Saying it has more members directly affected by the process safety management standard than any other union, the United Steelworkers filed a brief with the D.C. Circuit March 1 in support of the Department of Labor's position in the challenge to the standard brought by the Agricultural Retailers Association and others.

 

At issue in the agricultural industry's challenge to the Retail Memorandum issued by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration last summer. The memorandum attempted to clarify which businesses were covered by the PSM standard and which weren't. In 1992, OSHA issued an interpretive letter stating that any business that sold more than 50 percent of its chemicals directly to users was a retail facility.

 

The agency's 50 percent rule didn't address the size of such retailers, but the preamble to the process safety standard provided the example of a gas station for cars and trucks as the type of retailers excluded. OSHA's revision to the memorandum sought to address the agricultural grade ammonium nitrate blast at a fertilizer distribution center in West, Texas, in 2013.

 

Click Here to read more.