28 l ROOFINGBC l WINTER 2018 FEATURE ENVIROSPEC INCORPORATED Visit our website at www.EnvirospecInc.com or contact us at Phone (905) 271-3441 Fax (905) 271-7552 The PAVE-EL® Pedestal System: • Transforms flat roofs into attractive, maintenance-free, landscaped paver stone terraces. • Elevates paver stones for perfect drainage. • Levels paver stones and ensures their uniform spacing for an ideal roof terrace surface. Turn roof tops into useable, attractive roof decks Designed & Manufactured in Canada I n recent years, WorkSafeBC has initiated a number of focused strategies to help improve worker safety, including an occupational disease prevention initiative (ODI). Part of that initiative involved sending a letter to various employers in the Construction sector that stated the following:  While workplace deaths due to injury have decreased in the past decade, work- place deaths due to occupational disease continue to rise. Since 2010 in B.C., there have been more workplace deaths due to occupational disease than all other causes combined. As a result WorkSafeBC created the Occupational Disease Strategic Prevention Plan with the goal to “strengthen WorkSafeBC’s focus on occupational disease, taking action to prevent exposures today that will prevent diseases and deaths in the future.” The key areas of focus identified WORKSAFEBC’S OCCUPATIONAL DISEASE INITIATIVE AND RCABC in the initiative were cancer, asthma and poisoning disease outcomes. RCABC Involvement Through this letter, employers were notified that WorkSafeBC officers may be visiting work sites to conduct inspec- tions related to this initiative. RCABC was notified by several members during the summer of 2017 that officers had conducted inspections at their work sites. Officers identified exposure levels for a variety of trades on the job site and inquired about roofing material exposure control plans. They were interested in determining what type of roofing system was being installed and whether an adequate Exposure Control Plan (ECP) was in place. Job hazard analysis (JHA) safe work procedures (SWP) and SDS/MSDS were provided and after review of these documents the officers identified opportunities to improve ECPs.  RCABC hosted a meeting with WorkSafeBC to discuss the require- ments of the ODI. Through this discus- sion, RCABC identified an opportu- nity to engage with WorkSafeBC to represent our members and ensure industry had a voice with WorkSafeBC on this topic. The RCABC Board of Directors approved funding alongside WorkSafeBC to conduct air sampling for the development of Exposure Control Plan templates for SBS, EPDM, TPO and PVC roof systems. With the RCABC Board’s approval, Arcose Consulting was hired to identify the chemical exposure risks of our workers and of others that may be present at our workplaces. RCABC held conference calls with all of our major membrane manu- facturers to make them aware of the project and WorkSafeBC’s focus on the roofing industry. Project Scope The Project included: •  Conducting a risk assessment review of 245 safety data sheets (SDS) to identify chemicals of high concern to be sampled for and included in this ECP. These chemi- cals were selected based on the level of toxicity, availability of sampling method, designated substance status, and route of exposure. •  Reviewing SDS sheets for Styrene Butadiene Styrene (SBS), Ethylene Propylene Diene Monomer (EPDM), Thermoplastic Polyolefin (TPO) and Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) roofing systems. •  Identifying the following chemicals as being high priority and included in the ECP project: -Toluene -Ethylbenzene