Health and safety Stuff A Couple of Definitions

Health and Safety Stuff: Your Right (and need) to Know MSDS: Material Safety Data Sheet The Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) is a summary of the important health related facts about a chemical used in our work or home environment. The purpose of the MSDS is “to inform industrial purchasers and users of hazardous chemicals of the reasonably foreseeable physical and chemical hazards that may arise from the use of those chemicals.” Most products we use in our day to day work and lives have MSDS There is a generally accepted format for MSDS’s --- BUT THEY ARE NOT ALL THE SAME.

Health and Safety Stuff: Your Right (and need) to Know TLV:Threshold Limit Value TLV is the concentration of material to which a person can be exposed Day after Day without adverse effects There three Kinds of TLV’s TLV – TWA: TWA=Time weighted Average --- for example an average over a 40 hour work week or over an 8 hour day TLV-STEL: The max concentration for 15 min exposures at most 4 times a day with at least 1 hour between exposures TLV-C: Ceiling Limit – NEVER EXCEED THIS LIMIT EVEN INSTANTANEOUSLY>

Health and Safety Stuff: Your Right (and need) to Know Immediately Dangerous to Life and Health (IDLH) “An atmosphere that poses immediate threat to life, would cause irreversible adverse health effects or would impair an individual’s ability to escape from a dangerous atmosphere.”