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Safety Reference
1-800-452-1261
flinnsci.com
SUGGESTIONS FOR TAKING A CHEMICAL INVENTORY
• Have spill/breakage aids available
• Make sure the room is well lighted
• Plan before you start
• Alert school administrators about the inventory
We are sure that responsible faculty and staff agree that it is neces- sary to know exactly what chemical substances are present on school premises and in what quantities. Such an inventory would serve many valuable purposes such as (but not limited to):
• To comply with regulatory requirements
• To make the school safer
• To efficiently use (and perhaps share) the existing inventory
• To rid the premises of excess/unused chemical substances
• To implement the storage of all remaining substances in compatible chemical families
• To isolate and safely store particularly hazardous substances
• To create and maintain a perpetual inventory of all chemical substances
• To identify substances (severe toxins, carcinogens, etc.) that should not be found on school premises and rid the premises of these materi- als
• To identify substances as a function of their specific hazardous char- acter (flammables, acids, oxidizers, etc.) and provide dedicated and approved storage for them.
In our opinion, just plain old-fashioned “good sense” suggests that it is time for action! Action demands that you know what you have and how much of it you have. Once this inventory is accomplished a great many benefits will follow.
It is very important to point out that laboratory chemicals should no longer be purchased like other routine school supplies! The normal routine of most schools is to acquire a year’s supply of needed chemicals at one time, along with other routine science supply needs. The result of this process is that dozens of chemical items, many in very large quantities, arrive at the school and are then stored in science storerooms never designed to handle such quantities and rarely equipped to meet even minimum standards of safe storage. We are sure your conventional wisdom says that the smaller the quantities of these materials found in schools at any given time, the smaller the problem.
We cannot emphasize strongly enough the need for faculty and staff to recognize the problems created by lumping hazardous chemicals into the buying routine. To continue to apply the same buying routine to hazards simply aggravates and perpetuates the problem. Those in the school with science backgrounds must educate the non-science-trained administrators about the severe problems created by continuing to buy hazardous chemicals in the same manner as they buy routine supplies.
It can also accurately be stated that when a large school with many instructors has no one in charge of managing the chemical storeroom, the problem is made more severe. When every instructor is in charge of this matter—then, in fact, no one is in charge.
• Use safe ladders
• Wear appropriate clothing • Avoid involving students
• Work slowly
Institutions with multiple science buildings should also give very serious consideration to establishing a central “chemical ordering committee.” This committee could routinely see every chemical requisition. Their review would be aimed at completely eliminating or reducing the quantity of some substances purchased. No, we are not suggesting that instructors be denied access to needed reagents. We are, however, suggesting that the matter be well managed. Who better to manage the problem than the knowledgeable users; i.e., the instruc- tors meeting as a committee.
It is common to find, among multiple buildings, an excess of a chemical in Building A while, in Building B, an order was just placed for the very same chemical. Why can’t inventories be shared with the goal of better systemwide chemical management? If the impediment to better, safer and more efficient substance management is the “estab- lished system” or the “established bureaucracy” then the “system”
or the “bureaucracy” must be educated and its methods changed. An efficient method of chemical management is to provide inventory level information to all users and allow all users access to excess inventories. One building or department should not be allowed to rob another’s inventory. However, excesses should be identified and shared. A good substance or inventory manager should not be penalized to serve the poor manager in another department or building. Conventional wisdom suggests that excess substances can be better managed by sharing knowledge of their existence. For more efficient management of chemical supplies, a good inventory and communication is critical.
CHEMICAL INVENTORY continued on next page.