LABORATORY SAFETY HANDBOOK HAZARDOUS WASTE GENERATOR HANDBOOK

LABORATORY SAFETY HANDBOOKHAZARDOUS WASTEGENERATOR HANDBOOKAdapted from LSW Handbook from Carnegie MelonEdited by: Ian SeilerDepartment Of ChemistryCentral Washington University

Laboratory Safety and Hazardous Waste GeneratorInformationPart 1 Laboratory SafetyAIntroductory InformationPage2 OSHA Applicable Regulations Laboratory Safety training Chemical Hygiene Officer Determining Employee Exposures Chemical Hygiene PlanBIdentifying/Understanding the Hazards of Your Chemicals C Dexposure to Hazardous Chemicals Permissible Exposure and AirMonitoring Medical Monitoring Detecting Releases of ChemicalsWorking Safety with Hazardous Materials Fume HoodsProtective EquipmentChemical Purchasing, Handling, StorageHousekeeping and MaintenanceGeneral Rules of Work 11Compressed Gas SafetyHandling PHS MaterialsPrior Approval, Working AloneUnattended OperationsEmergency Response 15 Emergency AwarenessShowers and EyewashesSpill clean-up kits Small-scale Spill ResponseFire ExtinguishersPart 2 Hazardous Waste GenerationAIntroductory Information BCD Other W aste Items18Defining a Hazardous Waste19Satellite Accumulation RequirementsIdentification of Hazardous WasteWaste Pick-ups Hazardous Waste Tags Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Recover Needles, SharpsCompressed GasesWaste Minimization FTraining and InstructionRemoval of Hazardous Waste from the Lab E Accumulating Hazardous Waste 2122Minimizing Waste in a LaboratoryOther Waste Streams Page17ApplicabilityThe RegulationsDefining Hazardous Wastes 4 Signs and Symptoms of Over-Container Labels[Material] Safety Data SheetsOther Information SourcesThe Chemical InventoryUnderstanding the Hazards Present inYOUR laboratory23Biological WastesBroken Glass 1

Laboratory SafetyA. Introductory InformationThis DocumentCentral Washington University provides safety instruction to employees who work inlaboratories with hazardous chemicals. This document supplements the information providedin the Lab Safety training class and is designed to be retained and used as a safetyreference by university lab workers.The OSHA Applicable Regulations1. The OSHA Lab StandardThe United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has promulgateda regulation that is applicable to all employees who work in a laboratory with hazardouschemicals. It is entitled "Occupational exposure to hazardous chemicals in laboratories" andis generally spoken of as the "Lab Standard". The Lab Standard has the followingrequirements of employers: Prepare a Chemical Hygiene Plan (CHP) outlining how the employer will comply withthe requirements of the regulationMaintain employee exposures below the OSHA permissible exposure limits (PELs)Determine employee exposures to hazardous chemicalsProvide employees with information and training about hazardous chemicals, their useand their hazardsOffer medical consultations in cases of potential over-exposures to hazardous chemicalsIdentify the hazards of the chemicals employees work withIdentify respirator use and limitationsInformation on each of these items will be presented in this handout and in the Lab Safetytraining class.2. Emergency ResponseAnother OSHA regulation, "Hazardous waste operations and emergency response", alsoaddresses workers in laboratory areas. All persons who work with hazardous chemicals mayhave a responsibility in the event of a spill or leak of a hazardous chemical. This regulationrequires that such persons be trained in the proper actions, should this occur. Theseresponse procedures will be addressed later in this handout and in the Lab Safety class.2

The Chemical Hygiene OfficerOSHA requires that employers of laboratory workers name a Chemical Hygiene Officer (CHO)to oversee the requirements of the Lab Standard.The CHO for Central Washington University is:James HudsonDepartment of Environmental Health and SafetyPhone:509-963-2338Email:JHudson@cwu.eduThe Chemical Hygiene PlanOSHA also requires the preparation of a Chemical Hygiene Plan (CHP) to outline how CentralWashington University will comply with the Lab Standard. It contains procedures andrequirements that all laboratory workers must follow. This document is available to employees oflaboratories in one of three ways: The EH&S web site, m the EH&S office, FMD BuildingContained in your research lab’s specific Chemical Hygiene Plan BinderLaboratory Safety TrainingThe Lab Standard mandates that all laboratory workers receive training in the details of theChemical Hygiene Plan and the OSHA Laboratory Standard. The Central WashingtonUniversity Department of Chemistry performs this training on a regular basis, generally thefirst Friday of each quarter, or by making a request to either the Department Safety Officer orcampus Environmental Health and Safety. It is the responsibility of the individual laboratorysupervisors and Principal Investigators (PIs) to ensure that all new employees receive thistraining before the first day of their employment.This training is REQUIRED once for all new or re-assigned lab employees. Completing arefresher module (performed electronically) is required every three years as well.Determining Employee ExposuresThe laboratory workers at CWU work with hundreds of different chemicals in scores of differentways. It is not practical to perform air monitoring to evaluate each of these different potentialchemical exposures. To ensure that all laboratory chemical exposures remain belowapplicable limits, the University instead requires laboratory workers to follow the requirementspresented in the Chemical Hygiene Plan and in the Laboratory Safety training class. Adherenceto these mandates will ensure that employee exposures remain at a safe level.3

