimately blocked by a federal appeals court in September 2016 (GM Sept. 23, 2016).
OSHA in October 2013 issued 24 serious safety violations against Adair Grain Inc., the owner of West Fertilizer, which carried citations and fines totaling $118,300 (GM Oct. 14, 2013).