Capabilities - Work Environment

Bringing together expertise in chemistry, physics, occupational hygiene, environmental sciences, forensic analysis, and computer modelling. We provide a comprehensive service for the investigation of health and safety risks in the workplace and wider environment.

  Case Studies

Our capability in the area of work environment encompasses expertise in:

• Inhalation exposure assessment of chemical and biological agents, including: dusts and fume; gases and vapours; minerals and fibres, including asbestos; pesticides; liquid aerosols; allergens; pathogens.
  
  

• Dermal exposure and surface measurement of chemicals including pesticides. Specialist facilities include whole-body fluorescence monitoring equipment and portable X-ray spectrometry.

• Occupational hygiene surveys.

• Visualisation of exposure.

• Noise. Specialist facilities include an anechoic chamber.

• Hand-arm and whole-body vibration. Multi-disciplinary teams combining measurement, clinical aspects and human factors are available.

• Thermal stress.

• Integrated teams of occupational hygienists, field-based scientists and specialist analysts with knowledge of the practical difficulties of exposure measurement.

• Development of sampling and measurement methods and on-site techniques. This includes developing and publishing recommended methods in the HSE Books Series: Methods for the Determination of Hazardous Substances (MDHS).

• Operation of proficiency testing schemes in support of workplace and environmental risk assessments - Workplace Analysis Scheme for Proficiency (WASP); Asbestos in Materials Scheme (AIMS); Regular Inter-laboratory Counting Exchange (RICE); United Kingdom Man Made Mineral Fibres Counting Scheme (UK MMMF).

• Exposure control techniques and methods of assessment, including: substitution strategies; containment techniques, in particular the development of standards for the design and testing of fume cupboards; ventilation systems; filtration; computational predictions.

• Personal protective equipment, including: breathing apparatus; respiratory protective equipment (RPE); chemical protective clothing; hearing protection; goggles; foundry clothing; head protection.

• Respiratory protective equipment (RPE) fit testing.

• Pedestrian safety including: slip resistance of footwear and flooring; design aspects of stairs, ramps and walkways; safe floor cleaning practice.

• Computer-aided techniques - modelling movement of contaminants in work areas using computational fluid dynamics (CFD); databases; environmental modelling, including chemical fate in the environment.

• Probabilistic modelling of workplace exposure, including: inhalation exposure; dermal exposure; spatial distribution of contaminants; Bayesian techniques.
  

Further Information:

Contact our Business Development Unit by telephone (+44) 01298 218218, fax (+44) 01298 218822 or email hslinfo@hsl.gov.uk.

  Back to the top