Operational Safety Concept

For the GHE’s laboratories and workshops

1 Scope of the operational safety concept

This operational safety concept constitutes the binding framework for implementing the legal and ETH-internal guidelines, which must be observed for activities in Global Health Engineering (GHE)¹. Incorporated in the operational safety concept are measures of GHE for workplace safety and measures to keep people and the environment safe.

This operational safety concept of GHE is based on the document “Safety and Occupational Health, Manual on the implementation of EKAS Directive 6508”² and the corresponding directive.

This safety concept is continuously updated when the risk situation has changed, primarily when new work methods are used, new materials are handled, new devices which are relevant for safety are used or when existing areas are repurposed, or new rooms are occupied but also when the respective activities, processes, facilities are no longer used.

2 Safety objectives

In the labs and workshops of GHE, the high-pressure gas (\({\rm O_2, CH_4, CO_2}\)), ammonia, human excreta, urine, drills, manual saws, hammers, benchtop drill, 3D printer, laser cutters, water cutters are worked with. The risk to people and the environment cannot be entirely excluded from these activities. Global Health Engineering, therefore, takes the necessary action to protect people and the environment from harmful effects. The head of GHE, as the employer’s representative, assumes responsibility for the occupational safety and health protection of employees and students and takes the required steps³.

3 Safety organization

Tasks, competence and responsibilities regarding safety and health protection are clearly organized at GHE.

3.1 Responsibility and liability

As head of the research group, the professor assumes the role of employer⁴, and, in addition to that, the operational responsibility for the health and safety of all employees and students is warranted. The professor is responsible for:

• periodically updating the operational safety concept and any additional concepts, particularly the list of current projects and hazard notices.
• correct disposal of hazardous waste.
• creating, updating, and implementing operating instructions and safety regulations, which, together with work regulations and safety rules, serve to ensure workplace safety and environmental performance.
• if required, documentation of her area of responsibility for the authorities (reporting and authorization documents, among other things).

She ensures:

• work-related staff training on handling special hazards and lab materials (at least once a year).
• information - possibly in coordination with the Group Safety Representative (GSR) - on hazards, the necessary protective measures, and incidents and accidents.
• availability of correct personal protective equipment (PPE) and making sure that, if necessary, its maintenance, replacement and cleaning are organized.
• cleaning of defined areas, with the respective special requirements, and coordination with cleaning staff, if they are charged with this.
• adherence to the regulatory and ETH-internal specifications when sending and transporting hazardous goods.
• appointing a GSR (and other relevant safety roles, as needed)

She provides proper implementation and adherence to the operational safety concept and has established the necessary organizational structure.

To maintain operational safety, the necessary financial and personnel means are made available by GHE. Like all other groups in D-MAVT department, the chair has a GSR, who acts as the contact person for SSHE. The duties and responsibilities of the GSR have also been defined.

The essential points regarding liability and insurance are listed in the SUVA publication “What are your duties in the field of occupational safety and health protection?”⁵ as well as the corresponding ETH factsheet.

3.2 Organizational structure

In the list of names, the position of the GSR and any other necessary safety roles, e.g., biosafety officer (BSO), laser safety officer (LSO), radiation protection supervisor, and workshop supervisor, are defined within GHE. The table below describes the safety organization within GHE.

role	name	building / room	phone number
professor	Elizabeth Tilley	CLD D 10.1	+41 44 632 88 28
GSR	Jakub Tkaczuk	CLD D 2.1	+41 44 632 31 62
BSO	Jakub Tkaczuk	CLD D 2.1	+41 44 632 31 62
workshop supervisor	Jakub Tkaczuk	CLD D 2.1	+41 44 632 31 62

3.3 Group Safety Representative

The status, duties, and competencies of the GSR and other safety roles are specified and documented in the personnel file.

3.4 Employees, students, doctoral candidates, post-docs

At GHE, a variety of persons have the role of employee. As employees, they have the following obligations in terms of occupational safety and health protection:

• Follow the employer’s instructions regarding occupational safety and health protection.
• Follow the safety rules (e.g., Standard Operating Procedures (SOP), workshop and lab rules).
• Use safety equipment correctly.
• Fix defects (e.g., faulty equipment, unsafe work steps), or if it is impossible to fix them directly, report them.
• Do not put themselves in a state which could endanger themselves or other employees. This applies to the consumption of alcoholic beverages or other intoxicating substances (including medication).

BSc and MSc students are considered apprentices, i.e., they need supervision during laboratory and workshop activities.

4 Emergency organization: planning and incident management

In case of injury, fire, damages and other critical incidents, fast and qualified help must be warranted. In principle, the information posted in buildings and rooms regarding escape routes, behavior in the event of fire/smoke, medical emergencies, evacuation, etc. must be observed. Minor incidents are generally handled by the person(s) who caused the event, possibly with the GSR’s or another user’s support. In case of severe incidents, the ETH Emergency Desk must be alerted.

