As Gay Sigel walked through the doors at One IBM Plaza in Chicago, fresh out of law school and ready to launch her career as an attorney at Jenner & Block, she could not have envisioned the tremendous impact she would have on her clients, her colleagues, and her community over the next 39 years. Gay started her legal career as a general litigator, but Gay and Bob Graham were quick to realize how the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) was creating a new and exciting area of the law that was increasingly important for the firm’s clients: Environmental Law. Gay and Bob saw an opportunity to specialize in that area and founded Jenner & Block’s Environmental Health and Safety Practice. Gay has been an ever-present force in the EHS community ever since.

Over her 39-year career at Jenner & Block, Gay has worked on some of the most significant environmental cases in the country for clients ranging from global Fortune 50 corporations to environmental organizations to individuals. For more than a decade, she taught environmental law at Northwestern University, helping shape the next generation of environmental lawyers. She has worked on issues of global impact, like those affecting climate change, issues of local impact like those related to combined sewer overflows to the Chicago River, and issues of individual impact like those involving employee safety and health. No matter the subject, Gay has always been a tireless advocate for her clients. We often describe her as the Energizer Bunny of environmental lawyers: she is the hardest working attorney we have ever met. 

Gay’s true passion is to make this world a better, more just place for others. So, throughout her career as an environmental, health, and safety lawyer, Gay has devoted her time, energy, and emotional resources to innumerable pro bono cases and charitable and advocacy organizations. Her pro bono work includes successfully protecting asylum applicants, defending criminal cases, asserting parental rights, and defending arts organizations in OSHA matters. Among her many civic endeavors, Gay was a founding member of the AIDS Legal Council of Chicago (n/k/a as the Legal Council for Health Justice); she was the Secretary and active member of the Board of Directors for the Chicago Foundation for Women; and she was on the Board of the New Israel Fund. Gay continues to promote justice wherever she sees injustice, including as an advocate for women’s rights, particularly for women’s reproductive rights.

In both her environmental, health, and safety practice as well as her pro bono and charitable work, Gay is a tremendous mentor to younger (and even older) attorneys. She is curious, committed, exacting, fearless, and demanding (though more of herself than of others). We all give Gay much credit for making us the lawyers we are today.

Gay is leaving Jenner & Block to embark on her next adventure. She is returning to public service as Assistant Corporation Counsel Supervisor with the City of Chicago's Department of Law where she will be focusing on environmental issues. The City and its residents will be well served as Gay will bring her vast experience and unparalleled energy to work tirelessly to protect the City and its environment. We will miss working with and learning from Gay on a daily basis, but we look forward to seeing the great things she will accomplish for the City of Chicago. We know we speak for the entire firm as we wish Gay bon voyage—we will miss you! 

Steven M. Siros, Allison A. Torrence, Andi S. Kenney

By Allison A. Torrence and Tatjana Vujic

On the final day of its 2022 term, the Supreme Court issued its highly-anticipated opinion in the case of West Virginia v. EPA, 579 U.S. __ (2022), addressing EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gases (“GHGs”) under the Clean Air Act (“CAA”), but having much broader implications for the authority of all administrative agencies. The opinion signals a significant shift in the standards used to review administrative actions. Chief Justice Roberts wrote the opinion for the Court, joined by Justices Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett. Justice Gorsuch filed a concurring opinion, in which Justice Alito joined, and Justice Kagan filed a dissenting opinion, in which Justices Breyer and Sotomayor joined.

Major Questions Doctrine Has its Day in the Sun

In a significant yet long-predicted move, the six-to-three opinion rejected EPA’s approach to regulating GHG emissions under the Obama Administration’s Clean Power Plan (“CPP”), under which EPA intended to regulate existing coal-and natural-gas-fired power plants pursuant to Section 111(d) of the CAA.[1] Of greater significance, however, the Court took the opportunity to fully embrace the “major questions doctrine,” a standard several Justices had endorsed but which had not yet been fully unveiled by the Court. The doctrine now requires agencies, in instances in which a regulation will have major economic and political consequences, to point to clear statutory language showing congressional authorization for the power claimed by the agency. In particular, in “extraordinary cases” in which “the history and the breadth of the authority that the agency has asserted and the economic and political significance of that assertion” is significant or major, courts have “a reason to hesitate before concluding that Congress meant to confer such authority.” Slip op. at 17. In such extraordinary cases, the Court will not read into ambiguous statutory text authority that is not clearly spelled out. Instead, “something more than a merely plausible textual basis for the agency action is necessary”; specifically, “[t]he agency instead must point to clear congressional authorization for the power it claims.” Slip op. at 19.

As support for the adoption and application of the major questions doctrine, the Court cited numerous cases in which agency authority was curtailed because of extraordinary circumstances that it determined required a clear congressional directive. The cases included the FDA’s attempt to regulate tobacco (FDA v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., 529 U.S. 120 (2000), the CDC’s effort to issue an eviction moratorium during the COVID-19 pandemic (Alabama Assn. of Realtors v. Dept. of Health & Human Servs., 594 U.S. __ (2021)), EPA’s assertion of permitting authority over millions of small sources like hotels and office buildings (Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA, 573 U.S. 302 (2014)), and OSHA’s endeavor to require 84 million Americans either obtain a COVID-19 vaccine or undergo weekly testing (National Federation of Independent Business v. OSHA, 595 U.S. __ (2021)), all of which, according to the Court, involved an agency overstepping its authority to act in situations not dissimilar from the extraordinary circumstances presented in West Virginia v. EPA. The dissent, on the other hand, regarded the majority’s use of the major questions doctrine to be without precedent, observing that “[t]he Court has never even used the term ‘major questions doctrine’ before.” Dissent at 15.

As discussed below, when the Court determines that the major questions doctrine applies, even if the administrative action arguably fits within what may seem like a broad grant of statutory authority, it is not necessarily enough to authorize the agency to act. Rather, if the court finds that the administrative rule is an “extraordinary case”, i.e., will have a significant economic or political impact, the agency must base its action on very clear congressional authorization to justify the power it is attempting to assert.

Clean Power Plan is Out But Regulating GHGs Still OK

Turning back to the regulation at issue in West Virginia, the Court reviewed the Clean Power Plan, which dates back to the Obama Administration’s EPA. At that time, EPA promulgated the CPP pursuant to its authority under the New Source Performance Standards (“NSPS”) in Section 111(d) of the CAA. The Court’s review thus centered on Section 111(d), which gives EPA authority to select the “best system of emission reduction” for existing sources of pollution, like power plants. 42 U.S.C. § 7411(d). Under the CPP, the Obama Administration’s EPA used the NSPS to set GHG emission standards for existing power plants which would require many operators to shut down older coal-fired units and/or shift generation to lower-emitting natural gas units or renewable sources of electricity. The Court viewed EPA’s CPP, which would have required power producers to significantly change the generation mix, as an “extraordinary case” because it would have a major impact on the economy and was a “transformative expansion in [EPA’s] regulatory authority” based on “vague language” in the CAA. Slip op. at 20. In addition, the Court noted that EPA was using an “ancillary provision” in the CAA to regulate GHGs and stated that “the Agency’s discovery [of Section 111(d)]”—which the Court described as a “gap filler”—"allowed it to adopt a regulatory program that Congress had conspicuously and repeatedly declined to enact itself.” Slip op. at 20.

Best System of Emission Reduction

Notably, the Court acknowledged that “as a matter of definitional possibilities, generation shifting can be described as a system” (and thus a “best system of emission reduction”), but nevertheless determined that the CAA’s grant of authority was too vague. Slip op. at 28. According to the Court, almost anything could be described as a “system”, and therefore the CPP was based on a vague grant of authority and did not pass the major questions doctrine test. Slip op. at 28. The majority found such a broad grant of authority questionable, particularly because climate change legislation has been debated in Congress for years with no action, signaling that EPA could not exercise such broad authority when Congress had clearly declined to take such action itself.

By contrast and contrary to the majority’s narrow reading of “best system of emission reduction,” the dissent argued that the generation shifting prescribed by the CPP was precisely the type of “system” of emission reduction permitted under the CAA. In particular, the dissent contended that the term “system” is not vague (which Justice Kagan defined as unclear, ambiguous or hazy) but intentionally expansive to allow for such system-wide programs. Thus, the crux of the disagreement between the majority and dissent is that the dissent saw the CAA as having bestowed broad authority on EPA to regulate complex and important issues of air pollution—including and especially climate change, particularly considering the severity of the problem—in the manner that EPA determines is most appropriate, while the majority required further scrutiny for large-scale administrative endeavors like the CPP, which it held require very clear and specific authorization.

What’s Next?

In terms of the implications of West Virginia, what is clear is that the major questions doctrine is here to stay and EPA’s ability to regulate GHG’s under Section 111(d) of the CAA may be curtailed but has not been rejected. In fact, the Court specifically endorsed EPA’s authority to regulate GHGs. So, what does this mean, not only for GHG regulation but also for agency rulemaking in general?

First, while the ruling marks a significant setback for EPA, it does not shut the door on the agency’s ability to regulate GHGs. The CPP rules at issue raised the specter of the major questions doctrine because the regulation would have required generation shifting across the entire energy industry—an action viewed by the Court as having a significant impact on the national economy. The Court, however, declined to opine on “how far our opinion constrains EPA,” indicating that EPA’s authority had not been disallowed. Slip op. at 31, fn5. In fact, the opinion unequivocally states that it is within EPA’s purview to set a specific limit on GHG emissions. Slip op. at 6 (“Although the States set the actual rules governing existing power plants, EPA itself still retains the primary regulatory role in Section 111(d). The Agency, not the States, decides the amount of pollution reduction that must ultimately be achieved.”) Nothing in the opinion suggests that EPA cannot choose to regulate GHGs at power plants with more traditional technology-based requirements. Indeed, an inside-the-fence-line regulation that requires technology like carbon-capture would likely be within EPA’s traditional expertise and less likely to implicate large swaths of the economy like generation switching, and hence not be struck down.

Looking beyond EPA and GHG regulation, additional fallout from the Court’s embrace of the major questions doctrine is sure to occur. In addition to the Court’s explicit adoption of the major questions doctrine, Justice Gorsuch—a longstanding proponent of the doctrine—used his concurring opinion to lay out what he saw as the appropriate elements to consider when evaluating administrative rules under the doctrine. While Justice Gorsuch’s concurrence is not binding, future courts and administrative agencies likely will look to both the Court’s majority opinion and the Gorsuch concurrence for guidance. Administrative regulations will face increased challenges and heightened judicial scrutiny thanks to the major questions doctrine, and we can expect to see not only the number of challenges increase but also the number of successful challenges rise. Additionally, administrative agencies may proactively rein in regulatory actions they were planning to promulgate—keeping the rules more modest or tailored in an attempt to avoid challenges based on the major questions doctrine.

Undoubtedly, this will not be the last word on EPA regulation of GHGs or the use of the major questions doctrine. EPA will issue new GHG regulations, which certainly will invite future litigation. The decision will also certainly trigger many more challenges of agency authority under the newly minted major questions doctrine.

[1] Notably, the CPP was revoked by the Trump EPA, and the Biden EPA has stated that it intends to promulgate new GHG regulations different from the previous rules under past administrations. Nevertheless, the Court held that the parties had standing to proceed and the case was not moot. Slip op. at 14, 16.

By Allison A. Torrence

As we near Earth Day 2022, the United States may be headed toward a profound change in the way EPA and similar administrative agencies regulate the complex areas of environmental law. EPA began operating more than 50 years ago in 1970, and has been tasked with promulgating and enforcing some of the most complex regulations on the books. From the Clean Air Act to the Clean Water Act; to CERCLA and RCRA and TSCA; and everything in between.

EPA has penned voluminous regulations over the past 50 years to implement vital environmental policies handed down from Congress—to remarkable effect. While there is certainly progress left to be done, improvements in air and water quality in the United States, along with hazardous waste management, has been impressive. For example, according to EPA data, from 1970 to 2020, a period in which gross domestic product rose 272% and US population rose 61%, aggregate emissions of the six criteria pollutants decreased by 78%.

(source: epa.gov)

For the past 50 years the environmental administrative law process has worked mostly the same way: First, Congress passes a law covering a certain environmental subject matter (e.g., water quality), which provides policy objectives and a framework of restrictions, prohibitions and affirmative obligations. Second, EPA, the administrative agency tasked with implementing the environmental law, promulgates detailed regulations defining terms used in the law and explaining in a more comprehensive fashion how to comply with the obligations outlined in the statute. Depending on the subject matter being addressed, Congress may leave more details up to EPA, as the subject matter expert, to fill in via regulation. In some instances, there is a third step, where additional authority is delegated to the states and tribes to implement environmental regulations at the state-level based on the framework established by Congress and EPA. Occasionally someone thinks EPA overstepped its authority under a given statute, or failed to act when it was supposed to, and litigation follows to correct the over or under action.

Currently, this system of administrative law is facing challenges from parties that believe administrative agencies like EPA have moved from implementing Congress’s policy to setting their own. The most significant such challenge has come in the consolidated Clean Air Act (“CAA”) cases pending before the U.S. Supreme Court, West Virginia v. EPA, Nos. 20-1530, 20-1531, 20-1778, 20-1780.^[1] In West Virginia v. EPA, challengers object to the Obama-EPA’s Clean Power Plan (“CPP”), which used a provision in the New Source Performance Standards (“NSPS”) section of the CAA to set greenhouse gas emission standards for existing power plants. The biggest issue with the CPP, according to challengers, is that the new standards would require many operators to shut down older coal-fired units and shift generation to lower-emitting natural gas or renewable units. Challengers, which include several states, power companies and coal companies, argue the CPP implicates the “major questions doctrine” or “non-delegation doctrine”. These doctrines provide that large-scale initiatives that have broad impacts can't be based on vague, minor, or obscure provisions of law. Challengers argue that the NSPS provision used as the basis for the CPP is a minor provision of law that is being used by EPA to create a large-scale shift in energy policy. EPA argues that, although it is currently revising its greenhouse gas regulations, the actions taken in the CPP were authorized by Congress in the CAA, are consistent with with the text of the CAA as written, and do not raise the specter of the major questions or non-delegations doctrines.

