During the next several months, even next several years, facility mangers of manufacturing locations will become increasingly aware of major changes in the ways certain chemicals, including professional cleaning chemicals, are labeled. OSHA has modified the Hazard Communications Standard (HCS) to make chemical information, labels and especially warning labels, both similar to and more consistent with those used in many other countries around the world according to the U.N. Globally Harmonized System (GHS) of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals.

Essentially the goal of the change is that a cleaning worker using a U.S.-made cleaning chemical in, say, a Hong Kong hotel will understand how to use the product and what precautions to take, including what to do should an accident occur. These changes will impact all types of chemicals; however they will most specifically address those chemicals that OSHA classifies as hazardous. According to OSHA, a hazardous chemical is “any chemical which is classified as a physical hazard or a health hazard.”