4.1 How to play it safe at ETH Zurich

The most important rules of conduct in case of emergency can be found in the leaflet “How to Play it Safe at ETH Zurich”. It can be downloaded from the SSHE website and may also be obtained from SSHE in printed form.

4.2 Emergencies in the lab and workshop

An overview of correct behaviour in case of incidents in the lab or workshop has been put together on the poster “Emergency in the lab - What to do?”, which is displayed in all labs and workshops. This poster can be ordered from SSHE by email.

4.3 Reporting lab and workshop incidents

All lab and workshop incidents must be reported to the line manager and the GSR. Then they report the event to SSHE by email. That includes laboratory, workshop, office, and transit accidents.

4.3.1 Personal injury (personal accident, occupational accident, near miss)

If an incident causes personal injury and if the person affected has an employment contract with ETH Zurich, this must be additionally reported to the HR department with this accident report completed online. For people without the ETH employment contract, e.g., students or guest scientists, the accident report goes to the respective health/accident insurance.

To improve the work safety standards in labs and workshops at ETH, SGU follows up on all kinds of incidents. Therefore, SGU would like to meet with the injured person to learn more about the accident and how it could have been prevented. This will help to take the right corrective and preventive measures for the future.

4.3.2 Damage of material and equipment

Should material damage, e.g., to research equipment, be caused by the incident, the damage must be reported via a damage report. Reporting lab and workshop incidents helps the GSR, the line manager and SSHE to determine the cause, reduce, and prevent risks in the future.

5 Hazard identification and risk assessment

Hazards can only be dealt with if they have been identified. To make work safer, one of the critical tasks is determining where the hazards in the lab, workshop, and field research lie and assessing the corresponding risks. When new activities are undertaken or significant changes made, hazards must be identified or the existing hazard identification re-evaluated. This serves as the basis for defining and implementing the necessary safety measures.

Identifying hazards is the responsibility of the professor. If required, SSHE can be consulted.

5.1 Reporting requirements

The employees and students report to the professor:

• All new activities (before beginning the work).
• Significant changes, e.g., use of new materials/chemicals with substantially different properties (before changing).
• Significant new findings regarding safety-relevant aspects of an ongoing activity.

5.2 Project list and workflows

The professor and the GSR maintain an overview of the safety-relevant activities within GHE and record these in Appendix 1. Project list and Appendix 2. Description of workflows and activities.

The professor and the GSR periodically examine all the workstations and processes for hazards, e.g., machines, equipment, tools, means of transport, heavy loads, or hazardous substances (chemicals). The findings are collected in Appendix 3.

6 Safety measures and rules of conduct

Safety rules make it possible for employees and third parties to always act safely. Operating regulations and specific rules for the workplace are crucial, especially for high-risk and exceptional tasks and activities.

6.1 Access control and work area identification

Access to the lab and workshop facilities with special hazards is restricted to authorized (and trained) personnel only. The group’s key manager applies for keys for the respective persons. The rooms with limited access are designated with yellow signs “Access for authorized personnel only” on the door or the prohibition sign “No access for unauthorized persons”. Furthermore, the required warning and mandatory signs must be displayed on all doors⁶.

At GHE, this applies to the following rooms:

• wet laboratory (BSL2) - CLA J26
• mechanical workshop - CLA B2.2

6.2 Instructions for safe working

6.2.1 Operating instructions and rules of conduct

The research group regulates diverse aspects of occupational and environmental safety in operating instructions, work guidelines or SOPs. These documents are filed electronically in Appendix 4.

6.2.2 Laboratory and workshop safety rules

Employees of GHE adhere to the legally binding regulations, the respective SUVA and EKAS publications, as well as ETH-internal directives (downloadable from the SSHE Website). The laboratory/workshop rules summarise the key points, “EKAS directive no. 1871”Chemical laboratories”, the ETH factsheet “Working Alone”, lab rules in Appendix 5 and this safety concept.

6.3 Guidelines for lab cleaning

External cleaning staff clean the lab and workshops according to the Service Level Agreement. Because of the hazards, special agreements and regulations apply for room CLA J26 and are written down in Appendix 6.

The GSR informs the facility management, who is responsible for forwarding the information to the cleaning company and instructing the latter. Should special regulations apply in individual labs, the GSR trains cleaning staff accordingly.

6.4 Purchase, maintenance, and upkeep of equipment

GHE ensures that the machines, equipment, and tools used in their lab, workshop, and field correspond to the applicable safety regulations. When purchasing new equipment, they, therefore, demand that the declaration of conformity⁷ and operating instructions⁸ are supplied and that these documents be stored in an organized and accessible manner. Should it be necessary for research purposes to procure or to build equipment without CE declaration of conformity, then a hazard assessment must be performed; responsible for this is the professor who takes on the responsibilities of the manufacturer and distributor.

The GSR stores the paper version of declarations of conformity for all the devices in his office (CLD D 2.1). The digital versions of certificates of conformity for the wet laboratory are available here.

User manuals for the equipment in the wet laboratory in their digital versions are stored here.

6.4.1 Responsibility for equipment maintenance and upkeep

At GHE, all technical devices, operating equipment and tools are serviced regularly so that the quality of the research or diagnostic results, as well as the safety of employees and protection of persons and the environment in general, are guaranteed.

Maintenance schedules for individual devices and delegation of responsibilities are set down in writing in Appendix 7.

6.5 Planning, building, rebuilding, dismantling, and relocating

One of the professor’s and GSR’s duties is to propose modifications to the safety precautions according to the state of the art and technology, even if this could result in a renovation or new construction. Proposals for structural/technical modifications (to the infrastructure or changes in the locking system) are sent via the GMIS-System. GHE itself commissions modifications to devices, machines, experiments, and others.

Safety Officers are always consulted whenever new building work or structural modifications are carried out at ETH Zurich and when technical changes are made to safety-relevant facilities⁹.

In the event of modifications, repurposing, dismantling, and relocating activities, specially adapted safety precautions must be taken at the required time, especially regarding the decontamination of labs and technical equipment. If, despite prior decontamination, a chemical hazard or similar risk cannot be completely ruled out, this aspect is explicitly regulated for the phase of construction work with the increased risk, e.g., dismantling filters.

7 Planning and realizing measures

The identified hazards are eliminated or reduced to an acceptable degree with suitable measures. It should be ensured that the measures taken remain effective in the long term. The hazard and risk assessment (Appendix 3) lists the required measures, deadlines, and responsible persons. When a measure has been implemented, it is noted accordingly in the table.

8 Instruction, training, and information on operational safety

Safe and health-conscious action implies the corresponding knowledge. This knowledge is guaranteed through targeted and periodic training of all staff.

At ETH Zurich, training and education is a central element in ensuring persons’ safety and the environment’s protection. ETH Zurich offers its staff diverse training and continuing education courses in all the SSHE-relevant areas. The professor is responsible for initial training of new employees, instructing them on safety issues, and periodic refresher courses. This task is delegated to the GSR. However, the responsibility cannot be delegated. All completed safety training is documented in writing and stored electronically.

Before entering the laboratory, every person must complete the Moodle test Safety in the laboratory. Before entering the mechanical workshop, every person must complete the Moodle test Safety in the mechanical shop. General training is provided upon entry for the wet lab and the workshop. The equipment-specific training is provided to interested and qualified personnel. The permission for equipment use is granted individually according to the level of training and experience. The attestations of information, instruction, and training are stored in Appendix 8.

9 Health protection

Including ergonomic, occupational hygiene, and occupational psychology principles and rules is a prerequisite for the optimal work design. Health-damaging factors must be recorded systematically, and measures must be taken where necessary. Inspection of personal workplaces and the related ergonomic adjustments can help reduce symptoms or eliminate them. If necessary, the representatives of GHE may consult the ETH occupational physician Dr. Ines Raabe.

10 Review and audits

Global Health Engineering checks regularly if the safety and health protection goals have been reached and if safety rules are being applied. Furthermore, periodic clean-up activities are held in the lab and workshop facilities according to Appendix 9.

11 Appendices

• Appendix 1: Project list
• Appendix 2: Description of workflows and activities
• Appendix 3: Hazard identification and risk assessment
• Appendix 4: Collection of operating instructions, user manuals and SOP
• Appendix 5: General lab/workshop rules
• Appendix 6: Special safety regulations for lab/workshop cleaning by a cleaning service
• Appendix 7: Maintenance and servicing schedule
• Appendix 8: Certificates of information, instruction, and training
• Appendix 9: Task schedule

Footnotes

1. English translation of 832.30 Ordinance on Accident and Occupational Diseases Prevention.

2. Safety and Occupational Health | Manual for implementing EKAS Directive 6508.

3. SUVA: “What are your duties in the field of occupational safety and health protection?”, SBA 140.E

4. SUVA: “What are your duties in the field of occupational safety and health protection?”, SBA 140.E

5. SUVA: “What are your duties in the field of occupational safety and health protection?”, SBA 140.E

6. These labeling materials can be obtained from stickers@ethz.ch. The catalog is available here.

7. With a declaration of conformity, the manufacturer or supplier (the so-called “distributor”) confirms that the fundamental health and safety requirements are met and that the machine sold was built according to state-of-the-art technology. In case of an accident due to a technical defect of the machine, the distributor is liable, and the purchaser is better protected.

8. The machine or device must also be accompanied by a user manual (with information on set-up, operation, troubleshooting and maintenance), which serves to instruct employees.

9. Safety aspects such as fire prevention, rules on access or environmental and occupational safety are closely related to planning and construction. Structural measures are often a prerequisite for technical safety precautions. Structural and technical safety measures, which are considered together with the proposed operating procedures at the planning stage, ensure trouble-free operation in the future.