While this case will certainly dictate how EPA is permitted to regulate greenhouse gases under the CAA, it will likely have broader impacts on administrative law. On the one hand, the Court may issue a narrow opinion that evaluates the CPP based on the regulations being inconsistent with the text or intent of the CAA. On the other hand, the Supreme Court may issue a broader opinion that invokes the major questions or non-delegation doctrines to hold that based on the significant-impacts of the regulation, it is an area that should be governed by Congress, not an administrative agency. If the Supreme Court takes the latter route, it could set more limits on Congress’s ability to delegate regulatory authority to administrative agencies like EPA.

Indeed, in the Supreme Court’s recent decision on the OSHA emergency temporary standard on employer vaccine or test mandate (“the OSHA ETS”), Ohio v. Dept. of Labor, et al., 595 U.S. ____ (2022), the Court struck down an administrative regulation in a preview of what might be coming in the EPA CAA case. As everyone knows by now, the Supreme Court struck down the OSHA ETS, holding it was an overstep of the agency’s authority to regulate safety issues in the workplace. The Court’s opinion focused on the impact of the OSHA ETS—that it will impact 84 million employees and it went beyond the workplace—instead of the statutory language. The Court stated, “[i]t is telling that OSHA, in its half century of existence, has never before adopted a broad public health regulation of this kind—addressing a threat that is untethered, in any causal sense, from the workplace.” Slip op. at 8.  

Justices Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch invoked the major questions doctrine in their concurring opinion, stating that Congress must speak clearly if it wishes to delegate to an administrative agency decisions of vast economic and political import. In the case of OSHA and COVID-19, the Justices maintained that Congress did not clearly assign to OSHA the power to deal with COVID-19 because it had not done so over the past two years of the pandemic. Notably, the fact that when Congress passed the Occupational Safety and Health Act, it authorized OSHA to issue emergency regulations upon determining that “employees are exposed to grave danger from exposure to substances or agents determined to be toxic or physically harmful” and “that such emergency standard[s] [are] necessary to protect employees from such danger[s]”, was not a sufficient basis for the Court or the three consenting Justices. In their view, in order to authorize OSHA to issue this vaccine or test mandate, Congress had to do more than delegate to OSHA general emergency powers 50 years ago, but instead would have had to delegate authority specific to the current pandemic.

Applying this logic to EPA and the currently-pending CAA case, Justices Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch may conclude that provisions of the CAA written 50 or 30 years ago, before climate change was fully on Congress’s radar, should not be used to as the basis for regulations that impact important climate and energy policy. Of course, many questions remain: Will a majority of the court adopt this view, and how far they will take it? If Congress can’t delegate climate change and energy policy, what else is off the table—water rights? Hazardous waste? Chemical management? If Congress can’t delegate to EPA and other administrative agencies at the same frequency as in the past, how will Congress manage passing laws dealing with complex and technical areas of law?

All of these questions and more may arise, depending on how the Supreme Court rules in West Virginia v. EPA. For now, we are waiting to see what will happen, in anticipation of some potentially significant changes on the horizon.

[1] Jenner & Block filed an Amicus Curiae brief in this case on behalf of Former Power Industry Executives in support of EPA.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On June 21, 2021, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) had its Occupational Exposure to COVID-19, Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) published in the Federal Register, making it immediately effective on that date. 86 FR 32377 (June 21, 2021). OSHA has the authority to issue an ETS, for immediate application upon publication in the Federal Register, without first proceeding through typical notice-and-comment rulemaking, if OSHA “determines” that “employees are exposed to grave danger from exposure to substances or agents determined to be toxic or physically harmful or from new hazards,” and an ETS is “necessary to protect employees from such danger.” 29 USC §655(c)(1). 

Any person “adversely affected” by the ETS may raise a legal challenge in the U.S. Court of Appeals of their principal place of business or residence, within 60 days after the ETS’s publication, and the court could then issue a stay of the rule’s implementation. 29 USC §655(f)(1). By statute, the “determinations of [OSHA] shall be conclusive if supported by substantial evidence in the record considered as a whole.” Id.  OSHA has not successfully issued an ETS in more than four decades; the open legal issue is whether OSHA’s ETS will survive legal challenge, if any is raised. 

Despite its broad title in the Federal Register, the ETS, to be codified at 29 CFR §1910.502, is targeted to specific employment “settings,” i.e., “all settings where any employee provides healthcare services or healthcare support services.” 29 CFR §1910.502(a)(1). OSHA further narrows the scope of the ETS to apply to those employees who are licensed healthcare providers and likely to be involved in the care of people suspected or confirmed to have COVID-19 and certain fully vaccinated employees. See generally, id. at §1910.502(a)(2) and the OSHA decision tree “Is Your Workplace Covered by the ETS?” The ETS requires that affected employers (1) have a COVID-19 plan, typically in writing, with a designated person in charge of implementing the plan, and based on a risk assessment, providing policies and procedures for control of COVID-19 transmission; (2) institute patient screening and management; (3) implement policies and procedures for precautions, including regarding PPE, response to aerosol-generating procedures, cleaning/disinfecting, physical distancing, and barriers; (4) ventilation standards; (5) have health screening and paid medical removal of employees after illness and exposure; (6) have paid vaccination leave; (7) provide training and communication, including regarding anti-retaliation protections; (8) institute recordkeeping of all COVID-19 cases, regardless of work-relatedness; and (9) institute a “mini respiratory protection program” when use of respirators are not otherwise required, but the employee or employer chooses to upgrade a facemask to an N95 or similar respirator. Employers must comply with all provisions within 14 days, i.e., by July 5, 2021, except for the provisions regarding physical barriers, training, and ventilation, which have a July 21, 2021 compliance date. 

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On June 10, 2021, the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) published its long-awaited response to President Biden’s January 21, 2021 Executive Order to OSHA, which had directed the agency to consider and, if necessary, by March 15, 2021, issue an Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) in response to workplace hazards from COVID-19. With the deadline long-passed, interest in OSHA’s approach was heightened when the CDC, on May 13, 2021, issued its Interim Public Health Recommendations for Fully Vaccinated People (the “May 13 CDC Guidance”), and OSHA posted on its website that it was updating its guidance in response.

As the author predicted, OSHA did not issue a broad COVID-19 ETS applicable to all industries. Instead, on June 10, 2021, OSHA issued two documents: (1) an ETS applicable only to the healthcare industry; and (2) updated guidance applicable to all other industries, implementing the recommendations from the May 13 CDC Guidance. This article addresses only the updated guidance.

The June 10, 2021 OSHA guidance, “Protecting Workers: Guidance on Mitigating and Preventing the Spread of COVID-19 in the Workplace” (“Updated OSHA Guidance”) replaces guidance of the same name that the agency issued on January 29, 2021. The difference between the two versions of OSHA’s guidance reflects the significant changes that have occurred in disease transmission and workplace risks, due to vaccines and other factors. Because the May 13 CDC Guidance found that most “fully vaccinated people can resume activities without wearing a mask or physically distancing” in most locations, the Updated OSHA Guidance announced: “Unless otherwise required by federal, state, local, tribal, or territorial laws, rules, and regulations, most employers no longer need to take steps to protect their fully vaccinated workers who are not otherwise at-risk from COVID-19 exposure” (emphasis removed). Therefore, the Updated OSHA Guidance “focuses only on protecting unvaccinated or otherwise at-risk workers in their workplaces (or well-defined portions of workplaces).” “At-risk workers” are defined as those (a) whose medical condition are such that they may not “have a full immune response to vaccination,” or (b) who, under the Americans with Disabilities Act, “may be legally entitled to reasonable accommodations that protect them from the risk of contracting COVID-19 if, for example, they cannot be protected through vaccination, cannot get vaccinated, or cannot use face coverings.”

With publication of the Updated OSHA Guidance, the agency clearly is pulling back from regulating COVID-19 in most workplaces, particularly compared to its stance earlier this year. As is typical, OSHA advises that its guidance “is not a standard or regulation, and it creates no new legal obligations.” Also, as typical, the guidance has a subtext that its guidance could be used to establish a recognized hazard and methods of prevention under the OSH Act’s General Duty Clause. Yet, by issuing guidance, rather than regulation, OSHA is signaling that its concerns about risks from COVID-19 in most workplaces have significantly decreased since vaccines have become widely available.

In the Updated OSHA Guidance, it advises that both at-risk workers and other unvaccinated workers (collectively, “protected workers”) should be protected from the risks of COVID-19 in the workplace. The Updated OSHA Guidance proceeds to describe control measures that an employer “should take” to protect these workers in all industries except healthcare (who are covered by the new ETS); public transportation (workers are subject to CDC’s transportation-related mask mandate); and schools (which are to follow “applicable,” but unspecified, CDC guidance).

With respect to recommended protections, OSHA provides a two-part approach. Part one describes controls for all workplaces, and part two is an “Appendix” with “Measures Appropriate for Higher Risk Workplaces with Mixed-Vaccination Status Workers.” In part one, OSHA recommends 11 “multi-layered interventions” that “employers should engage with workers and their representatives to determine how to implement” for protected workers:

1. Grant paid time off for vaccination.
2. Sick or symptomatic employees, and protected workers who were exposed as “close contacts” should stay home.
3. Physical distancing in all communal areas, particularly indoors, and use barriers when distancing is not possible.
4. Provide, at employer’s cost, CDC-compliant face coverings or surgical masks to protected workers, for indoor work. All but immunocompromised workers can opt for no mask-wearing outdoors. Employers can determine that PPE, e., respirators, are necessary for protected workers, including when PPE is a “reasonable accommodation” under the ADA. In addition, if workers “want to use PPE if they are still concerned about their personal safety (e.g., if a family member is at higher-risk for severe illness,” employers should “[e]ncourage and support voluntary use of PPE in these circumstances and ensure the equipment is adequate to protect the worker.” However, if face coverings present greater risk, e.g., from heat-related illness, the employer should develop other face covering/respirator options.
5. Educate and train workers on COVID-19, controls (including vaccination), and workplace policies, and track that training “as appropriate.” “Ensure” that supervisors are familiar with the employer’s “workplace flexibilities and other human resources policies and procedures,” and that all workers understand their rights.
6. “Suggest that unvaccinated customers, visitors, or guests wear face coverings,” in workplaces where there are public interactions with protected workers, “even if no longer required by your jurisdiction.”
7. Maintain ventilation systems, per CDC and ASHRAE guidance, including installing air filters at a minimum of MERV 13.
8. Routinely clean and disinfect if someone with COVID-19 symptoms or diagnosis was in the worksite within the past 24 hours, in accordance with OSHA standards for use of cleaning chemicals.
9. Record and report COVID-19 infections/deaths per 29 CFR part 1904, but through May 2022, OSHA is not requiring that adverse reactions to a mandated vaccine be recorded as a work-related illness.
10. Protect workers from retaliation and establish an anonymous process for voicing concerns.
11. Follow OSHA standards on PPE, sanitation, and other potentially applicable regulations, as well as an employer’s obligations under the General Duty Clause.

In the Appendix, OSHA recommends that employers assess whether their protected workers are at greater risk, by evaluating close contact situations, duration of contacts, type of contacts, and “distinctive factors” such as employer-provided transport, community exposure, and communal housing and living quarters, particularly in manufacturing, meat and poultry processing, high-volume retail and grocery, and seafood processing. In those workplaces, employers should evaluate imposing additional protections for protected workers, such as physical distancing, staggered work schedules, ventilation improvements, and barriers.

Although OSHA urges employers to impose a separate set of obligations solely for a subset of workers, OSHA is silent on several issues of importance to an employer managing its workplace during this “vaccine-available” phase of the pandemic. Instead, it is up to employers to determine how to navigate the public health, safety, and equal opportunity employment law, and other legal constraints to implement those issues at their workplaces.  For example, OSHA is silent on:

• An employer’s methods for identifying or verifying which of its workers are vaccinated and, therefore, no longer need to be protected from COVID-19 hazards.
• Whether there are any non-excepted industries where there should be protections for vaccinated workers, who are not known to be at-risk, but who may still get symptoms or test positive for COVID-19 because, as CDC has said: “How long vaccine protection lasts and how much vaccines protect against emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants are still under investigation.” However, vaccinated workers are indirectly addressed when OSHA states that “all workers should be supported in continuing face covering use if they choose, especially in order to safely work closely with other people.”
• Whether those who contracted COVID-19 over the past 90 days, but are not vaccinated, can be treated as vaccinated workers. (Note: CDC guidance states that people who recovered from COVID-19 do not need to quarantine after exposure to another COVID-19 case.)
• OSHA’s Appendix does not emphasize PPE, such as N95 respirators, even for voluntary use, and even at the higher-risk workplaces.
• The Updated OSHA Guidance does not refer to the agency’s March 12, 2021 COVID-19 National Emphasis Program or enforcement protocols.

The Updated OSHA Guidance no longer (or only briefly) discusses several topics that were discussed at length in the January 29, 2021 OSHA guidance.  For example, the old guidance instructed employers to “Not distinguish[] between workers who are vaccinated and those who are not.” The Updated OSHA Guidance instructs the opposite.  The Updated OSHA Guidance also:

• No longer addresses the need to assign a workplace coordinator for COVID-19 or to conduct a “thorough hazard assessment”.
• No longer recommends an extensive and enhanced cleaning and disinfection process.
• No longer addresses screening and testing.
• No longer provides extensive instructions regarding “good hygiene practices,” including hand washing and sanitizers.
• No longer states detailed recommendations on isolation, quarantine, contact tracing, and return to work protocols. Instead, OSHA now encourages employers to report COVID-19 cases as required locally and to support local contact tracing efforts, and to have all ill workers stay home, but does so in far less detail.

Throughout the pandemic, employers have been looking to the CDC and OSHA, as well as the EEOC, for guidance on the steps they should take to protect workers and to avoid liability to their workers, the government, and the public. Particularly now that state and local governments have eliminated all or most COVID-19 restrictions, employers seeking to limit their liabilities will have the difficult task of developing different ways to work now that their employees can, and according to OSHA, should be divided into two populations: the vaccinated worker and the protected worker. The Updated OSHA Guidance describes how the protected worker should be treated differently, but the employer has the more difficult challenge of adapting that guidance to the business’s unique culture, financial constraints, and goals for survival and success, during yet another unprecedented phase of working in a pandemic.

