For several years, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration has been working on a safety standard intended to address worker exposure to heat stress and related medical issues. With summer temperatures quickly approaching, employers should be aware of potential enforcement action from OSHA even in the absence of a specific heat exposure standard.

For the past several summers, OSHA has announced its intent to use the General Duty Clause (GDC) to cite companies it contends have exposed workers to unreasonable risk of death or injury due to heat stress. The GDC is a catch-all provision in the OSH Act that permits the agency to cite companies for safety risks even in the absence of a specific standard governing those activities. While OSHA has a higher legal burden to support GDC citations, the agency can issue penalties to employers deemed not to have followed generally accepted safety practices prevalent in their industries.

For heat stress, OSHA uses the standard recommended by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) for occupational heat exposure as the basis for GDC citations. The NIOSH standard calls for implementation of cooling breaks, water availability, and other steps when the Wet Bulb Global Temperature (WBGT) exceeds certain levels. The WBGT level combines heat and humidity to determine dangerous exposure levels.

The federal OSHA standard under development is expected to incorporate much of the NIOSH guidelines and apply to both outdoor and indoor work activities. California, Colorado, Minnesota, Oregon, and Washington have implemented heat stress rules for workers in those states. For other employers, development and implementation of heat exposure policies can help avoid employee injury and illness, avoid OSHA enforcement under the GDC, and anticipate likely compliance obligations once the federal OSHA heat standard is released.

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