Hazardous energy: Put a lock on it!

Employees servicing or maintaining machines or equipment may be exposed to serious physical harm or death if hazardous energy isn’t properly controlled. Machine operators, laborers, and craft workers are among the three million workers who service equipment and face the greatest risk. OSHA’s standard for The Control of Hazardous Energy (Lockout/Tagout or LOTO) at 1910.147, addresses the practices and procedures necessary to disable machinery or equipment to prevent the release of hazardous energy.

Energy sources and control procedures

Energy may be electrical, mechanical, hydraulic, pneumatic, chemical, thermal, or another source. It becomes hazardous when it builds to a dangerous level or is released in a quantity that could injure a worker. Hazardous energy is never far from those who need to service or maintain equipment. Simply turning the power off doesn’t make equipment safe! It’s critical that employees who service or repair equipment know both how hazardous energy could harm them and how to control it.

Employers must develop energy-control procedures to guide employees through the necessary steps for safely controlling hazardous energy on machines and equipment. Each procedure must detail, in the proper order, the six procedural steps listed in 1910.147(d) for applying LOTO to a given machine or piece of equipment before servicing or maintenance begins and the five procedural steps for releasing that machine from LOTO after servicing or maintenance is complete. The six steps for applying LOTO are:

1. Preparation for shutdown,
2. Shutdown,
3. Energy isolation,
4. Application of LOTO devices,
5. Release of stored energy, and
6. Verification of isolation.

The five steps for releasing machinery and equipment once servicing and maintenance have been completed are:

1. Inspection of system components,
2. Checking for safe positioning,
3. Removal of LOTO devices,
4. Notification of removal, and
5. Safe re-energization.

Only authorized employees – those who service and maintain machines and equipment – may perform energy-control procedures. Procedures must be inspected at least annually to ensure they haven’t changed. Inspections must be done by an authorized employee other than the employee(s) using the procedure being inspected. Where lockout is used for energy control, the inspection must include a review, between the inspector and each authorized employee, of that employee’s responsibilities under the procedure being inspected.

Employers must certify that the inspection has been performed. The certification must identify the machine or equipment on which the energy control procedure was being used and include:

• The date of the inspection,
• The employees included in the inspection, and
• The person performing the inspection.

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