For more information or advice on the OSHA standards and enforcement during the pandemic, please contact the author. Additional information regarding working during the COVID-19 pandemic can be found in Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog and in the Jenner & Block COVID-19 Resource Center.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On his first full day in office, President Biden issued an Executive Order on Protecting Worker Health and Safety, which required OSHA to “consider whether any emergency temporary standards on COVID‑19, including with respect to masks in the workplace, are necessary,” and if so, to issue such emergency temporary standards (ETS) by March 15, 2021. Executive Order 13999, § 2(b) (Jan. 21, 2021), 86 FR 7211 (Jan. 26, 2021). An ETS, which skips the initial notice and comment process before it is in effect, can be issued pursuant to Section 6(c) of the OSH Act if OSHA determines that employees are exposed to “grave danger” and that an emergency standard is “necessary” to protect them from the grave danger. 29 USC § 655(c).

March 15, 2021 came and went; no ETS was issued. As of this writing, OSHA has not made a public statement as to why it did not issue an ETS on March 15, or the agency’s considerations and future plans regarding an ETS. Why might OSHA have chosen not to act now? What has OSHA done instead? What ETS might be on the horizon?

Why Might OSHA Have Decided Not to Issue an ETS Now?

There is considerable legal risk that a COVID-19 ETS will not hold up in court. OSHA has not successfully issued an ETS since 1978. Its last attempt to issue an ETS would have regulated asbestos exposure and was invalidated by the US Court of Appeals in 1984. In Asbestos Info. Ass’n v. OSHA, 727 F.2d 415 (5th Cir. 1984), the court rejected the ETS because OSHA did not  sufficiently support its conclusion of a “grave danger,” i.e., that 80 people would die in the next six months without the ETS and that OSHA could not show that an asbestos ETS was “necessary” given its existing respiratory standard.

As an additional legal hurdle, OSHA, in the last administration, has already gone on record that an ETS is unnecessary, and won that position in federal court. On June 11, 2020, the US Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit denied the AFL-CIO’s petition for a writ of mandamus to compel OSHA to issue an ETS for Infectious Diseases. The three-judge panel found that “OSHA reasonably determined that an ETS is not necessary at this time” given the “unprecedented nature of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the regulatory tools that the OSHA has at its disposal to ensure that employers are maintaining hazard-free work environments, see 29 U.S.C. § 654(a).” The panel held that “OSHA’s decision not to issue an ETS is entitled to considerable deference.”

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On March 12, 2021, OSHA took two significant new actions to enhance its enforcement actions regarding COVID-19 workplace safety: (1) establishing the National Emphasis Program – COVID-19 (the NEP) targeting higher hazard industries for OSHA enforcement action; and (2) updating and replacing its former Interim Enforcement Response Plan for COVID-19 (the Enforcement Plan) to prioritize in-person worksite inspections by OSHA Compliance Safety and Health Officers (CSHO). This action is in response to President Biden’s January 21, 2021 Executive Order on Protecting Worker Health and Safety, in which he directed OSHA to “launch a national program to focus OSHA enforcement efforts related to COVID-19 on violations that put the largest number of workers at serious risk or are contrary to anti-retaliation principles.” Executive Order (EO) No. 13999, § 2(d), 86 FR 7211 (Jan. 26, 2021). Although the Executive Order (§ 2(b)) also required OSHA to consider whether to issue a COVID-19 Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS), and to do so by March 15, 2021 if determined necessary, these two new OSHA policy documents are not an ETS. Instead, OSHA has buried in the text of both the NEP and the Enforcement Plan that “in the event that” OSHA issues an ETS, the ETS will be used instead of a General Duty Clause violation as the basis for citations with respect to COVID-19 safety violations, which will be enforced through the new NEP and Enforcement Plan.

A National Emphasis Program is an OSHA enforcement policy procedure, developed in accordance with OSHA’s Directives System, through which OSHA decides how it is selecting sites for enforcement initiatives. An OSHA enforcement response plan informs CSHO how to conduct their enforcement activities, whether in regard to an NEP, a particular hazard, or otherwise. In this case, the NEP and the Enforcement Plan together tell employers the categories of workplaces and the types of enforcement procedures that are OSHA’s highest COVID-19 safety priorities.

In the NEP, OSHA is targeting those specified industries whose workers “have increased potential exposure to [a COVID-19] hazard, and that puts the largest number of workers at serious risk.” NEP, p. 1. The NEP also focuses on making sure that “workers are protected from retaliation,” including by referring allegations of retaliation to OSHA’s Whistleblower Protection Program. Id. OSHA makes clear that its NEP is to “augment” its continuing enforcement actions at all workplaces where it receives a complaint, severe incident report, or referral involving COVID-19 safety issues.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On his first full day in office, President Biden issued an Executive Order on Protecting Worker Health and Safety, which required OSHA to “consider whether any emergency temporary standards on COVID‑19, including with respect to masks in the workplace, are necessary,” and if so, to issue such emergency temporary standards (ETS) by March 15, 2021. Executive Order 13999, § 2(b) (Jan. 21, 2021), 86 FR 7211 (Jan. 26, 2021). An ETS, which skips the initial notice and comment process before it is in effect, can be issued pursuant to Section 6(c) of the OSH Act if OSHA determines that employees are exposed to “grave danger” and that an emergency standard is necessary to protect them from the grave danger. 29 U.S.C. § 655(c).

Putting aside that OSHA has not successfully issued an ETS since 1978, including that the last attempt to issue an ETS, regulating asbestos exposure, was invalidated by the US Court of Appeals in 1984,[1] OSHA now has several models for a COVID‑19 ETS from which it may draw. Specifically, California, Michigan, Oregon, and Virginia are among the 22 states and territories that administer and enforce their own state-plan OSHA, rather than rely solely on federal standards and enforcement.[2] These four states have developed their own COVID‑19 safety regulations that apply to most, if not all, workplaces in their respective states, and have both distinctive features and commonalities. Employers would be well-advised to be aware of each of the states’ specific standards, not only to comply with regulatory requirements in that state, but to consider whether their workplace is ready for potential, nationwide regulations which may incorporate elements of these states’ approaches.

With OSHA under a Presidential deadline to issue a nationwide COVID-19 safety regulation, we review the current status of OSHA guidance; describe the basic elements of the four states’ regulations; and look at recent federal orders by other agencies to anticipate what employers nationwide may soon be facing.

US OSHA: COVID‑19 Regulation and Guidance in the Prior Administration

By Matthew G. Lawson

On February 5, 2021, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) issued a proposed rule updating its Hazard Communication (“Haz Com”) Standard to align its rules with those in the seventh version of the United Nation’s Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals (GHS), published in 2017.  OSHA’s proposed regulatory update is being issued as the United States’ major international trading partners, including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and those in Europe, similarly prepare to align their own hazard communications rules with the seventh version of the GHS.

Originally established in 1983, OSHA’s Haz Com Standard provides a systematized approach to communicating workplace hazards associated with exposure to hazardous chemicals.  Under the Haz Com Standard, chemical manufacturers and/or importers are required to classify the hazards of chemicals which they produce or import into the United States, and all employers are required to provide information to their employees about the hazardous chemicals to which they are exposed, by means of a hazard communication program, labels and other forms of warning, safety data sheets, and information and training.  At an international level, the GHS provides a universally harmonized approach to classifying chemicals and communicating hazard information.  Core tenants of the GHS include universal standards for hazard testing criteria, warning pictograms, and safety data sheets for hazardous chemicals.

In a pre-published version of the proposed rule, OSHA’s proposed modifications to the Haz Com Standard include codifying enforcement policies currently in OSHA’s compliance directive, clarifying requirements related to the transport of hazardous chemicals, adding alternative labeling provisions for small containers and adopting new requirements related to preparation of Safety Data Sheets.  Key modifications included in the proposed rule, include:

• New flexibility for labeling bulk shipments of hazardous chemicals, including allowing labels to be placed on the immediate container or transmitted with shipping papers, bills of lading, or by other technological or electronic means that are immediately available to workers in printed form on the receiving end of the shipment;
• New alternative labeling options where a manufacturer or importer can demonstrate that it is not feasible to use traditional pull-out labels, fold-back labels, or tags containing the full label information normally required under the Haz Com Standard, including specific alternative requirements for containers less than or equal to 100ml capacity and for containers less than or equal to 3ml capacity; and
• New requirements to update the labels on individual containers that have been released for shipment but are awaiting future distribution where the manufacturer, importer or distributer becomes aware of new significant information regarding the hazards of the chemical.  

OSHA last updated its Haz Com Standard in 2012, to align the standard with the then recently published third version of GHS.  In its newly proposed rule, OSHA clarifies that it is “not proposing to change the fundamental structure” of its Haz Com Standard, but instead seeking to “address specific issues that have arisen since the 2012 rulemaking” and to provide better alignment with international trading partners.  According to OSHA, its proposed modifications to the Haz Com Standard “will increase worker protections, and reduce the incidence of chemical-related occupational illnesses and injuries by further improving the information on the labels and Safety Data Sheets for hazardous chemicals.” 

OSHA is currently accepting comments on its proposed rule until April 19, 2021.  Comments may be submitted electronically to Docket No. OSHA-2019-0001at http://www.regulations.gov, which is the Federal e-Rulemaking Portal.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On the afternoon of November 30, 2020, the California Office of Administrative Law (OAL) issued the final approval, allowing the emergency COVID‑19 regulation proposed by the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal-OSHA) and approved by the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board (Board) on November 19. The emergency regulation, establishing new sections 3205, 3205.1 through 3205.4 to Title 8, Division 1, Chapter 4 (General Industry Safety Orders) of the California Code of Regulations (CCR) is titled “COVID‑19 Prevention.” The COVID‑19 Prevention Rule is attached here as approved by the OAL. The COVID‑19 Prevention Rule is immediately effective on November 30, 2020. As an emergency regulation, it expires by October 21, 2021, unless it is extended or made permanent.

California, which as a “state-plan State,” can adopt workplace safety and health regulations more stringent than US OSHA regulations and guidance, has through its emergency regulatory process adopted a COVID‑19 regulation that applies to “all employees and places of employment” in California, except if the employees are working from home, the place of employment has only one employee “who does not have contact with other persons,” or employees when covered by California’s Aerosol Transmissible Diseases regulation, 8 CCR § 5199, which applies only to health care services, facilities, and operations. 8 CCR § 3205(a)(1). 

The basic construction of the COVID‑19 Prevention Rule follows the elements of California’s Injury and Illness Prevention Program (IIPP) rule, 8 CCR § 3203, and requires that all employers prepare and adopt a written program with the same elements of employee communication, hazard identification, inspections, hazard correction, training, controls, reporting, recordkeeping and access, but adds substantive requirements relating to COVID‑19 within each of those elements, and adds elements unique to an employer’s response to and control of COVID‑19. The COVID‑19 Prevention Rule also has provisions affecting aspects of an employer’s operations beyond its traditional safety and health scope, including an obligation to “continue and maintain an employee’s earnings, seniority and all other employee rights and benefits, including the employee’s right to their former job status, as if the employee had not been removed from their job” for employees who are otherwise able to work, but are excluded from the worksite for work-related COVID‑19 exposures and quarantines. 8 CCR § 3205(10)(C).

Other notable aspects of the regulation include:

• Definitions of COVID‑19 “exposure”, “symptoms”, “high-risk exposure period”, “exposed workplace”, periods of exclusion from the workplace (quarantine and isolation) and return-to-work criteria, that do not match the CDC’s current approach for essential workforces and which do not allow for any future changes in CDC guidelines regarding the length of isolation, quarantine, or return-to-work criteria.
• Employers must provide viral testing for all employees excluded under Cal-OSHA’s broad definition of “exposed workplace,” up to twice weekly depending on the severity of an outbreak at the workplace.
• Employers, with employee participation, must “conduct a workplace-specific identification of all interactions, areas, processes, equipment and materials that could potentially expose employees to COVID‑19 hazards.” 8 CCR § 3502 (c)(2)(D).
• Specific requirements regarding controls, including physical distancing, face coverings, ventilation, disinfection, cleaning, hygiene, PPE and engineering controls.
• Employers must provide notice within one business day of all COVID‑19 cases in the exposed workplace to employees “who may have had COVID‑19 exposures and [their union representative] and to all other employers/contractors in the workplace. 8 CCR § 3502 (c)(3)(B)3. (See also recently enacted revision to Labor Code § 6409.6 (AB 685).)
• Employers must communicate hazards, policies and procedures to employees and all “other employers, persons, and entities within or in contact with the employer’s workplace.” 8 CCR § 3502 (c)(1)(D)
• Specific requirements regarding COVID‑19 case investigation that must be documented and provided to any employee, employee representative, Cal-OSHA, or local health agencies.
• Employers must have a documented procedure for investigation of COVID‑19 cases in the workplace, with many specific steps required in the COVID‑19 Prevention Rule.
• Requirements for employer-provided transportation to and from the workplace and employer-provided housing. 8 CCR §§ 3205.3 and 3205.4.

Merely preparing the written program document, in addition to the required procedures and protocols, will be a significant undertaking for almost all California employers. In the public hearing before the Board, Cal-OSHA representatives minimized the additional burden placed on employers given its view that employers already should have already undertaken much of the effort to update their basic IIPP document. Cal-OSHA representatives stated, however, that it recognized that employers would have to take some time to get all the requirements in place and would exercise enforcement discretion given the regulation’s immediate effective date. Cal-OSHA also informed the Board that it planned to issue interpretive guidance and other materials, but did not specify a date by which it would do so. Cal-OSHA stated that it would hold Advisory Committee meetings with employers and employees regarding refining the Rule, but noted that the agency did not expect to propose any changes in the regulatory language in the near-term.

For more information or advice on how to comply and implement the COVID‑19 Prevention Rule, please contact the author.  Additional information regarding working during the COVID‑19 pandemic can be found on this blog and in Jenner & Block’s COVID‑19 Resource Center.

By Gabrielle Sigel  and Leah M. Song

On November 2, 2020, Judge Cogan of the U.S. District for the Eastern District of New York dismissed the amended complaint of workers at Amazon’s Staten Island JFK8 fulfillment center (“JFK8”) against their employer over its alleged non-compliance with state and federal public health guidance and law during the COVID‑19 pandemic. Palmer. v. Amazon.com Inc., No. 20-cv-02468, U.S. Dist. Ct. E.D.N.Y., Doc. 73, Nov. 2, 2020 (“Op.”).

