Industrial bakeries appear to have won a round in the regulation wars when state officials responded to their complaints and eased up on a proposed regulation requiring inspections for large bakery ovens.
Last month, the standards board of the California Occupational Safety and Health Administration agreed to modify its inspection regulation, reducing the required frequency of inspections and allowing more flexibility. The changes came after considerable industry criticism of the proposed regulation.
The rule would affect about 8,000 large bakery ovens throughout the state. Those are operated by grocery store chains, commercial bakeries, and large facilities such as hospitals, schools and prisons. Thousands of small bakery ovens operated at most restaurants or small retail stores are exempt.
The proposed rule was in response to inconsistencies between California and federal safety standards regarding industrial oven inspections. Even though the federal government set the overall safety standards for large ovens, states have the responsibility of enforcement, which was impossible because the two sets of standards didn’t match.
The initial proposed inspection rule required that each large oven be inspected twice a month by workers at the facility and once each year by a qualified independent inspector. But that prompted an outcry in the public comments submitted from the industry.
For example, Patrick Singh, director of safety and loss control for Pleasanton-based Safeway Stores Inc., parent of Vons supermarkets, wrote that such frequent inspections would be “unnecessarily burdensome to employers and could actually endanger employees by exposing them to electrical hazards.”
In response to Singh’s complaints and others from the industry, the standards board amended the rule to allow for an unspecified number of “frequent” inspections by onsite workers. And it exempted high-tech ovens that have internal electronic inspection systems.
“Our standards are now more permissive than was originally required and in some cases are now more permissive than the federal standard,” said Hans Boersma, senior engineer with the standards board.
The board is soliciting input on its revised rule from the industry through Jan. 20. The regulation must be brought back before the board by its April meeting.
New Air Rules
The South Coast Air Quality Management District will consider adopting three major regulations impacting business at its Feb. 6 board meeting.
The rule likely to impact the most businesses focuses on lubricants, metal-treatment fluids and rust inhibitors commonly used by manufacturers, machine and auto body shops. These substances contain volatile organic compounds, which play a role in forming smog when they’re released into the air.
Proposed Rule 1144 restricts the concentrations of volatile organic compounds that can be in any of these substances; the limits range from 50 grams per liter to 300 grams per liter and go into effect over the next four years. To meet these limits, many of the fluids will have to be reformulated.
The board will also consider a companion rule that targets paint thinners and solvents used by consumers. That proposed rule, 1143, limits the concentration of volatile organic compounds to 25 grams per liter, effective Jan. 1, 2010. Starting this July, however, distributors and manufacturers of these paint thinners would have to obtain identification numbers so their products can be tracked.
Finally, under proposed Rule 317, all facilities that emit volatile organic compounds and nitrogen oxides will have to pay a fee of at least $8,000 per ton emitted, starting in 2012. That’s because the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 require any region that does not meet the emission reduction targets set forth in the act by 2010 to assess the fee.
Although the Los Angeles region has made considerable progress toward these targets, air quality officials said that meeting them next year is now almost impossible.
Staff reporter Howard Fine can be reached at [email protected] or at (323) 549-5225, ext. 227.
