February 2012
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Welcome to the final edition of the Science and Research Outlook (SRO) Newsletter. I would like to thank you for your support and hope you have found the newsletters interesting and informative. I would also like to thank the Steel Construction Institute for developing and hosting the SRO site over the past 7 years. In our final issue we have the usual wide range of topics including hand arm vibration, leadership and worker engagement, keeping loads stable in rigid sided lorries, the effectiveness of local exhaust ventilation systems and oil contamination of fire retardant overalls. From April 2012 we will be transferring to an in-house system that will allow you to receive all the latest information on recently published and commissioned Health and Safety Executive (HSE) funded research via a HSE Research bulletin. If you are subscribed to SRO you will be automatically subscribed to the new bulletin, but can unsubscribe from it at any time. If you do not wish to be subscribed then please unsubscribe from SRO before 20 February 2012 via the 'My Details' page. The next message you receive from us will be from the hse@public.govdelivery.com email account. As before, the information you provide will be secure and will only be used by HSE.
Leadership and worker involvement on the Olympic Park
This research considers leadership and worker involvement practice across selected projects on the London 2012 Olympic Park. The aim was to understand the degree to which the various approaches impacted positively or negatively on worker involvement in health and safety matters, and identify what could potentially be transferable both to other construction projects and to industry more widely.
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Hand-arm vibration of horticultural machinery
In recent years there have been many cases of Hand Arm Vibration Syndrome (HAVS) being reported for people who work in agriculture, horticulture and landscape gardening. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and the Health and Safety Laboratory (HSL) do not currently hold much information on vibration exposures in these areas of work. The work described in these reports (RR884 and RR894) assesses the standard test defined in BS EN 836:1997 and BS EN ISO 10517:2009 for repeatability and ease of use and where possible for reproducibility (by comparing machine manufacturers’ declared vibration against HSL measurements to the same standardised procedures).
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Safe crossing on high speed roads
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) funded this work to assess the adequacy of current guidance - HSE Construction Information Sheet 53 (CIS53) - aimed at clients, designers and workers involved in road works on motorways/high speed dual carriageways (50mph or greater). The work has comprised of: a literature review; observing workers setting up temporary traffic management; and analysis of traffic flow data.
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Gas conveyance hazards
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) recognises that there is increasing interest in the use of non-conventional source (NCS) gases and that conveyance of the gas from the source to the end user will be through the existing natural gas grid. All gas transported and used has to comply with the Gas Safety (Management) Regulations [GS(M)R] and this raises questions with regard to the suitability of the NCS gas within the network and the possible additional hazards that may result over and above those associated with natural gas.
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Assessment of LEV effectiveness
Colophony or Rosin Based Solder Flux Fume is a known cause of occupational asthma and as such exposure to it should be controlled. An effective method of engineering exposure control is to use local exhaust ventilation (LEV) to extract the fume at source. Personal exposure to solder fume was quantitatively measured in the breathing zone of a manikin, these exposures were then compared to those caused by uncontrolled soldering in order to assess five different LEV systems.
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Routes to competence in construction
The health and safety record of the UK construction sector is a prime focus of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), combining as it does, high fatality and injury rates with relatively high rates of work-related ill-health. Persuasive proof of the link between competence and health and safety is difficult to demonstrate but, nevertheless, 'competence' has been central to improving the sector’s health and safety performance since the late 1980s.
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Fire retardant overalls
Overalls become oil-contaminated very rapidly in many work situations, particularly offshore, in some cases within one day. From time to time, there are significant hydrocarbon fires offshore (e.g. on the Rough Platform). There is evidence that frequent washing reduces the fire retardant properties of some materials, thereby increasing personal risk to persons and compromising their safety in a fire.
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Public exposure to silica
The purpose of this pilot study was to assess the potential for inadvertent exposure of the public to respirable crystalline silica (RCS) from construction activities. The study assessed the respirable dust (RD) from demolition, block cutting, road building, general construction activities and city centre air from 13 visits to 7 sites. In total, 48 samples from the construction activities and 11 city centre air samples, for comparison, were collected.
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Load security on rigid-sided lorries
The project seeks to establish good practice for securing loads on rigid-sided lorries across various industry sectors. Good practice in this case is defined as those methods that are the most practical, involve the least risk of loads becoming unstable or falling, least risk to the operator/driver, and are practicable.
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Leadership and worker engagement
This report summarises the final phase of a project ongoing since 2007 and funded by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), aiming to improve health and safety practices in construction through leadership and worker engagement (LWE). A web-based, interactive toolkit was developed with Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in mind. In-depth feedback (workshops, focus groups, interviews) was obtained from 17 companies (13 SMEs) at key milestones. In parallel, the validity and reliability of a Health and Safety (cultural) Diagnostic Tool (HSDT) contained within the toolkit was examined.
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Exposure to metalworking fluids
The potential impact of the use of compressed air for the removal of residual metalworking fluids on health was investigated using a test chamber approach followed by a workplace study. The former had the advantage in that the background levels of particles could be reduced significantly. The greatest risk was found to be dermal exposure due to large droplets of MWF coating the worker’s torso and arms.
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To The Future
In this, the last edition of the SRO, we thought we would look back over the futures topics presented in the twelve previous editions.
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Research Projects Update
This article lists a selection of recently completed HSE research projects, with links to full project details found on this site.
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