The workers alleged issues with the company’s productivity requirements preventing basic hygiene, limited air-conditioned break rooms impeding social distancing, inadequate contact tracing, and lack of communication and pay regarding COVID‑19 leave at the JFK8 facility. The amended complaint asserted claims for (i) public nuisance, (ii) breach of the duty to provide a safe workplace under New York Labor Law (“NYLL”) § 200, (iii) failure to timely pay COVID‑19 leave under NYLL § 191, and (iv) an injunction against future failure to timely pay COVID‑19 leave. Plaintiffs sought injunctive relief for their first, second, and fourth causes of action, and damages for their third cause of action.

On August 11, 2020, Amazon moved to dismiss the action based on the theory of primary jurisdiction, workers’ compensation law exclusivity, and other grounds. Judge Cogan granted Amazon’s motion to dismiss the public nuisance and workplace safety duty claims, without prejudice, based on the federal doctrine of primary jurisdiction, which “seeks to maintain a proper balance between the roles of courts and administrative agencies,” allowing a district court to choose not to rule in favor of having a matter addressed by an administrative agency. Op. at 8. Judge Cogan found that the “central issue in this case is whether Amazon’s workplace policies at JFK8 adequately protect the safety of its workers during the COVID‑19 pandemic,” which the court framed as a question of whether that issue is best handled by OSHA or the court. Id. at 10.  The court noted that, although OSHA has not issued a regulatory standard specific to COVID‑19, this “does not mean…that OSHA has abdicated its responsibilities during the pandemic. Rather, the agency has exercised its discretion in determining how to proceed in the face of an evolving pandemic fraught with uncertainty.” Id. The court reasoned that it was “not expert in public health or workplace safety matters, and lack[s] the training, expertise, and resources to oversee compliance with evolving industry guidance.” Id. at 11. Furthermore, the court found that “[p]laintiffs’ claims and proposed injunctive relief go to the heart of OSHA’s expertise and discretion.” Id. The court further held that the “risk of inconsistent rulings further weighs in favor of applying the doctrine of primary jurisdiction” as “[c]ourts are particularly ill-suited to address this evolving situation” and OSHA would be able to impose more flexible and uniform policies across the industry. Id. Therefore, the court dismissed plaintiffs’ public nuisance and NYLL § 200 claims, “so that plaintiffs may determine whether to seek relief through the appropriate administrative and regulatory framework.” Id. at 12.  

Moreover, the court held that, even if the court did not defer to OSHA’s primary jurisdiction, it would dismiss the public nuisance claim because New York law requires that a private action for public nuisance allege that the plaintiff sustained special injury not common to the public at large. Finding that an increased risk of contracting COVID‑19 is “common to the New York City community at large” and the JFK8 facility is “not the source of COVID‑19,” the court held that plaintiffs could not maintain a public nuisance claim. Id. at 13-14. The court also found that, although the state safe workplace claim under NYLL § 200 is not preempted by the OSH Act, plaintiffs’ claims for past injuries, even for injunctive relief, are precluded by the language of New York’s workers’ compensation law, which makes workers’ compensation the exclusive remedy for workers’ claims against employers “for any liability whatsoever.” Id. at 14-20.

The court also dismissed plaintiffs’ NYLL § 191 claims regarding failure to pay timely COVID‑19 sick leave, finding that the statute addresses claims for prompt payment of “wages,” not sick leave. In reaching that decision, the court rejected the NY State Department of Labor’s recent COVID‑19 guidance in which it stated that prompt payment of COVID‑19 sick leave was subject to NYLL § 191’s requirements. Id. at 21-24.

Another example of a case in which a court relied on the primary jurisdiction clause to dismiss COVID‑19 workplace safety claims against an employer is Rural Community Workers Alliance (“RCWA”) v. Smithfield Foods, Inc., No. 5:20-cv-06063 (N.D. Mo.) from May 5, 2020. In that case, the United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri granted Smithfield Foods’ (“Smithfield”) motion to dismiss pursuant to the primary jurisdiction doctrine. The RCWA plaintiffs alleged two common law claims: (1) Smithfield’s practices at the meat processing plant constituted a public nuisance; and (2) Smithfield had breached its duty to provide a safe workplace. The plaintiffs, an employee and a workers advocacy group, sought only injunctive relief to require Smithfield to comply with OSHA/CDC guidance issued for the entire meat processing industry, and importantly, did not allege that they or any of their members had contracted COVID‑19 at the plant.

The Missouri federal case dismissed the case with prejudice, based on the federal primary jurisdiction doctrine. The court found and deferred to OSHA’s primary jurisdiction to interpret and apply its guidance and to the rights, albeit limited, that plaintiffs can seek through OSHA’s administrative and judicial processes. Id. at 14-17. In addition, the court found that plaintiffs had not met their “extraordinary burden” of proving a right to preliminary injunctive relief. Id. at 17. The court found that, despite the prevalence of COVID‑19 in the community and in the plant, the plaintiffs had not suffered “irreparable harm” because they alleged only the possibility of death or serious illness in the future. Id. at 18-20. The court found that “unfortunately, no one can guarantee health for essential workers – or even the general public – in the middle of this global pandemic.” Id. at 19. Thus, because the employer was taking measures to control the spread and there no confirmed COVID‑19 cases currently, “the court cannot conclude that the spread of COVID‑19 at the Plant is inevitable or that Smithfield will be unable to contain it if it occurs.” Id. at 20. The court also noted, when balancing the harms of granting (or denying) the injunction that “no essential-business employer can completely eliminate the risks that COVID‑19 will spread to its employees through the workplace. Thus, it is important that employers make meaningful, good faith attempts to reduce the risk.” Id.

The court also found that plaintiffs were unlikely to prevail on the merits of their nuisance claim because the employer had taken “significant measures” and there were no occurrences of the disease. Id. at 21-22. Similarly, the court found that plaintiffs would not be able to prove that Smithfield had breached its duty to provide a safe place to work, because the company “has taken substantial steps to reduce the protection for COVID‑19 exposure” and appeared to be complying with the OSHA/CDC guidance. Id. at 22.

Please feel free to contact the authors with questions or for further information. For regular updates about the impact of COVID‑19 in the workplace and on business generally, please visit Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog and Jenner & Block’s COVID‑19 Resource Center.

By Leah M. Song and Gabrielle Sigel 

On June 18, 2020, U.S. OSHA issued its “Guidance on Returning to Work,” (“Reopening Guidance”) compiling best practices and existing regulatory standards to assist employers and workers return to work and reopen businesses characterized as non-essential in the earlier weeks of the COVID‑19 pandemic. OSHA described the purpose of the Reopening Guidance as a supplement to OSHA’s first COVID-19 guidance for all employers, issued on March 9, 2020, titled “Guidance on Preparing Workplaces for COVID‑19,” and to the White House’s April 16, 2020 “Guidelines for Opening Up America Again,” both of which have been analyzed on the Jenner & Block Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog here and here, respectively.  In its news release introducing the Reopening Guidance, OSHA states that “[n]on-essential businesses should reopen as state and local governments lift  stay-at-home … orders, and follow public health recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other federal requirements or guidelines.”

The Reopening Guidance states that it “focuses on the need for employers to develop and implement strategies. . .” for safe work after reopening. Although OSHA does not directly state that employers must have written reopening plans, OSHA’s Reopening Guidance provides the following “guiding principles” that employers’ reopening plans “should address”:

• Hazard Assessment
• Hygiene
• Social distancing
• Identification and Isolation of Sick Employees
• Return to Work After Illness or Exposure
• Controls
• Workplace Flexibilities
• Training
• Anti-retaliation

(Reopening Guidance, pp. 6-10.) OSHA then provides suggestions on how to implement each of the “guiding principles.” Id. For instance, the Hazard Assessment guiding principle includes “practices to determine when, where, how, and to what sources of SARS-CoV-2 workers are likely to be exposed in the course of their job duties.” The Reopening Guidance provides several examples of how to implement hazard assessments, such as assessing job tasks to determine which involve occupational exposure to the virus and exposure to other members of the public or coworkers. In the discussion of the guiding principle of “Controls,” OSHA addresses PPE and makes clear, as it did in its Face Coverings guidance on June 10, 2020, that face coverings are not PPE. (Reopening Guidance, p. 8.) OSHA repeats this distinction regarding PPE in its discussion of the guiding principle of “Training.” OSHA states that although employers should train workers on how to don/doff, clean, store, maintain, and dispose of PPE, face coverings are not PPE, indicating that those training procedures are not for face coverings. (Reopening Guidance, p. 9.)  The CDC, however, has issued more comprehensive guidelines regarding use of face coverings.  OSHA concludes its discussion of the guiding principles by stating:  “Regardless of the types of infection prevention and control measures employers incorporate into their reopening plans, they should consider ways to communicate about those measures to workers, including through training … and providing a point of contact for any worker questions or concerns.”  

In the Reopening Guidance, OSHA reiterates what it states on its COVID‑19 webpage, that during the pandemic, employers continue to be responsible for complying with OSHA regulations. In the Reopening Guidance, OSHA provides an Appendix A organizing those regulatory requirements in table format. In addition, OSHA states that “[w]here there is no OSHA standard specific to SARS-CoV‑2, employers have the responsibility to provide a safe and healthful workplace that is free from serious recognized hazards” under the OSH Act’s General Duty Clause. 29 CFR 654(a)(1). (Reopening Guidance, p. 11.)

The Reopening Guidance (pp. 11-16) concludes with a series of Employer FAQs, addressing the following topics:

1. OSH Act does not prohibit worksite COVID‑19 testing, but OSHA cautions that a negative result may not indicate no hazard;
2. OSH Act does not prohibit worksite temperature checks or health screenings;
3. OSHA requirements when performing tests and screening, including to protect employees who are performing screenings and to maintain records generating employee medical information;
4. Referencing the sources of other equal employment laws, other than the OSH Act, pertaining to health and medical issues;
5. Referencing the CDC as the source of guidelines for a sick employee’s safe return to work; and
6. Advising, in general, how employers can determine whether OSHA-required PPE is needed.

As with all its published guidance, OSHA states that it is “not a standard or regulation, and it creates no new legal obligations.”

Please feel free to contact the authors with questions or for further information. For regular updates about the impact of COVID‑19 in the workplace and on business generally, please visit Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog and Jenner & Block’s COVID‑19 Resource Center.

By Leah M. Song and Gabrielle Sigel 

On June 11, 2020, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit denied the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations’ (“AFL-CIO”) petition for a writ of mandamus to compel OSHA to issue an Emergency Temporary Standard for Infectious Diseases (“ETS”), providing regulations to protect workers against coronavirus exposure in the workplace.

The three-judge panel, consisting of Judges Henderson, Wilkins, and Rao, found that “OSHA reasonably determined that an ETS is not necessary at this time” given the “unprecedented nature of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the regulatory tools that the OSHA has at its disposal to ensure that employers are maintaining hazard-free work environments, see 29 U.S.C. § 654(a).” The statutory section referenced by the court, includes the General Duty Clause of the Occupational Safety and Health Act (“the OSH Act”), which states that each employer “shall furnish to each of his employees employment and a place of employment which are free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm to his employees.” 29 U.S.C. § 654(a)(1). The statute also requires that each employer shall “comply with occupational safety and health standards promulgated under this Act.” 29 U.S.C. § 654(a)(2). The panel held that “OSHA’s decision not to issue an ETS is entitled to considerable deference.”

Following the Court’s ruling, Solicitor of Labor Kate O’Scannlain and OSHA Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary Loren Sweatt stated in a news release: “We are pleased with the decision from the D.C. Circuit, which agreed that OSHA reasonably determined that its existing statutory and regulatory tools are protecting America’s workers and that an emergency temporary standard is not necessary at this time. OSHA will continue to enforce the law and offer guidance to employers and employees to keep America’s workplaces safe.” The ALF-CIO has the right to ask for a rehearing, including en banc, i.e., by all the judges appointed to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The lawsuit grew out of written requests that the AFL-CIO and more than 20 unions, including unions for healthcare workers, sent to OSHA in early March.  They asked OSHA to issue an ETS, rather than have employers rely solely on existing OSHA regulations and new COVID-19 guidance.  They requested an ETS that would include a requirement that all employers devise and implement an infection control plan and implement the necessary controls. After the AFL-CIO sent a letter on April 28, 2020, to the Secretary of Labor calling on the agency “to take immediate action to protect the safety and health of workers from exposure to COVID-19 on the job,” the Secretary responded two days later and stated that an ETS was not necessary.

On May 18, 2020, the AFL-CIO filed its petition for a writ of mandamus in the U.S. Court of Appeals to compel OSHA to issue an ETS within 30 days. The petition was based on Section 6(c) of the OSH Act, which states that OSHA “shall provide…for an emergency temporary standard to take immediate effect upon publication in the Federal Register if [it] determines (A) that employees are exposed to grave danger from exposure to substances or agents determined to be toxic or physically harmful or from new hazards, and (B) that such emergency standard is necessary to protect employees from such danger.” 29 U.S.C. § 655(c)(1). The AFL-CIO argued in its court petition that the COVID-19 pandemic is “exactly the type of workplace catastrophe that Congress intended an emergency temporary standard to address.” Given the risks facing essential workers and those returning to work, the AFL-CIO requested an expedited briefing and disposition of the petition and for OSHA to be given 10 days to respond.

On May 29, 2020, OSHA filed its response to the AFL-CIO’s petition, describing its efforts to protect workers during the pandemic through enforcing “existing rules and statutory requirements” and providing “rapid, flexible guidance.” OSHA emphasized the extreme nature of an ETS and how an ETS is rarely used as it “imposes a mandatory standard immediately without public input” and “stays in place…until a permanent rule informed by comment is put in place just six months later.” OSHA argued that 1) the AFL-CIO failed to demonstrate legal standing to bring the petition for a writ of mandamus; 2) an ETS is not “necessary” given OSHA’s existing specific rules, the general duty clause and would otherwise be counterproductive to OSHA’s COVID-19 efforts; and 3) “an ETS would foreclose ongoing policy assessments by the executive branch, Congress, and the states.” The National Association of Home Builders of the United States and other business associations filed amicus curiae briefs in support of OSHA’s position.

