What is OHSAS 18000, OHSAS 18001 and OHSAS 18002?

[Marc]

What is OHSAS 18001?

OHSAS 18001 is an Occupation Health and Safety Assessment Series for health and safety management systems. It is intended to help an organizations to control occupational health and safety risks. It was developed in response to widespread demand for a recognized standard against which to be certified and assessed.

OHSAS 18000 is an international occupational health and safety management system specification. It comprises two parts, 18001 and 18002 and embraces a number of other publications.

OHSAS 18001
This is the "Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems Specification". It was developed in response to urgent demand for a recognized standard against which occupational safety management systems can be assessed. It is compatible with ISO 9001 and ISO 14001.

It covers issues such as:

• Planning for hazard identification
• Risk assessment/control
• OHS (Occupational Health and Safety) management, awareness and competence, training, communication, emergency preparedness and response, performance measuring and improvement

OHSAS 18002
This provides guidelines for the implementation of OHSAS 18001. It explains the requirements of this and how to work towards implementation/registration.

The following other documents, amongst others, were used in the creation process:

• BS8800:1996 Guide to occupational health and safety management systems
• DNV Standard for Certification of Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems(OHSMS):1997
• Technical Report NPR 5001: 1997 Guide to an occupational health and safety management system
• Draft LRQA SMS 8800 Health & safety management systems assessment criteria
• SGS & ISMOL ISA 2000:1997 Requirements for Safety and Health Management Systems
• BVQI SafetyCert: Occupational Safety and Health Management Standard
• Draft AS/NZ 4801 Occupational health and safety management systems Specification with guidance for use
• Draft BSI PAS 088 Occupational health and safety management systems
• UNE 81900 series of pre-standards on the Prevention of occupational risks
• Draft NSAI SR 320 Recommendation for an Occupational Health and Safety (OH and S) Management System

Implementation of the standards is intended to provide multiple benefits.

• Reduced risk (via improved safety management of health and safety risks)
• Competitive advantage (via demonstration of commitment to health and safety)
• Improved performance (via improved operational efficiency through accident management reduction and reduced downtime)
• Reduced costs (via reduced insurance premiums and compensation/penalties for breached legislation/etc)

[Randy]

We're now looking at November 2008 for the release of the revision to 18002. I just got my draft for comments.

[Stijloor]

Originally Posted by Randy

We're now looking at November 2008 for the release of the revision to 18002. I just got my draft for comments.

Randy,

When you have time, anything you can share about the differences/changes?

Stijloor.

[Kales Veggie]

Interesting observation: International standard bodies such as ISO are not involved in establishing this standard.

[Randy]

Originally Posted by Stijloor

Randy,

When you have time, anything you can share about the differences/changes?

Stijloor.

The format is going to be quite different (I personally don't like it, but that argument was lost). The original format of requirement-intent-input-process (activity)-output has been changed to a claused based one. A great deal more explanitory information is going to be provided, but some of the clauses go down to 5 digits.

Due to copywrite I don't think I can do a cut ans paste at this time.

[Stijloor]

Originally Posted by Randy

Due to copywrite I don't think I can do a cut ans paste at this time.

Randy,

Understood!

Stijloor.

[Sidney Vianna]

Originally Posted by Stijloor

Randy,

When you have time, anything you can share about the differences/changes?

Stijloor.

I am confused. The draft was available via a link in this post. Since you thanked me for the post, I guessed you had downloaded it.

[Stijloor]

Originally Posted by Sidney Vianna

I am confused. The draft was available via a link in this post. Since you thanked me for the post, I guessed you had downloaded it.

Sidney,

I was going to download it. It then escaped my mind...and now it's no longer at that link.

Stijloor.