The tightly-knit Washington OSHA subculture will be out in force this Thursday no matter what the wind-chill factor is to attend an all-day (9-4:30) hearing at the Labor Department set up to, in Washington-speak, “allow interested parties to comment on the proposed rule to improve tracking of workplace injuries and illnesses.

The Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) will vote on the draft regulatory report of the August 6, 2012, fire at the Chevron refinery that endangered 19 workers and sent more than 15,000 residents to the hospital for medical attention at its public meeting on January 15.

Dr. David Michaels, Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA and Dr. John Howard, Director of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), spoke recently at the 2013 National Worker Safety and Health Conference in Baltimore, Maryland.

In a recently released draft report, the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) proposes recommendations for substantial changes to the way refineries are regulated in California. Entitled “Regulatory Report: Chevron Richmond Refinery Pipe Rupture and Fire,” the CSB draft calls on California to replace the current patchwork of largely reactive and activity-based regulations with a more rigorous, performance-based regulatory regime – similar to those successfully adopted overseas in regions such as the United Kingdom, Norway, and Australia – known as the “safety case” system.