There are a number of reasons why occupational hygienists carry out workplace exposure monitoring, but in the majority of cases the primary objective will be to determine the degree of risk due to inhalation so that we can decide on whether exposure is adequately controlled. In such cases we need a benchmark against which the results can be compared – in other works an occupational exposure limit (OEL). If we don’t have a limit then it is almost impossible to decide on whether there’s a problem or not and the sampling exercise can then raise more questions than it answers as workers and managers will want to know what the results represent.
In the United Kingdom the Health and Safety Executive publish Workplace Exposure Limits (WELs) that can be used by employers to demonstrate whether exposure is adequately controlled. The WELs are published by the HSE in their document EH40 “Workplace Exposure Limits”.
A new edition of EH40 was released in December last year which replaced the previous version, first published in 2005. It includes the new limits that came into force on 18 December for a number of substances including mercury, phenol and sulphuric acid mist. A hard copy can be purchased from HSE Books but it can also be downloaded free of charge from here.
At one time a new edition of EH40 was published every year as there were always a number of new limits introduced and changes to existing WELs. This was because the HSE used to devote significant resources to reviewing the effects of hazardous substances and setting exposure limits. However, a number of years ago they made a conscious decision to reduce the resources that they were devoting to setting WELs. This has meant that since the 2005 edition of EH40 was published there have been very few changes other than those required by the European Union. The changes included in the newly published version of EH40 all originated from the EU as European Indicative Occupational Exposure Values (IOELVs). It is mandatory for member states to implement these limits within a specified timescale and Member States’ domestic limits must be at least as stringent as the IOLEV.
The change in the HSE’s policy on setting WELs was, and still is, very controversial – at least as far as occupational hygienists are concerned. WELs are an important tool. One argument the HSE would make is that it is more effective to devote their scarce resources into developing advice on controls. I’ve some sympathy with this view but there are a wide range of different approaches that can be applied to any situation where exposure needs to be controlled, all involving different levels of expenditure. The best control approach will reduce exposure to an acceptable level without entailing more cost than necessary. So, to decide what is appropriate we need some measure of what is an acceptable level of exposure, which brings us back to the need for a benchmark – i.e. a credible exposure limit.
It could be argued that the onus on setting limits has been passed on to the producer of hazardous substances by the requirement to develop a “derived no effect level” (DNEL) under the EU Regulation on the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation & restriction of CHemicals (REACH). However the procedure for setting DNELs normally results in a very low value well below any OELs that may have been assigned. Applying DNELs in the real world could result in an over cautious approach to control, so their suitability for use as OELs in practice is questionable.
There’s a database of OELs set by various EU member states, Canada (Québec), Japan, Switzerland, and the United States published by GESTIS, a joint project of the German Social Accident Insurance Institutions. The database, in English, is accessible online here. They’ve also produced an app for the iPhone and iPad which can be downloaded via the iTunes App store. A number of other databases on different aspects of hazardous substances, including one of sampling and analytical methods, are available via their website, so it’s a very useful resource for occupational hygienists.
John Cherrie of the Institute of Occupational Medicine in Edinburgh has recently used the GESTIS database to review limits for a number of substances. His findings that there can be a considerable variation in the OELs set by different countries and in many cases the UK had the highest OEL for a given substance, are very interesting.
Recognition, Evaluation, Control 