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The dangers of working in oil refineries have become a major priority of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA. 

Policy changes going along with that new emphasis will benefit Alaska worker safety, and should also be good news for Alaska residents. Hazardous conditions at oil refineries have caused numerous deaths during the past few years.

OSHA is wrapping up its investigation into one such accident at a refinery near Houston, TX, that killed 15 workers and injured more than 100. The plant is owned and operated by BP.

Some of the measures that OSHA has taken in the wake of that tragedy include:

• Hiring more refinery  inspectors
• Inspecting refineries more often
• Enforcing stricter standards for safety

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has added new refinery inspectors and has embarked on a training program. So far, according to Edwin G. Foulke Jr., Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA, the agency has trained more than 160 OSHA staff to conduct what are called Process Safety Management inspections, or PSMs. “By August of this year we will have 280 PSM-trained inspectors,” he said

That way, OSHA should be assured of inspecting every refinery in the U.S. under its authority, through the new National Emphasis Program.

All of the inspections are conducted not only by OSHA, but also by its state affiliates.

The Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) held a hearing recently on the Houston refinery tragedy of the spring of 2005.

In that tragedy, flames shot into the air thousands of feet, and ash rained down on the area neighboring the plant. The refinery had employed 1,800 workers. And it processed 433,000 barrels of crude oil every day. That represents 3% of the country’s total processing capacity. Gas prices went up sharply in the summer of 2006. The loss of production as a result of the Houston explosion was partly responsible for those higher prices.

The U.S. Department of Labor has concluded that oil companies will not voluntarily institute protections of their refinery workers, regardless of the Houston tragedy. Six months after the explosion, OSHA inspected another plant owned and operated by BP, this one in Ohio. It found that BP had not corrected any of the problems.

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