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Environmental & Risk Management / Clean Building / Environmental Hazard Manager
Environmental & Risk Management / Clean Building / Field Assessor
Environmental & Risk Management / Clean Building / Abatement Worker

Provide Details about Surveying a Hazmat Assessment Item

Typically, an environmental hazard manager has generated or created a series of hazard assessment items based on location or other criteria. These records are associated with an hazard assessment project and may contain basic location information. These assessment items have typically been assigned to a field assessor or inspector who will go out to the field to visit these areas and record results.

As a field assessor or inspector, you enter basic information about the survey that you performed and the hazardous material that you found.

For selected or all assessment locations, you may be asked to collect samples that can be sent to a laboratory for testing and document your collection of these samples. If you collected samples and sent them out for testing, you can base the values that you enter for some of the below fields on the test results.

The Clean Building application offers many fields for documenting the hazardous substances that you find at a site, providing a flexible solution for all types of facilities and substances. In reviewing these fields, you will see that many fields have similar names and default values. As a field assessor, you may need to check with your facility manager to verify exactly which fields you should complete. For example, the Hazard Rank and Hazard Rating fields are similar; your site might use one table to classify the hazard level by EPA standards, and the other to classify by AHERA standards.

Procedure

Note: Depending on practices at your site, an environmental hazard manager or other professional involved in hazard management (such as an inspector or abatement worker) may also perform this task. Whether you are a field assessor, an inspector, an abatement worker, or an environmental hazard manager, you will enter information using one of the following tasks:
Manage Assessment Items
Manage My Assessment Items
Manage My Hazard Abatement Items
Depending on your role, not all fields listed below will be available for you to edit.

Note: For completing the first section of the form accessed by the below task, see Provide Details on the Location of Hazmat Assessment Item.

  1. On the Process Navigator, select the Manage  Assessment Items task, which is available from the Field Assessor, Abatement Worker, and Environmental Hazard Manager roles.

  2. Select the hazard assessment project to see a list of existing assessment items for the project. If you are a field assessor or abatement worker, you will see only items assigned to you.
  1. Click the Edit button for an assessment item.
  1. In the resulting form, complete these fields.

Assessed By

This will already be completed with your name by the hazard manager.
Date Assessed Enter the date that the assessment is taking place.

Material Code

Choose the material you are examining, such as cement, pipe, or carpet.

Material Description

Further describe the material that you are examining.

Pending Action

Use this field to describe the next planned step in the management process of this item. For example, you might initially complete this field with "Perform Assessment." Later, in the process you can change it to "Perform Abatement" or "Perform Re-Inspection." This field is validated by the Hazard Problem Types table.

Use Pending Action and Hazard Status (below) to help track your workflow. For example, the Hazard Status may be “initial survey in progress”, and Pending Action may be “estimate inspection” or “perform inspection”, depending on the unique workflow that each organization chooses to follow.

Hazard Status

Holds the current status in the hazmat management process of managing this item. As the process flows from a problem being reported, to investigated, to further testing, to resolution, users involved in the process will update this field with the appropriate value.

For example, you can choose from Reported, Initially Assessed, Assessed, Verified, and so on. The exact values from which you can choose are determined by your site.
Contains Hazardous Substance? Use this field to indicate if the area you are assessing contains a hazardous substance. You might set this to Unknown at the time of your initial assessment and then set to Yes after sample results are returned from the laboratory. If you did not sample the exact area described by this assessment item because other sampling was taken in a nearby location, you can set this value to Presumed.
Friability Indicate whether this area has friable material that may release its hazardous substances into the air upon contact.
Hazard Rank
Hazard Rating

These fields are similar in that each categorize the hazard level. Interpretation of how to use these fields is open to how the application is implemented at your site. You may need to check with the facility manager at your site for information about completing these fields. One example of usage is: in the U.S., you can use one table to classify the hazard level by EPA standards, and the other to classify by AHERA standards.

Note that Hazard Rating and Hazmat Condition Rating are distinct values, with Hazmat Condition Rating being calculated based on Condition Value and Condition Priority.

