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An air contaminant is any substance that is accidentally or unintentionally introduced into the air, having the effect of rendering the air toxic or harmful to some degree.
OSHA’s requirements protect employees from occupational exposure to air contaminants. The regulation applies to all workers who may be subjected to workplace air contaminants. The regulation lists various substances along with permissible exposure limits (PELs).
You do not have to handle a container of hazardous chemicals to be concerned with exposure to air contaminants. For example, idling vehicles emit engine exhaust that contains hazardous carbon monoxide. OSHA has a permissible exposure limit of 50 parts per million as an eight-hour time-weighted average for exposure to carbon monoxide. An employer must ensure employees are not overexposed to carbon monoxide if there is engine exhaust present.
Healthcare employee exposure to hazardous chemicals may include pesticides, disinfectants, and hazardous drugs in the workplace. While OSHA does not have specific standard for every healthcare contaminant, the Agency may use the General Duty Clause of the OSH Act to hold employers responsible for protecting workers.
Over 23 percent of surveyed warehousing and storage industry employees were regularly exposed to vapors, gas, dust, or fumes at work twice a week or more during the previous 12 months. Source: 2010 National Health Interview Survey sponsored by NIOSH.
Because the organic material in tobacco doesn’t burn completely, cigarette smoke contains more than 4,700 chemical compounds. Although OSHA has no regulation that addresses environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) as a whole, the Air Contaminants Standard at 29 CFR 1910.1000 limits employee exposure to several of the main chemical components found in tobacco smoke. However, OSHA indicates that in normal situations, exposures would not exceed these permissible exposure limits (PELs), and, as a matter of prosecutorial discretion, OSHA will not apply the General Duty Clause (Section 5(a)(1) of the OSH Act) to ETS. Source: OSHA Policy on Indoor Air Quality: Office Temperature/Humidity and Environmental Tobacco Smoke, February 24, 2003.
Employers must: