Hazardous Substances & Workplace Exposure Monitoring

When Exposure Monitoring Is Required

The Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 (COSHH) require employers to assess the risk from hazardous substances and to prevent or adequately control exposure. Regulation 10 goes further: exposure monitoring must be carried out where it is needed to demonstrate that adequate control is being maintained, or where it is otherwise required to protect the health of employees. In practice, that means measurement rather than assumption whenever a substance is genuinely hazardous and the level of exposure is uncertain.

• Your COSHH assessment cannot show, without measurement, that control is adequate
• Processes, materials, shift patterns or production volumes have changed
• New plant, a new site or a new task has been introduced
• Health surveillance, symptoms or employee complaints suggest a problem
• Local exhaust ventilation performance or reliance on respiratory protection is in question
• You need defensible evidence for an enforcing authority, an insurer or a client audit

What We Measure and How

We build a sampling strategy around the way work is actually done. Similar exposure groups are identified, the highest-risk tasks are targeted, and sampling runs long enough to represent the working shift. Personal sampling is carried out in the breathing zone using pumps and sampling heads worn by the employee, so the result reflects what that person inhales. Static and background sampling is used alongside it to map the wider working environment, identify sources and show how contamination spreads away from the task.

• Inhalable and respirable dust, including respirable crystalline silica and wood dust
• Welding fume and other process fumes
• Solvents and volatile organic compounds
• Gases, mists and fibres
• Personal breathing-zone sampling over representative task and shift durations
• Static and background sampling for source identification and area mapping

What the Report Gives You

Every survey ends with a written report that a health and safety manager can act on and a director can understand. Measured exposures are set against the relevant Workplace Exposure Limits in HSE EH40, so the compliance position is stated plainly rather than implied. We identify which groups of workers are most at risk, explain why exposure is occurring, and set out controls in the order the hierarchy of control demands — elimination and substitution first, then engineering controls such as local exhaust ventilation, then ways of working, with respiratory protective equipment as the last line rather than the default answer.

• Measured results compared directly against HSE EH40 Workplace Exposure Limits
• Clear identification of the tasks and groups most at risk
• Prioritised control recommendations following the hierarchy of control
• Comment on the adequacy of existing extraction and protective equipment
• Advice on when the assessment should be repeated and what would trigger an earlier review
• Findings written so they can be used directly in your COSHH documentation

Where Local Exhaust Ventilation Fits

Exposure monitoring and extraction are two halves of the same conversation. If sampling shows exposure is too high at a fixed workstation, the answer is usually engineering control rather than more respirators — and if you already have local exhaust ventilation, monitoring tells you whether it is doing its job in practice. Remember that local exhaust ventilation must receive a thorough examination and test at least every 14 months, and our LEV testing service is set up to run alongside your exposure monitoring programme so the two datasets support each other.

Industries and Tasks We Cover

We work across the sectors where hazardous substances are generated as a by-product of ordinary work. That includes manufacturing and engineering, joinery and woodworking, stone and masonry cutting, construction and demolition, maintenance and refurbishment contractors, printing and coatings, laboratories and research facilities, warehousing, and commercial estates where contractor activity affects occupied space.

• Cutting, grinding, drilling and abrasive blasting of stone, concrete and masonry
• Sawing, sanding and routing of hardwood and softwood
• MIG, TIG, MMA welding, soldering and hot work
• Spraying, coating, degreasing and solvent cleaning
• Weighing, decanting and mixing of powders and chemicals
• Maintenance tasks and confined or poorly ventilated work areas

How the Process Works

The process is deliberately simple and designed around minimal disruption to production. You make an enquiry, we scope the work with you, we attend site and monitor during normal operations, and you receive a report you can act on.

• Enquiry — you tell us the substances, tasks and sites involved
• Scoping — we agree the similar exposure groups, sampling strategy and site access
• On-site monitoring — personal and static sampling during representative working periods
• Analysis and interpretation — results assessed against HSE EH40
• Reporting — findings, risk ranking, prioritised controls and re-assessment advice
• Follow-up — support in planning controls and any repeat monitoring