Material Condition

 Choose a value to indicate if this area is damaged, has potential to become damaged, is not damaged, and so forth. Noting the potential for damage is important if the area has friable material. For example, if the area becomes damaged, the material can become dislodged and released into the air.
Condition Value

Enter the current condition of this area. Carefully consider this value because it is used to generate the hazmat condition rating . Choose from:

  • Not Entered - Item has not been assessed.
  • Very Good - Asset has no defect; appearance is as new. No improvements needed.
  • Good - Minor improvement required. Minor system deficiencies with only marginal effect on system functions. Asset exhibits superficial wear and tear, minor defects, minor signs of deterioration to surface finishes; but does not require major maintenance; no major defects exist.
  • Fair -  Moderate improvement required. Deficiencies cause intermittent problems or affect multiple users. Uncorrected, will result in premature failure or accelerated deterioration of component or system. Asset is in average condition; deteriorated surfaces require attention; services are functional, but require attention. Backlog of maintenance work exists.
  • Poor -  Major improvement required. Critical deficiencies affecting function, health or safety. Asset is in poor condition; deteriorated surfaces require significant attention; services are functional but failing often; significant backlog maintenance work exists.
  • Unacceptable - Complete failure or loss of function. Complete replacement required. Asset has deteriorated badly; serious structural problems; general appearance is poor with eroded protective coatings; elements are broken, services are not performing; significant number of major defects exist
Condition Priority Select a description of how important this problem is from a business standpoint. Values are listed according to increasing urgency. It is important to carefully consider this value because it is used to generate the hazmat condition rating of the item. Choose from:
  • Not Entered - This is the default value for new items. You should change this value to one of the below.
  • Maintain - Regular maintenance required to maintain current status.
  • Company Image - Improvements required to enhance the public image of the company.
  • Def. Renovation -  Deferral of repairs or renovations which may eventually lead to major damage to a facility and loss of use, hamper building utilization, or affect economies of operation.
  • Cost Effective - Energy or functional conservation measures with a rapid return on investment.
  • Delayed Priority - Repairs and renovations required, but of less urgency than mission support.
  • Mission Support - Actions required to support functional activities, such as manufacturing or production equipment that requires repair to be fully functional, or rooms that require repair in order to support a productive work environment.
  • Environ. Code - Repairs, renovations, and improvements required for long-term compliance with local, state, or federal environmental regulations.
  • Facility Loss - Repairs, renovations, and improvements required to prevent serious facility deterioration and significantly higher costs if not immediately corrected.
  • Code Compliance - Repairs, renovations, and improvements required for immediate compliance with local, state, or federal building regulations.
  • Life Safety - Hazardous building or site conditions that jeopardize life safety of occupants.
Hazard Response

Choose a value to indicate how the company will respond to this item. For example, you might encase, encapsulate, or remove the material.

Sometimes no action is required, For example, testing might reveal that no hazardous substance was found. Or, a material may be in great condition and be non-friable so that the chance of it releasing hazardous substance is minute. In this case, there may be more environmental risk in removing the material, and thereby dislodging hazardous substances through handling, than leaving the material in tact.
Abatement Reason If you decided to abate this hazmat, use this field to document the main reason why you are abating the area. Note that this field my be completed by a facility manager or environmental hazard manager, rather than an assessor.
Recommended Action Choose your recommendation for this area, such as Clean, Adjust, Repair, or No Action.
Material Photo
Material Document		 Use these document fields to store scanned copies of any documents, drawings, or photos related to the material you are assessing. For example, you may wish to take pictures of the material and attach the image files as documents
Material Notes Enter additional notes about the material you are assessing. For example, you could use this field to note that you are sending a sample out to the lab for testing.
Quantity
Units		 Enter the quantity and the unit of measurement for the material that you are assessing.

Number of Pipes
Number of Fittings

 Use these fields to document your pipes, particularly in situations involving asbestos. Asbestos is common in long pipes within older buildings, and these long pipes consist of segments that are joined together using pipe fittings. The fittings often also contain asbestos. Therefore, for a long stretch of pipe, in addition to knowing the total length, it is important to track the number of pipe segments and fittings that the total pipe length is composed of. This information is often used in abatement planning; for example, to replace the insulation or the entire pipe length, the number of pipe segments and fittings is crucial data.
Classification 1,2,3

The government agency that regulates hazardous substances typically has a set of classifications by which they organize hazardous substances. For example, in the US the EPA AHERA (Asbestos Hazard Emergency Response Act) defines categories indicating the danger level that an instance of asbestos presents.

Choose the classifications under which this hazardous material falls. Note that a hazardous substance may fall under more than one classification; for example, if it is found in a school it may be subject to both AHERA and EPA classifications. Therefore, you can assign up to three classifications to an item.

Labeled As part of a previous abatement project, an abatement worker may have sealed this area and labeled it as containing hazardous substance. Alternatively, a material may contain visible manufacturer labels confirming the presence of hazardous substance. Inspectors typically do not need to collect samples or inspect areas that have previously been labeled regarding the presence of hazardous substances .Use this field to indicate such labeled areas.

Next

Updating a hazmat assessment item as a project progresses