Campus Safety Links
The College of Engineering works with the Environmental Health and Safety Chemical Safety Office to determine best practices and ensure compliance with federal, state, and local chemical and environmental safety laws.
All labs are required to:
Have a current and accurate lab door emergency card. These door cards provide first glance information to an emergency responder. They allow responders to ensure they are prepared for whatever may be in the lab and warn responders who may not be adequately protected from the listed hazards not to enter. They also provide necessary contact information for custodians or others who may find or hear something amiss in the lab after hours.
Test emergency eyewashes weekly. Sediments and bacteria can build up in eyewash plumbing. In order to ensure that your eyewash is ready for use when needed, a lab member should be assigned to run and document eyewash testing each week. EH&S has a slideshow on what labs should be looking for in these tests. Contact the CoE Safety Office if you need new test record cards.
Maintain a complete inventory of hazardous chemicals on site, Safety Data Sheets (previously MSDS) for those chemicals, and a Laboratory Chemical Hygiene Plan (Lab CHP).
Labs are encouraged to store the inventory, SDS, and Lab CHP digitally, with a copy stored on a non-password protected thumb drive hanging near the door. This allows for easy updates as materials and procedures change in the lab and allows the lab to meet the OSHA requirement that “…Electronic access and other alternatives to maintaining paper copies of the safety data sheets are permitted as long as no barriers to immediate employee access in each workplace are created by such options.”
All SDS are available from the vendors. Many are also available from Chemical Safety Software.