On June 2, 2020, the AFL-CIO filed its reply brief  defending its legal standing to bring the case based on its representation of workers in highly impacted industries and that at least 660 of its members have died as a result of COVID-19. The AFL-CIO continued to stress that an ETS is necessary given the “urgent situation” and “grave danger” that COVID-19 presents. Additionally, the AFL-CIO stated that “Congress required OSHA to issue standards despite inevitable scientific uncertainty,” and an ETS does provide flexibility navigating new scientific information since “an ETS can be issued and modified without notice and comment.” The AFL-CIO clarified that the OSH Act requires the agency to issue an ETS, “not that it requires a static, uniform, or all-encompassing ETS.”

In denying AFL-CIO’s petition, the court did not address OSHA’s standing argument, ruling solely on the substance of AFL-CIO’s petition.

Of note, OSHA regulations do not have direct application to the 22 states who have their own state occupational safety and health agencies and regulations governing private employers. One of those “state plan states” is California.  On May 20, 2020, the Labor & Employment Committee of the National Lawyers Guild and Worksafe, a California nonprofit “dedicated to ensuring occupational safety and health rights of vulnerable workers,” filed a petition for a temporary emergency standard before the California Occupational Safety & Health Standards Board (“the Board”). The petitioners requested that the Board create two new California safety regulations. First, the petitioners requested “a temporary emergency standard that would provide specific protections to California employees who may have exposure to COVID-19, but are not protected by the Aerosol Transmissible Diseases standards (Sections 5199 and 5199.1).” The petitioners recommended that the Board consider their draft emergency temporary standard for the Board’s consideration of language for an emergency standard. The petitioners’ draft parallels the framework of the Injury and Illness Prevention Program, but adding COVID-19 related provisions, such as identifying an employee representative, establishing various procedures, and analyzing job hazards and implementing preventative measures. Second, the petitioners requested that the Board enter into “a permanent rulemaking effort to protect workers from infectious diseases including novel pathogens,” such as COVID-19. As of June 11, 2020, the Board has not yet issued its decision on the petition.

Please feel free to contact the authors with questions or for further information. For regular updates about the impact of COVID‑19 in the workplace and on business generally, please visit Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog and Jenner & Block’s COVID‑19 Resource Center.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On June 10, 2020, in a series of six “frequently asked questions and answers” (Face Coverings FAQs), OSHA provided its first general guidance on the use of cloth face coverings in the workplace.  In announcing the FAQs, OSHA’s Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Loren Swett, stated that it was issuing the guidance because “millions of Americans will be wearing masks in their workplace for the first time” and “OSHA is ready to help workers and employers understand how to properly use masks so they can stay safe and healthy in the workplace.”

The Face Coverings FAQs document is the first COVID-19 guidance that OSHA has provided in a Q&A format.  In this format, OSHA’s guidance may not provide straightforward answers to many employers’ questions.  For most employers, the most important takeaway from the Face Coverings FAQs is: Cloth face coverings are not OSHA-required personal protective equipment (“PPE”), which must be provided and paid for by an employer; however, an employer may recommend or require cloth face coverings as a method of non-PPE virus “source control” and as part of a COVID-19 infection response plan.  OSHA does not address whether employer-required cloth face coverings, when required as non-PPE “source control,” must be paid for by the employer.

Here are some key points from the Face Coverings FAQs:

• Cloth face coverings are used to “contain the wearer’s potentially infectious respiratory droplets produced when an infected person coughs, sneezes, or talks and to limit the spread of … the virus that causes … COVID-19, to others.” By “containing” droplets, rather than protecting the wearer against “droplets,” cloth face coverings are solely used for “source control”, not wearer protection.
• “Source control” is to prevent people who are asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic “from spreading potentially infectious respiratory droplets to others.”
• Cloth face coverings, whether homemade or commercially produced, “are not considered personal protective equipment (PPE)” under OSHA’s PPE regulations, 29 CFR 1910.132.
• Cloth face coverings are different from PPE, such as medical face masks (surgical masks) or respirators, because the sole purpose of cloth face coverings is as source control.
• Because face coverings are not PPE, “OSHA’s PPE standards do not require employers to provide them.” However, “OSHA generally recommends that employers encourage workers to wear face coverings at work,” as a method of source control.
• Because cloth face coverings are not necessary PPE, an employer cannot be required under OSHA’s PPE standards to provide them at no cost to workers.
• Employers can require cloth face coverings. Specifically, employers “may choose to ensure that cloth face coverings are worn as a feasible means of abatement in a control plan designed to address hazards from …the virus that causes COVID-19.” (emphasis added)  In those circumstances, employers are “choos[ing] to use cloth face coverings as a means of source control,” in combination with engineering and administrative controls, such as social distancing. 
• Cloth face coverings cannot be a substitute for social distancing measures.
• Cloth face coverings cannot be used by “those who have trouble breathing or are otherwise unable to put on or remove a mask without assistance.”
• Employers “have discretion” as to “whether to allow employees to wear cloth face coverings…based on the specific circumstances present at the work site.” For example, an employer can determine that cloth face coverings cannot be used if they “present[] or exacerbate[] a hazard” or are incompatible with otherwise required PPE. 
• If the employer determines that cloth face coverings are inappropriate, “employers can provide PPE, such as face shields and/or surgical masks,” instead of encouraging face masks. In a footnote, OSHA explains that when surgical masks are used solely for “source control,” they are not considered “PPE,” which would be required to be provided and paid for by the employer under the PPE regulations.
• Neither cloth face coverings nor surgical masks can be used as a substitute for respirators, when respirators are required. Respirators prevent the wearer from inhaling small particles, and must be provided and used according to OSHA’s Respiratory Protection standard, 29 CFR 1910.134.
• Per existing regulation, filtering facepiece respirators (FFRs), such as N95s, can be used by employees “voluntarily,” if they first receive certain required information regarding their use and hazards.
• Even though cloth face coverings are not required pursuant to PPE regulations, OSHA twice refers to an employer’s statutory obligations under the OSH Act’s General Duty Clause to provide a workplace “free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm.” In those references, OSHA refers to using cloth face coverings as source covering one “feasible method” to address hazards from the virus in the workplace.

OSHA makes important distinctions between a cloth face coverings and “medical face masks”, of which surgical masks are an example. A surgical mask is not necessarily approved by the FDA as a medical device.  Both medical face masks and cloth face coverings fail to protect the wearer against airborne transmissible agents because of their loose fit, and both can be used to “contain the wearer’s respiratory droplets”, i.e., “source control”. However, in contrast with cloth face coverings, surgical masks can be PPE if they are used to “protect workers against splashes and sprays (i.e., droplets) containing potentially infectious materials.”  However, a surgical mask also may not be considered PPE, when it is used solely as “source control.” Thus, with respect to surgical masks, OSHA is making the distinction between PPE and non-PPE based on the purpose for which the employer uses it—if the mask is used solely for purposes of “source control,” it is not PPE; if the mask is used for wearer protection against others’ droplets, it is PPE.  However, because “cloth face coverings” are defined to exclude protecting the worker from others’ infection, if an employer is stating that it is using a piece of equipment as a method of wearer protection, the employer will be required to show that, in fact, the device can provide that protection and treat it as PPE.

OSHA’s references to the General Duty Clause are worth repeating and analyzing.  In the Face Covering FAQs, OSHA makes a distinction between what is required by existing regulations, such as the PPE or Respiratory Protection standards, and what may be required under the General Duty Clause.  In other guidance, OSHA has stated that the General Duty Clause is one of the "OSHA requirements" that “apply to preventing occupational exposure to SARS-CoV-2.” In the first comprehensive guidance OSHA issued regarding COVID-19, at page 7, OSHA stated that developing an infectious disease response plan is a step that all employers can take to guard against the workplace risks of exposure to the virus.

In the context of the General Duty Clause, OSHA’s Face Covering FAQs guidance states that an employer’s “control plan designed to address hazards” from the virus and COVID-19 can include “control measures,” including engineering controls, administrative controls (such as social distancing), PPE, and different methods of virus “source control,” all as “feasible methods” to address the hazards. OSHA also describes non-PPE as a “means of abatement” under the General Duty Clause.  Thus, especially because of the potentially broad scope of the General Duty Clause, an employer would be well-advised to have a COVID-19 response plan, which should include an identification of the risk of workplace exposure (it may be low) and descriptions of engineering and administrative controls, PPE, and other controls for the risk of exposure to the virus in the workplace.  Consistent with the Face Coverings FAQs guidance, the response plan should carefully distinguish between equipment to be used as required PPE and equipment required or allowed to be used as “source control.”

Please feel free to contact the author with questions or for further information.  For regular updates about the impact of COVID 19 in the workplace and on business generally, please visit Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog and Jenner & Block’s COVID 19 Resource Center.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On May 19, 2020, in recognition of many more businesses opening their workplaces in response to governors modifying stay-at-home orders and the President’s urging businesses to reopen across the country, OSHA revised two of its prior COVID-19 enforcement policies, thereby informing employers that OSHA would no longer grant enforcement discretion regarding the recording of work-related COVID-19 exposure cases and that OSHA intended to conduct more onsite inspections of alleged workplace violations and complaints, particularly those focusing on COVID-19 issues. 

OSHA began its announced changes in enforcement policies by stating that, “The government and the private sector have taken rapid and evolving measures to slow the virus’s spread, protect employees, and adapt to new ways of doing business.”  The two revised policies are to “ensure employers are taking action to protect their employees” as workplaces reopen.  Both new policies go into effect on May 26, 2020.

OSHA’s first policy change is to its own enforcement procedures.  OSHA plans to increase in-person inspections of “all types of workplaces.”  OSHA stated that it can conduct more onsite inspections because the risk to OSHA inspectors is lower and the PPE that OSHA inspectors would need is “more widely available.” Thus, OSHA will rescind its April 13, 2020, Interim Enforcement Response Plan for COVID-19, which stated OSHA's temporary policy of suspending most onsite inspections in favor of written and telephonic communications with employers.  Under the May 26, 2020 Updated Interim Enforcement Response Plan, OSHA intends to return to its pre-pandemic approach for determining whether to respond to employee complaints by (a) in-person investigation; (b) non-formal telephonic investigations; and/or (c) requests that employers respond in writing to a complaint, such as through a Rapid Response Investigation in response to a reported fatality or work-related in-patient hospitalization.  However, in all cases, OSHA intends to “continue to prioritize COVID-19 cases.” 

OSHA’s updated policy also provides that in geographic areas with sustained or resurgent cases of community transmission, OSHA’s Area Directors have the discretion to prioritize onsite inspections for cases of fatalities and imminent danger exposures, particularly in “high-risk workplaces, such as hospitals and other healthcare providers treating patients with COVID-19 [and] workplaces with high numbers of complaints or known COVID-19 cases.”

OSHA’s second announced enforcement policy change concerns OSHA’s recordkeeping regulations, which obligates employers in many businesses with 10 or more employees to record certain cases of employee illness as a recordable case on OSHA-required logs of work-related injuries and illnesses.  The recordkeeping regulation provides that if the employee has a confirmed case of COVID-19, which is “work-related” as defined in OSHA regulation, 29 CFR § 1904.5, and for which the employee received medical treatment beyond first aid or days away from work (the latter almost always being the case), the employee’s illness is recordable. 

The challenge to employers in the case of a community-wide communicable disease is knowing whether the employee’s illness is “work-related.”  In OSHA’s April 10, 2020 enforcement discretion policy issued on this topic, OSHA recognized that for all workplaces except those with a high-risk of exposure to COVID-19-positive people (e.g., COVID-19 hospital wards and prisons), employers did not have to take action to determine whether an employee’s illness was due to a work-related exposure and thus recordable.  In the new OSHA policy, effective May 26, 2020, all employers, regardless of COVID-19 exposure risk levels, must determine whether an employee’s illness is work-related. 

However, OSHA recognizes that, “[g]iven the nature of the disease and ubiquity of community spread, … in many instances it remains difficult to determine whether a COVID-19 illness is work-related, especially when an employee has experienced potential exposure both in and out of the workplace.”  Thus, if the employer conducts a “reasonable and good faith inquiry” and the employer “cannot determine whether it is more likely than not that exposure in the workplace played a causal role…., the employer does not need to record that COVID-19 illness.” (Emphasis added.)

OSHA will consider whether an employer has made a “reasonable determination of work-relatedness” by evaluating:

• The reasonableness of the employer's investigation into work-relatedness. OSHA states that employers should “not be expected to undertake extensive medical inquiries, given employee privacy concerns and most employers' lack of expertise in this area.” Instead, in response to known employee illness, the employer should “(1) ask the employee how he believes he contracted the COVID-19 illness; (2) while respecting employee privacy, discuss with the employee his work and out-of-work activities that may have led to the COVID-19 illness; and (3) review the employee's work environment for potential exposure,” including other cases in that environment.
• The evidence available to the employer.“Available” evidence can be information both available at the time of the investigation and learned later by the employer.
• The evidence that a COVID-19 illness was contracted at work. OSHA will evaluate “all reasonably available evidence… to determine whether an employer has complied with its recording obligation.” Such evidence can include clusters of cases in the work environment or whether the employee had “frequent, close exposure to the general public in a locality with ongoing community transmission” and in either case there is “no alternative explanation.”  On the other hand, a case is “likely not work-related,” if the employee had “close” and “frequent” exposure to someone outside the workplace who was infectious during the relevant time period.

Especially because OSHA can do its own post hoc determination of the reasonableness of the employee’s decision, employers should document their investigation of each case of an employee COVID-19 illness.

OSHA ends its revised policy by cautioning employers that, regardless of whether an employee’s illness is recordable, “as a matter of health and safety” [subtext: subject to potential OSHA enforcement], the employer should respond to protect other workers when it learns that one employee has become ill.  OSHA does not describe, however, what those next steps should be.

Please feel free to contact the author with questions or for further information.  For regular updates about the impact of COVID‑19 in the workplace and on business generally, please visit Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog and Jenner & Block’s COVID‑19 Resource Center.

By Gabrielle Sigel and Leah M. Song

On April 17, 2020, OSHA posted an April 16, 2020 enforcement guidance, which, for the first time, recognized that due to COVID-19, employers were not able to feasibly comply with a wide-range of OSHA regulatory requirements.  In a memorandum titled, “Discretion in Enforcement when Considering an Employer’s Good Faith Efforts during the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Pandemic” (“Good Faith Guidance”).  OSHA instructed its Compliance Officers that they should exercise enforcement discretion and not issue citations for regulatory violations if employers made a “good faith effort” but ultimately could not comply with regulations requiring “annual or recurring audits, reviews, training, or assessments” (collectively, “Recurring Requirements”).  The Good Faith Guidance takes effect immediately, applies to all OSHA-regulated industries, and continues “until further notice.”

In support of its enforcement discretion decision, OSHA found that, due to widespread business shutdowns in response to COVID-19, many employers were not able to perform certain mandatory Recurring Requirements, such as annual audiograms, Process Safety Management revalidations and reviews, respirator spirometry testing, annual training requirements, and inspection, certification, and relicensing activities.  As further support, OSHA noted that the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine had advised that all occupational spirometry testing for respirator use be suspended, and the Council for Accreditation in Occupational Hearing Conservation recommended that all audiometric evaluations be suspended. 

Given these circumstances, OSHA stated that an employer should not be cited for failure to comply with Recurring Requirements if the employer demonstrates that it made “good faith efforts,” as follows:

• “Thoroughly explored all options” to comply with regulatory requirements, such as virtual or remote trainings;
• Implemented any interim alternative protections, such as engineering or administrative controls;
• Took steps to reschedule the required annual activity as soon as possible; and
• Ensured that employees were not exposed to hazards from tasks, processes, or equipment for which they were not prepared or trained

If an employer was unable to comply with Recurring Requirements because the workplace was required to close entirely, the employer should demonstrate a “good faith attempt to meet the applicable requirements as soon as possible following the re-opening of the workplace.” 

Given the Good Faith Guidance, employers would be well-advised to document their good faith efforts to comply with Recurring Requirements and why it was not possible to comply.  Although OSHA Compliance Officers have been directed to take an employer’s good faith efforts into “strong consideration” before issuing a citation, the Compliance Officer must document the regulatory violation and the good faith efforts in its case file.  In addition, in a program to be developed “at a later date,” OSHA plans to conduct monitoring inspections of locations where violations occurred but were not cited to “ensure that corrective actions have been taken once normal activities resume.”

The Good Faith Guidance supplements other previously issued OSHA enforcement discretion guidance memos and enforcement directives arising out of the COVID-19 health emergency, which have been analyzed in Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog.

For regular updates about the impact of COVID‑19 in the workplace and on business generally, please visit Jenner & Block’s COVID‑19 Resource Center and the Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On April 16, 2020, OSHA released an “alert” with “safety tips” that manufacturing employers “can follow to help protect manufacturing workers from OSHA liability.”  (“Manufacturers Alert”) (emphasis added).  Although the “alert” is not a regulation which OSHA can directly enforce, OSHA may attempt to use an alert as a basis for imposing liability on employers under the OSH Act’s General Duty Clause.  In any case, employers should expect that OSHA compliance officers will use the Manufacturers Alert to evaluate enforcement options in response to employee complaints about coronavirus exposure in the workplace.  In addition, employees may view the Manufacturers Alert as a checklist to evaluate their workplaces and for complaints to OSHA and their employers.  The full list of OSHA’s “tips” are provided at the end of this article.

OSHA’s Manufacturers Alert was issued on the same day that the White House issued its guidelines for “Opening Up America Again” (“the Guidelines”).  The Guidelines include recommendations specifically targeted to employers prior to a State or region reopening for business.  Notably, OSHA’s Manufacturers Alert did not include several precautions or directions to employers that were listed in the Guidelines, including directions to employers to conduct symptom monitoring, temperature checks, and contact tracing, and to obtain clearance by a medical provider before a symptomatic worker can return to the workplace.

According to the Guidelines, all employers should:

Develop and implement appropriate policies, in accordance with Federal, State, and local regulations guidance, and informed by industry practices, regarding:

• Social distancing and protective equipment
• Temperature checks
• Testing, isolating, and contact tracing
• Sanitation
• Use and disinfection of common and high-traffic areas
• Business travel

Previously, OSHA published “Ten Steps All Workplaces Can Take to Reduce Risk of Exposure to Coronavirus.”  The Manufacturers Alert adds six-foot physical distancing to those “Ten Steps” and tells manufacturing employers to consider limiting closer work or taking “innovative approaches” to limit exposures during closer work.  Unlike the Ten Steps, the Manufacturers Alert also includes directions to allow workers to wear masks at work and to train workers on donning, doffing, and maintaining protective clothing and equipment.

OSHA’s Manufacturers Alert lists the following 12 “tips:”

• Encourage workers to stay home if they are sick.
• Establish flexible work hours (e.g., staggered shifts), if feasible.
• Practice sensible social distancing and maintain six feet between co-workers, where possible.
• For work activities where social distancing is a challenge, consider limiting the duration of these activities and/or implementing innovative approaches, such as temporarily moving or repositioning workstations to create more distance or installing barriers (e.g., plexiglass shields) between workstations.
• Monitor public health communications about COVID-19 recommendations for the workplace and ensure that workers have access to and understand that information.
• Train workers on how to properly put on, use/wear, take-off, and maintain protective clothing and equipment.
• Allow workers to wear masks over their nose and mouth to prevent spread of the virus.
• Encourage respiratory etiquette, including covering coughs and sneezes.
• Discourage workers from using other workers’ tools and equipment.
• Use Environmental Protection Agency-approved cleaning chemicals from List N or that have label claims against the coronavirus.
• Promote personal hygiene. If workers do not have access to soap and water for handwashing, provide alcohol-based hand rubs containing at least 60 percent alcohol. Provide disinfectants and disposable towels workers can use to clean work surfaces.
• Encourage workers to report any safety and health concerns.

For regular updates about the impact of COVID‑19 in the workplace and on business generally, please visit Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog and Jenner & Block’s COVID‑19 Resource Center.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On April 10, 2020, US OSHA partially retracted its initial instructions to employers, which had required employers to evaluate employees who contracted COVID‑19 as potential recordable occupational illnesses under OSHA’s injury/illness recordkeeping rules, 29 CFR Part 1904.  According to its new “Enforcement Guidance for Recording Cases of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID‑19),” (Recording Guidance), in most cases, OSHA will not enforce its recordkeeping rules that otherwise would have required all employers to make determinations as to whether “workers who contacted COVID‑19 did so due to exposures at work.”  However, OSHA did not retract its basic position that COVID‑19 “is a recordable illness,” which must be recorded as a work-related illness on OSHA 300 logs (or their equivalent) if:  (1) the employee has a “confirmed case of COVID‑19” based on at least one positive test for the virus; (2) the COVID‑19 is “work-related,” per 29 CFR § 1904.5, i.e., the disease is contracted from exposure in the work environment; and (3) the case meets recording criteria, including a significant illness diagnosed by a healthcare professional or days away from work.  Instead, OSHA recognized that in areas with community-spread of the coronavirus, most employers “may have difficulty” making determinations that COVID‑19 cases were due to exposures at work, so those employers would no longer have to affirmatively investigate whether the employee’s COVID‑19-positive diagnosis was work-related in order to avoid the risk of an OSHA enforcement action for a recordkeeping violation.

OSHA’s “enforcement discretion” towards an employer’s obligation to record COVID‑19 cases has several important caveats:

First, healthcare emergency response organizations, and correctional institutions (here, Non‑Exempt Employers) would continue to be required to determine whether an employee’s COVID‑19 diagnosis was due to workplace exposure.

Second, OSHA’s enforcement discretion apparently is limited to areas where there is community transmission of the virus.

Third, all employers would continue to be required to determine that an employee’s COVID‑19 diagnosis is a work-related case, if:

1. “There is objective evidence that a COVID‑19 case may be work related [such as if] a number of cases develop[] among workers who work closely together without an alternative explanation” and
2. The “objective evidence” is “reasonably available to the employer . . . [such as if] information [is] given to the employer by employees” or the employer learns information in the “ordinary course of managing its business and employees.”

If a case is recorded, the employer must keep the employee’s name confidential “if an employee voluntarily requests” that the employer do so.  Although OSHA’s Recording Guidance does not expressly address OSHA’s requirement to report serious and fatal illnesses to OSHA, because the reporting requirement is triggered by hospitalizations or fatalities due to a “work-related incident,” if, in reliance on the Recording Guidance, an employer does not determine that the illness is a work-related case, it follows that the case also would not be a reportable case. 

OSHA stated that it was granting this enforcement discretion in order to allow employers more time to focus on “good hygiene practices” and otherwise mitigating the effects of COVID‑19 in the workplace.  This Recording Guidance supplements OSHA’s general guidance on COVID‑19 preparedness in the workplace and OSHA COVID-19 enforcement guidances issued to address certain aspects of its respiratory protection rules, as well as OSHA’s new workplace poster, entitled “Ten Steps All Workplaces Can Take to Reduce Risk of Exposure to Coronavirus.”

For more information about the impact of COVID‑19 in the workplace and on business generally go to Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog and Jenner & Block’s COVID‑19 Resource Center.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On April 3, 2020, U.S. OSHA issued two Enforcement Guidance memos which, for the first time, provide guidance to all industries, including healthcare, regarding how to comply with OSHA rules in the face of N95 shortages.  The first document is entitled “Enforcement Guidance for Respiratory Protection and the N95 Shortage Due to Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Pandemic” (N95 Shortage Guidance).  The N95 Shortage Guidance informs all employers whose employees are required to use, or permitted to voluntarily use, respiratory protection, the limited circumstances in which an OSHA inspector may, on a “case-by-case basis, exercise enforcement discretion” when an employer deviates from OSHA’s current respiratory protection standards, including OSHA’s principal rules at 29 CFR §1910.134 (the Respiratory Standard).  While offering some relief from the threat of an OSHA enforcement action, the N95 Shortage Guidance also serves to reemphasize employers’ continuing obligations under the Respiratory Standard despite the short, often non-existent, supply of respiratory protection equipment. 

Employers’ continuing obligations in the face of shortages include:

1. Manage your respiratory protection program (RPP) in accordance with the Respiratory Standard and “pay close attention to shortages of N95s.”
2. Identify and evaluate respiratory hazards.
3. Develop, implement, and document worksite-specific procedures to address changes in use of N95s and other respiratory protection.
4. Revise your written RPP to reflect changes in workplace conditions caused by the N95 shortage and COVID-19.

For the first step completing these obligations, “all employers should reassess their engineering controls, work practices, and administrative controls” to identify how to decrease the need for N95s.  OSHA suggests alternatives to use of N95s, e.g., use of wet methods or portable local exhaust systems and moving the task requiring use of respiratory protection outdoors.  More cautiously, OSHA states that “[i]n some instances, an employer may also consider taking steps to temporarily suspend certain non-essential operations.”  However, OSHA does not require that employers stop performing tasks with respiratory hazards. 

Under the N95 Shortage Guidance, if N95 alternatives are not possible and “respiratory protection must be used” OSHA provides a series of decision-making options:

• Use alternative classes of NIOSH-approved respirators if they “provide equal or greater protection” compared to N95s.
• If NIOSH-approved alternatives are not available, or use of these alternatives create additional hazards, then employers may:
  • Implement extended use or reuse of N95s, with extended use preferred over reuse; or
  • Use NIOSH-approved N95s past the manufacturer’s recommended shelf life, but only if the equipment’s integrity has not been compromised.

OSHA then states further requirements for the use of any of these options, including documenting the use of options in written RPPs and providing additional training to employees on the new procedures.  In the health care industry only, OSHA refers employers to the CDC’s guidance on the hierarchy of decisions applicable in case of expired N95s, but states that its N95 Shortage Guidance is not intended to cover COVID-19 “crisis standard of care” scenarios.

In the second guidance document issued on April 3, 2020, entitled “Enforcement Guidance for Use of Respirators Protection Equipment Certified under Standards of other Countries or Jurisdictions” (Respirator Use Guidance), OSHA provides the hierarchy of decision-making that constitutes making a “good-faith effort” to provide appropriate respiratory protection:

• Implement OSHA’s hierarchy of controls to eliminate or substitute out workplace hazards
• Prioritize efforts to acquire and use equipment as follows:
  • NIOSH-certified
  • Foreign-certified, as listed by OSHA, other than by China
  • China-certified [without any NIOSH certificate]
• Only use equipment beyond shelf life if in non-compromised condition
• Extended use or reuse in accordance with CDC’s Strategies for Optimizing the Supply of N95 Respirators
• Use homemade masks or other improvised face coverings “only as a last resort”

The Respirator Use Guidance also summarizes other requirements for respiratory protection, including training, documenting changes in procedures and conditions, and equipment inspection.

The two April 3 Enforcement Guidance documents accompany OSHA’s March 14, 2020 enforcement guidance regarding respirator fit-testing for health care employers only, previously discussed by the author here.  See Jenner & Block’s “Corporate Environmental Lawyer” blog and Jenner & Block’s COVID-19/Coronavirus Resource Center for frequently updated information for businesses and organizations worldwide.

By Gabrielle Sigel  and Leah M. Song

Responding to COVID‑19, many state and local governments are issuing orders encouraging or requiring workers to stay at home (“Stay-At-Home Order”) unless their employment is deemed to be in an “essential business” or “critical infrastructure industry.” Whether working in an essential business or where no Stay-At-Home Order has been issued, employees may express concerns about, or refuse, coming to work due to fear of contracting COVID‑19 at work.  The federal Occupational Safety and Health Act (“OSH Act” or “the Act”) prohibits an employer from retaliating against an employee for exercising rights under the Act.  If an employer fires or takes other action against an employee who walks off the job due to COVID‑19 fears, is the employee exercising a right under the Act, such that the employer could face a government lawsuit for retaliating against the employee?  Although this discussion is limited to refusal to work rights and responsibilities under the OSH Act, as with many issues raised by the novel coronavirus, the answer will be fact-specific and may be unique to this public health crisis.  After analyzing the applicable law below, we provide practical suggestions for how employers and their counsel can analyze the issue if raised at their workplace.

I.  The OSHA Anti-Retaliation Provisions

Since the OSH Act’s enactment in 1970, Section 5(a)(1) of the Act states that “[e]ach employer shall furnish to each of his employees employment and a place of employment which are free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm to his employees.” 29 U.S.C. § 654 (“the General Duty Clause”).  From its beginning, the OSH Act also has provided that an employer cannot “discharge or in any manner discriminate against any employee” because the employee complains about a safety issue to management or OSHA or “because of the exercise by [an] employee on behalf of himself or others of any right afforded by this Act.”  29 U.S.C. § 660(c) (“Section 11 of the OSH Act”); see also 29 CFR Part 1977.  If an employer takes discriminatory action in retaliation, the Secretary of Labor (“the Secretary”) can sue the employer, under Section 11 of the OSH Act, in federal district, to require reinstatement, back pay, and “all appropriate relief.”  29 U.S.C. § 660(c)(2).  However, the OSH Act does not expressly address how employees can exercise their rights when there is an imminent risk of death or serious bodily injury and a reasonable belief that there is not sufficient time or opportunity to seek redress from OSHA or the employer.

Interpreting Section 11 in 1973, OSHA issued its anti-retaliation regulation at 29 CFR § 1977 (the “OSHA anti-retaliation regulation”), addressing whether, under what circumstances, and how an employee could refuse to perform work under the Act.  Section 1977.12(b)(1) (emphasis added) states:

[A]s a general matter, there is no right afforded by the Act which would entitle employees to walk off the job because of potential unsafe conditions at the workplace. Hazardous conditions which may be violative of the Act will ordinarily be corrected by the employer, once brought to his attention. If corrections are not accomplished, or if there is dispute about the existence of a hazard, the employee will normally have opportunity to request inspection of the workplace pursuant to section 8(f) of the Act, or to seek the assistance of other public agencies which have responsibility in the field of safety and health. Under such circumstances, therefore, an employer would not ordinarily be in violation of section 11(c) by taking action to discipline an employee for refusing to perform normal job activities because of alleged safety or health hazards.

29 CFR § 1977.12(b)(1) (emphasis added).

Despite this initial statement that employees do not have the right to walk off the job, in the next paragraph the regulation acknowledges that exigent circumstances may exist that would trigger employee protections for refusing to work.  Section 1977.12(b)(2) states:  “[O]ccasions might arise when an employee is confronted with a choice between not performing assigned tasks or subjecting himself to serious injury or death arising from a hazardous condition at the workplace,” and, on those occasions, an employer cannot take action against the employee.  29 CFR § 1977.12(b)(2).  Specifically, if:  (1) “the employee, with no reasonable alternative, refuses in good faith to expose himself to the dangerous condition;” (2) “a reasonable person… would conclude that there is a real danger of death or serious injury;” (3) due to the urgency of the situation, there is insufficient time “to eliminate the danger through resort to regular statutory enforcement channels;” and (4) the employee “sought from his employer, and was unable to obtain, a correction of the dangerous condition,” an employer taking action against the employee refusing to work could be subject to a Section 11 lawsuit brought by the Secretary.  Id.; see also 29 U.S.C. § 660(c).

OSHA has published guidance on the issue, Workers’ Right to Refuse Dangerous Work, cautioning that “OSHA cannot enforce union contracts that give employees the right to refuse to work,” but explaining the steps that workers should take if they believe working conditions are dangerous, the employer fails to eliminate the imminent danger, and there is not enough time to address the condition through regular enforcement channels:

1. Ask your employer to correct the hazard, or to assign other work;
2. Tell your employer that you won’t perform the work unless and until the hazard is corrected; and
3. Remain at the worksite until ordered to leave by your employer.

Notably, this OSHA guidance does not answer the question presented by COVID‑19:  an employer’s obligations and an employee’s rights when OSHA’s direction to “remain at the worksite” is at the root of an employee’s claim of a dangerous condition.  

II.  Caselaw and OSHA Guidance Interpreting Section 11 and the OSHA Anti-Retaliation Regulation

By: Alexander J. Bandza, Steven M. Siros, and Gabrielle Sigel

As the United States rapidly transitions to working from home (when possible) companies involved in environmental investigations or remediation work must determine whether such field or other work could, should, or must continue in the days, weeks, and months ahead. The world is pivoting to tackle COVID-19, a public health crisis, and many of the “essential services” exempted from stay-at-home/shelter-in-place orders (“Restriction Orders”) include work involving public health and safety, as well as critical infrastructure services. Therefore, any person with ongoing environmental investigation and remediation work (“environmental field work”) has to consider whether that work would be or should be included in the category of “essential services.”

From a policy standpoint, whether environmental field work should be considered “essential” requires an evaluation of the people and the environment potentially put at risk, the likelihood of that risk, and the resources the work uses. Continuation of environmental field work may benefit public health and the environment, but it also is occurring at some cost to public health and safety. For example, environmental projects use personal protective equipment (“PPE”) and laboratory equipment and personnel that may be able to be allocated to medical and other scientific research needs. Furthermore, some environmental field work requires close human contact and, at a minimum, will require travel to work and other activities that the Restriction Orders and federal and CDC guidelines are seeking to avoid. In addition, environmental contractors may not be able to perform work if key personnel are not available to work due to travel restrictions, health impacts, or family obligations. Thus, the consideration of whether environmental field work should continue during the COVID-19 crisis requires weighing complex public health and safety needs and risks.

To help those considering whether and how to continue environmental field work, evaluate the following:

(1)     Am I allowed to do the environmental field work under a state or local COVID-19 Restriction Order?

(2)     If I cannot continue under a Restriction Order or for other reasons, how do I protect my company’s interests to avoid penalties and other liabilities under the consent decrees, administrative orders, or various other agreements with or regulations imposed by state and federal environmental agencies; and

(3)     If I am allowed to or required to continue the work, what regulations pertain to how to do the work safely?

1.    AM I ALLOWED TO DO THE WORK UNDER A RESTRICTION ORDER?

As of the time of publication of this alert, there are no federal mandates or executive orders requiring business shutdowns or mandatory quarantines. However, many states, counties, and municipalities are issuing executive orders closing non-essential businesses and limiting gatherings of people.

    a.    State-Level COVID-19 Executive Orders

Each of these state and local mandates exempt “essential businesses” and the specific definition of an essential business varies from state to state. As a general rule, however, “essential businesses” are those that promote public safety, health, and welfare. Here are examples of several of the first state directives.    

California: On March 19, 2020, Governor Newsom issued Executive Order N-33-20 requiring California residents to remain at home unless they are involved in 16 critical infrastructure sectors. These 16 critical infrastructure sectors were designated by the Department of Homeland Security and include the water and wastewater systems sector that is responsible for ensuring the supply of safe drinking water and wastewater treatment and service.  

Illinois: On March 20, 2020, Governor Pritzker issued Executive Order 2020-10 requiring Illinois residents to remain in their homes to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The order specifically exempts “essential government functions”, “essential businesses and operations”, and “essential infrastructure activities.” Essential infrastructure activities include operation and maintenance of utilities, including water, sewer, and gas, and solid waste and recycling collection and removal and essential businesses and operations includes construction related activities.

New York: On March 20, 2020, Governor Cuomo issued an Executive Order (referred to as Pause, standing for Policies Assure Uniform Safety for Everyone), requiring that as of 8 p.m. on March 22, all non-essential businesses must ensure that their workforce works remotely. Exempt “Essential businesses” include essential infrastructure (including utilities and construction); essential services (including trash collection, mail, and shipping services; news media; banks and related financial institutions); sanitation and essential operations of residences or other essential businesses; and vendors that provide essential services or products (including services needed to ensure the continuing operation of government agencies and provide for the health, safety, and welfare of the public).

New Jersey: On March 21, 2020, Governor Murphy issued Executive Order 107 requiring that New Jersey residents remain in their homes and requiring that all “non-essential businesses” close. A previously issued executive order (Executive Order No. 104) defined “essential businesses” to include “grocery/food stores, pharmacies, medical supply stores, gas stations, healthcare facilities and ancillary stores within healthcare facilities.” All gatherings within the state are limited to 50 persons or fewer, except for “normal operations at airports, bus and train stations, medical facilities, office environments, factories, assemblages for the purpose of industrial or manufacturing work, construction sites, mass transit, or the purchase of groceries or consumer goods.”

In addition to these states, many other states have either implemented similar orders (including Connecticut, Delaware, and Louisiana) or likely will do so in the coming weeks. While expressly mentioning critical sectors such as health care, police and fire, and grocery stores, the orders do not squarely address whether environmental field work constitutes “essential businesses” subject to these exemptions. However, environmental field work logically could be included under the categories used to describe “essential business,” particularly because many of the environmental statutes requiring such work expressly state that the work is being ordered or conducted to protect human health and the environment.

    b.    Federal (U.S. EPA) Environmental Agency Guidance

The White House has issued Coronavirus Response Guidelines, “15 Days to Slow the Spread,” including a statement that if you work in one of the 16 “critical infrastructure industries” as defined by the Department of Homeland Security, you have a “special responsibility” to continue to work.

As of this publication, U.S. EPA has not released public guidance on whether ongoing or new site cleanups and/or site investigations would constitute “critical infrastructure industry.” At least to some degree, that determination is likely to be a site-specific, based on the unique circumstances of each site and, as further discussed below, the language of the agency orders or agreements which govern the environmental field work. It is likely that in the coming weeks, U.S. EPA will provide further guidance on assessing whether site cleanup activities constitute “critical infrastructure industry” exempt from the various Restriction Orders. One issue that may need to be resolved in the future relates to potential conflicts in federal and state guidance regarding what constitutes an “essential service.” Such issues could be addressed via federal and state cooperation agreements in the event of possible conflicts between federal and state directives.

    c.    State Environmental Agency Guidance

At least one state environmental regulatory agency has provided guidance directly on this issue. On March 20, 2020, the California State Resources Water Control Board, which generally has jurisdiction over impacted groundwater in California, published a Guidance Document that states:

Please be aware that timely compliance by the regulated community with all Water Board orders and other requirements (including regulations, permits, contractual obligations, primacy delegations, and funding conditions) is generally considered to be an essential function during the COVID-19 response. As a result, the Water Boards consider compliance with board-established orders and other requirements to be within the essential activities, essential governmental functions, or comparable exceptions to shelter-in-place directives provided by local public health officials.   

It is likely that similar guidance will be issued in the coming weeks by other state regulatory agencies.

2.    IF I CANNOT CONTINUE THE WORK UNDER A RESTRICTION ORDER OR OTHERWISE, HOW COULD I PROTECT MY COMPANY’S INTERESTS TO AVOID PENALTIES OR OTHER LIABILITIES?

Those responsible for ongoing environmental field work should carefully evaluate the governing consent decrees, administrative orders, or other agreements with state and federal environmental agencies, and private parties, under which they are performing environmental field work. The agreements may well have force majeure and other clauses addressing delays in the work.

For example, under the current federal model remedial design/remedial action (RD/RA) judicial consent decrees with potentially responsible parties (“PRPs”) under sections 106, 107 and 122 of CERCLA, PRPs have both covenanted not to sue the United States and agreed to indemnify the same for “claims on account of construction delays.” There are additional stipulated penalty provisions. Therefore, companies must act pursuant to the force majeure provisions to avoid these claims and stipulated penalties. Force majeure is defined as “any event arising from causes beyond the control of [PRPs], of any entity controlled by [PRPs], or of [PRPs]’ contractors that delays or prevents the performance of any obligation under this [consent decree] despite [PRPs]’ best efforts to fulfill the obligation.”

Relying on these provisions involves:

• Notifying “EPA’s Project Coordinator orally or, in his or her absence, EPA’s Alternate Project Coordinator or, in the event both of EPA’s designated representatives are unavailable, the Director of the Waste Management Division” in that specific U.S. EPA Region within a stipulated period of days (the period of days may vary under each consent decree).
• Providing in writing to U.S. EPA “an explanation and description of the reasons for the delay; the anticipated duration of the delay; all actions taken or to be taken to prevent or minimize the delay; a schedule for implementation of any measures to be taken to prevent or mitigate the delay or the effect of the delay; [the PRP’s] rationale for attributing such delay to a force majeure; and a statement as to whether, in the opinion of [the PRP], such event may cause or contribute to an endangerment to public health or welfare, or the environment” within a stipulated period of days (the period of days likely varies under each consent decree).
• Providing with the above writing “all available documentation supporting their claim that the delay was attributable to a force majeure.”

U.S. EPA is then to provide notice of its decision, which if U.S. EPA rejects the force majeure claim, the responsible parties must provide notice within 15 days of U.S. EPA’s decision to avail themselves of the model consent decree’s dispute resolution provision. The federal Model Administrative Settlement Agreement and Order on Consent for Removal Actions contains similar obligations and provisions.

It is thus plain that responsible parties conducting environmental field work should be prepared to contact U.S. EPA or state regulators orally as soon as practicable to determine their views on the necessity of the work and if there is disagreement about the same, begin to “paper the file” on the necessary force majeure documentation in the time frames provided in the governing consent decrees, administrative orders, or various other agreements with state and federal environmental agencies.

For sites that are in the early investigation stages, regulators may agree to a temporary pause in site investigations. For sites that are currently undergoing remedial measures, the determination on whether work should continue is again likely to be fact dependent. For example, a site with an ongoing groundwater treatment system that is being operated to protect a drinking water source is likely to be deemed an essential activity. For a site where the remedial measures involve excavating impacted soils that are not immediately affecting groundwater sources, it may be the case that the regulators determine that certain activities are not “essential” and can be temporarily paused or scaled back.

Even if the decision is made to proceed with the work, other circumstances may preclude or significantly impair the ability to do the work. For example, it may be difficult to obtain necessary supplies and/or vendors to perform these services. To the extent that wastes are generated in the course of doing this work, can these wastes be managed and disposed of in a timely manner? These are all issues that should be discussed with the regulators or private parties requiring the work.

3.    IF I CONTINUE THE WORK, HOW CAN I DO IT SAFELY?

Once a decision is made that environmental field work is “essential” and must proceed to at least some degree, special care must be taken to ensure that the work is performed safely given additional risks imposed by COVID-19.  On March 9, 2020, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”) issued its Guidance on Preparing Workplaces for COVID-19 that was the subject of a previous client alert.  This OSHA guidance outlines recommended steps that employers should take to protect workers, using OSHA’s “hierarchy of controls” framework for addressing workplace risks (i.e., engineering controls, followed by administrative controls, safe work practices, and PPE.  It is also prudent for all entities at the site to consider what steps they will take if they learn that one of the workers has become exposed to the novel coronavirus or contracted COVID-19. On March 20, 2020, the CDC issued updated “Environmental Cleaning and Disinfection Recommendations.” 

OSHA has long-standing regulations for work at hazardous waste sites under its Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response (“HAZWOPER”) standard (in general industry 29 CFR 1910.120 and in construction 29 CFR 1926.65), which establishes health and safety requirements for work at sites, as well as responses to emergencies involving releases of hazardous substances. Many environmental investigation and remediation sites have rigorous site-specific health and safety plans, and many are required to have such plans by a consent decree or other regulatory or contractual obligation. Many environmental contractors have such plans as part of their standard operating procedures. However, given COVID-19, special care should be taken to ensure that PPE that would ordinarily be used to prevent exposure to hazardous substances is not contaminated prior to being utilized in the field.  Moreover, ensuring feasible physical distancing, requiring diligent hygiene methods, and having appropriate cleaning equipment and chemicals in the field are also critical.  All entities with employees at the site should regularly check both the OSHA and CDC website for updated guidance on workplace health and safety best practices. It also is important to ensure that the protocols are being appropriately communicated and followed by all entities (including regulators) at a site; the best protocols and procedures are only as good as their actual implementation by all.

OSHA has reminded the regulated community that if employees contract COVID-19 as a result of performing their work-related duties, the employees who become ill could constitute recordable cases of illness under OSHA’s Injury and Illness Recordkeeping Standard, 29 CFR Part 1904.

Companies and their counsel also should evaluate existing master services agreements that govern the work of their vendors and contractors with a particular eye towards: (i) how indemnification provisions might apply in the event that a vendor’s or contractor’s employee is later determined to be infected with COVID-19 and such a latency period could plausibly extend to such an employee’s work at the company’s site and its employees, and vice versa; and (ii) payment delay provisions should the company or its vendors or contractors become concerned about solvency issues.

We will continue to provide updates on the impacts of COVID-19 on environmental, health and safety issues affecting our clients. Jenner & Block has established a COVID-19 resource center that provides updates on a variety of issues affecting our clients and we would encourage you to visit this resource center for timely updates on COVID-19 related issues.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

One of the current Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) regulations on center stage as a result of the health crisis caused by the novel coronavirus and COVID-19 is OSHA’s Respiratory Protection Standard, 29 CFR § 1910.134 (“the Standard”).  On March 14, 2020, OSHA issued a Temporary Enforcement Guidance, entitled “Healthcare Respiratory Protection Annual Fit-Testing for N95 Filtering Facepieces During the COVID-19 Outbreak” (“Temporary Guidance”).  Although directly applicable only to the healthcare industry, the Temporary Guidance portends what may become the new normal for all industries that require respirator use and that are continuing to operate during the COVID-19 crisis. 

In general, the Standard requires employers to provide respirators at the appropriate level of protection when it is necessary to protect employees from workplace inhalation hazards.  The Standard also requires such employers to have a written program addressing respirator use, and to implement procedures including for start-up and annual medical evaluation and fit-testing, training, and cleaning of respirators.  Through the Temporary Guidance, OSHA Compliance Officers are provided instructions from OSHA headquarters regarding enforcement of the Standard in the healthcare industry in light of the supply shortages of N95 filtering facepiece respirators. 

The Temporary Guidance notes that the CDC recommends that healthcare providers who are providing direct care to patients with known or suspected COVID-19 to, among other things, use personal protective equipment (“PPE”), such as respirators.  In the Temporary Guidance, OSHA recommends that if N95 respirators are not available, healthcare employers should provide a respirator of “equal or higher protection,” e.g. N99 or N100 filtering facepieces, reusable elastomeric respirators, or powered air purifying respirators.  In addition, to conserve resources, OSHA recommends that fit-testing of filtering facepiece respirators continue, but that employers use a qualitative, non-destructive method, rather than a quantitative, destructive method for fit-testing.  The CDC has its own guidelines regarding what healthcare workers should do when they are facing a shortage of N95 respirators.

With respect to enforcement, OSHA directed all offices to “exercise enforcement discretion” concerning the annual fit-testing requirement, 29 CFR § 1910.134(f)(2), if employers take other actions to mitigate risks to employees, including:

• Make a “good-faith effort” to comply with the Standard.
• Use only NIOSH-certified respirators [see concerns regarding counterfeit respirators].
• Perform initial fit-testing for employees using the same model, style, and size of respirator that the employee will actual use.
• Train employees regarding how to perform a “seal check” each time a respirator is donned.

Other requirements that OSHA is relying on to mitigate risk and avoid non-compliance are listed in the Temporary Guidance.

By Gabrielle Sigel, Co-Chair, Environmental and Workplace Health and Safety Law Practice

On March 9, 2020, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration issued its “Guidance on Preparing Workplaces for COVID-19,” (“Guidance”) compiling best practices and existing regulatory standards for evaluating and preparing for risks to workers from exposure to the novel coronavirus and COVID-19. OSHA urges that “it is important for all employers to plan now for COVID-19.” (p. 3) The Guidance describes: (1) how a COVID-19 outbreak could affect workplaces; (2) steps employers can take to reduce workers’ risk of exposure; (3) classification of jobs into categories of risk and controls to protect workers in each category; and (4) how to protect workers living or traveling outside the U.S.

OSHA acknowledges that “[w]hile there is no specific OSHA standard covering SARS-CoV-2 exposure, some OSHA requirements may apply to preventing occupational exposure to SARS-CoV-2,” specifically, OSHA’s regulations regarding provision of personal protective equipment (“PPE”) [ 29 CFR 1910 Subpart I], respirator use [29 CFR 1910.134], and the all-encompassing General Duty Clause of the OSH Act, which requires employers to provide each worker “employment and a place of employment, which are free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm.” 29 U.S.C. § 654(a)(1). (p.17) OSHA also suggests that the bloodborne pathogen standard [29 CFR 1910.1030] offers a framework for controlling exposures to respiratory secretions that may contain the virus.

In the Guidance, OSHA divides job tasks into exposure levels of “very high, high, medium, and lower risk” and then recommends steps employers should consider taking to protect workers in each risk category, using its “hierarchy of controls” framework for addressing workplace risks, i.e., engineering controls, followed by administrative controls, safe work practices, and PPE. (pp. 18-25) OSHA’s analysis is summarized below:

• Very High Risk Workers: Workers in the health care and related professions (including autopsy and mortuary workers) performing aerosol-generating procedures on known or suspected COVID-19 patients or handling specimens or body parts from such patients.
  • Engineering Controls: Install and maintain air-handling systems in healthcare facilities; patients with suspected or known COVID-19 should be placed in airborne infection isolation rooms, “if available;” aerosol-generating procedures should occur only in isolation rooms; use Biosafety Level 3 precautions for handling specimens.
  • Administrative Controls: Follow all healthcare facility guidelines and standards for identifying and isolating infected individuals and protecting workers; “consider” offering enhanced medical monitoring of workers; train workers on preventing transmission; ensure psychological and behavioral support for employee stress. Safe
  • Work Practices: Provide emergency responders and others working outside of fixed healthcare facilities with hand rubs containing at least 60% alcohol. PPE: Provide respirators for those working within 6 feet of potential or known infected patients; PPE ensemble including gowns, fluid-resistant coveralls, aprons and other protective clothing; proper disposal of PPE, including training of those involved in disposal.

• High Risk Workers: Other health care and mortuary workers who are exposed to known or suspected COVID-19 patients, but not those exposed to aerosol-generating procedures.
  • Engineering and administrative controls, safe practices, and PPE: Same as for Very High Risk Workers, adjusted based on somewhat lower risk.

• Medium Risk Workers: Workers whose job requires frequent and/or close contact within 6 feet of those who may be infected with the virus, but are not known to have contracted COVID-19. “Medium risk” classification applies to those who work with the general public in communities with “ongoing community transmission,” such as in schools and “some high-volume retail settings.”
  • Engineering Controls: Physical barriers, such as sneeze guards, “where feasible.”
  • Administrative Controls: “Consider” offering facemask to ill employees and customers until they can leave the workplace; inform customers of COVID-19 symptoms; “where appropriate,” limit customer and public access to workplace areas; communicate availability of medical resources.
  • PPE: May need combination of gloves, own, face mask, face shield/goggles, depending on work tasks, hazard assessment, and types of exposures; need for respirator would be “rare.”

• Lower Risk Workers: Workers whose jobs do not require frequent contact with the public and other coworkers.
  • Engineering Controls: None additional.
  • Administrative Controls: Monitor public health communications, including CDC’s website, and work with workers on effective communications.
  • PPE: None additional.

In addition to the steps above, OSHA’s Guidance provides “Steps All Employers Can Take to Reduce Workers’ Risk of Exposure to SARS-CoV-2.” (pp. 7-17) While not requiring employers take these measures, the Guidance states that “[a]s appropriate,” employers should implement “good hygiene and infection control practices”; “explore whether” employers can establish practices including physical and social distancing, and have cleaning equipment and chemicals that are EPA-approved for addressing viruses. (pp. 8-9) OSHA also states that employers should develop policies and procedures for “prompt identification and isolation of sick people, if appropriate.” (p.9) OSHA also encourages employers to “develop, implement and communicate about workplace flexibilities and protections” with the principal goal of allowing sick workers or those with illness in families to stay home. (p.11)

With respect to employers with workers working abroad, the Guidance advises that employers keep abreast of CDC and State Department announcements, tell workers that the State Department will not provide medications or supplies to Americans abroad, and be aware that travel in and out of a foreign country may be limited. (pp. 25-26) (The Guidance was issued before the President announced his ban of travel from Europe on March 11.)

Further and updated information about OSHA’s response and guidance about COVID-19 can be found at https://www.osha.gov/SLTC/covid-19/. California-OSHA also has published extensive “Guidance on Requirements to Protect Workers from Coronavirus.”

By Matthew G. Lawson

 On Monday, February 10, 2020, the Trump Administration released its proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2021. The proposal calls for sweeping cuts to a number of federal agencies and departments, including deep cuts to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (“USEPA”). If enacted, the proposed budget would grant $6.7 billion in funding to USEPA, a $2.4 billion or 26-percent reduction from the agency’s $9.1 billion budget in 2020. In the budget proposal’s preamble, the Administration promises to “call[] on the Government to reduce wasteful, unnecessary spending, and to fix mismanagement and redundancy across agencies.”

With respect to USEPA’s budget allocation, the proposal promises to “eliminate almost 50 wasteful programs that are outside of EPA’s core mission or duplicative of other efforts, saving taxpayers over $600 million.” Proposed major cuts include the reduction of nearly 50% of the agency’s research budget, including all funding for grants to independent universities and research institutes conducting air, water, and other environmental and health research. Another target for deep cuts is USEPA’s safe drinking water revolving funds. The revolving funds are used to help fund water infrastructure projects undertaken by state or municipal public water providers. Under the proposed budget, the available funds for such projects would be cut from approximately $2.77 billion down to $2 billion.

While the proposal primarily focuses on proposing cuts to USEPA’s fiscal budget, it does contain a few line item requests for additional funding. In particular, the proposal asks for an additional $6 million to carry out USEPA’s Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) Action Plan. The additional funding is sought to continue research into the risk posed by PFAS compounds, address current contamination issues, and effectively communicate findings to the public. In addition, the budget requests $16 million into new research to help prevent and respond to the rising growth of harmful algal blooms. 

The budget proposal is not the first time the Trump Administration has sought to implement deep cuts into USEPA’s budget. In fact, the Trump Administration has now proposed nearly identical cuts to the agency’s budget in each of the last three fiscal years. As previously discussed by the Corporate Environmental Lawyer, the Trump Administration first proposed a $2.7 billion budget reduction for USEPA in fiscal year 2018. However, the proposal was rebuffed by congress and the final spending bill ultimately signed by Trump held the agency’s budget at $8.1 billion, even with its 2017 level. The following year, the Trump Administration again proposed cutting the agency’s budget by more than $2 billion, but ultimately agreed to a spending deal that increased the agency’s budget to $8.8 billion. Finally, during fiscal year 2020, the Trump Administration proposed approximately $2.7 billion in cuts to USEPA’s budget. As before, Congress rejected the proposal and ultimately approved a nearly record high budget for USEPA of $9.1 Billion.  Congress’ continued rejection of the spending cuts proposed by the Trump Administration is acknowledged in the Administration’s most recent 2021 budget proposal, which derides Congress for continuing “to reject any efforts to restrain spending” and “greatly contribut[ing] to the continued ballooning of Federal debt and deficits, putting the Nation’s fiscal future at risk.” The proposal promises that the Trump Administration will use “all available tools and levers” to ensure that the spending reductions outlined in the budget are finally implemented.

By Matthew G. Lawson

The term “climate change litigation” has become a shorthand for a wide range of different legal proceedings associated with addressing the environmental impacts of climate change. Plaintiffs in climate change lawsuits may include individuals, non-governmental organizations, private companies, state or local level governments, and even company shareholders who, through various legal theories, allege that they have been harmed or will suffer future harm as a direct result of the world’s changing climate. The targets of climate change litigation have included individual public and private companies, government bodies, and even entire industry groups. While there appears to be no shortage of plaintiffs, defendants, or legal theories emerging in climate change litigation, one clear trend is that the number of these lawsuits has grown dramatically in recent years. By one count, more than fifty climate change suits have been filed in the United States every year since 2009, with over one hundred suits being filed in both 2016 and 2017.

In light of the growing trend of climate change litigation, Jenner & Block’s Corporate Environmental Lawyer blog is starting a periodic blog update which will discuss the emerging trends and key cases in this litigation arena.  In each update, our blog will focus on a sub-set of climate change cases and discuss recent decisions  on the topic. In Part 1 of this series, we will be discussing Citizen-Initiated Litigation Against National Governments.