Laboratory SafetyB. Identifying and Understanding the Hazards of YourChemicalsIdentifying a Chemical's HazardsWhen you work with a chemical material in the laboratory, it is important to know whether thematerial is hazardous, and also to know what those hazards are. There are a number of waysyou can obtain this information:Container LabelsOne of the requirements manufacturers have when they supply the chemicals you buy is to puta proper and complete label on the container. By law, they must indicate the name of theproduct and list the hazardous ingredients present. The label must also provide informationregarding the hazards associated with using the material. This is often done both with textinformation as well as with symbols. There are two common symbols used on labels to quicklyprovide information of the relative hazards of a material. One is called the National FireProtection Association (NFPA) warning diamond, which appears below as Figure 1. The otheris the Hazard Materials Information System (HMIS) system, which appears below as Figure 2.Both systems use a numerical rating of hazards in each of three colored sections (healthhazard, fire/flammability hazard and reactivity hazard).Figure 1Figure 2Numbers in these three sections can range from 0 to 4. Use the following guide to help youevaluate the hazard numbers.Health hazard(blue portion)Fire/flammabilityhazard(red portion)0 - Ordinary combustible hazards in a fire1 - Slightly hazardous2 - Hazardous3 - Extreme danger4 - Deadly0 - Will not burn1 - Will ignite if preheated2 - Will ignite if moderately heated3 - Will ignite at most ambient conditions4 - Burns readily at ambient conditions4

Reactivity hazard(yellow portion)0 - Stable and not reactive with water1 - Unstable if heated2 - Violent chemical change3 - Shock and heat may detonate4 - May detonateThe bottom, white section is used for other hazard warnings. For example:“CORR” means the material is corrosive“OXY” means the material is an oxidizerThere are two applicable rules for us regarding the labeling of chemical containers:1. You are NOT permitted to remove or deface a manufacturer's label from a container until thecontainer has been emptied.2. All secondary chemical containers (such as wash bottles, containers with specially prepareddilutions or mixtures, or any different storage container we have placed hazardous materialsinto) must be labeled. In other words, ALL containers in the laboratory must be labeled withat least the container contents.In March of 2012, OSHA revised its Hazard Communication Standard. While this regulationdoes not DIRECTLY affect laboratory workers, portions of it will impact you. One of theserevisions addresses a different set of pictograms or symbols to indicate a particular hazard of achemical or other hazardous material (Figure 3). The Safety Officer has prepared a Fact Sheetthat describes the meaning of each of the pictograms. A copy of the Fact Sheet is available onour web page, informationSafety Data Sheets (formerly, Material Safety Data Sheets)A Safety Data Sheet (SDS) is a summary of safety related information for a chemical or otheritem containing hazardous ingredients. All manufacturers making such products are required byOSHA to send you an SDS when you first order the product and for subsequent orders if theinformation on the SDS has changed since the previous shipment. [NOTE: as of March 2012,the term “Safety Data Sheet” has replaced the term “Material Safety Data Sheet,” to makethe document compatible with Globally Harmonized System (GHS) of hazardinformation.] OSHA requires that employers save all SDS received and make them available to theapplicable employees. EH&S maintains the SDS that they receive; each individuallaboratory must also do this. CWU further requires the laboratory supervisor or principal investigator to ensure thatan SDS for all chemicals in the inventory is available to lab employees either through theweb or as a paper copy kept in or near the laboratory. SDS links are provided for mostmanufacturers on their websites. Additionally, the FileMaker service can be accessedvia the Chemistry web site, http://www.cwu.edu/chemistry/safety-data-sheets. SDS can besearched by chemical name, Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) number ormanufacturer/product number. Employees working with any hazardous chemical are toread its SDS prior to working with the material. One exception: In the case of ParticularlyHazardous Substances (PHS) materials (see page 14 of this document), a paper copy ofthe SDS must be in the laboratory where the material is used; you may not rely onthe web for these special hazards.5

The SDSs generally contain a lot of information, some of which may not be clear to you whenyou read it. Table 1 contains some information that should be of help to you in understandingthe SDS. The 16 sections are standard among all SDS!Figure 3: Globally Harmonized System PictogramsGHS FlammableGHS OxidizingGHS ExplosiveGHS Gas PressureGHS CorrosiveGHS EnvironmentalGHS Severe ToxicGHS Health Danger6GHS Exclamation Point