SBA Letter Describes Concerns About OSHA's Heat Rule, Jurisdiction Over PELs
A Sept. 8 letter from the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy to the Department of Labor and OSHA contains several recommendations related to OSHA rules, exposure limits, and other concerns. The recommendations are based on occupational safety and health roundtables held by the Office of Advocacy in January and March. Roundtable participants included small business entities and their representatives.
The letter describes concerns with the “prescriptive and one-size-fits-all nature” of OSHA’s proposed rulemaking related to prevention of heat-related injury and illness. Provisions of OSHA’s heat rule, as proposed, would require affected employers to develop and implement site-specific heat injury and illness prevention plans as well as plans to acclimatize new or returning workers who may be unaccustomed to working in high-heat conditions. Other provisions address requirements for drinking water, rest breaks, and control of indoor heat. According to the Office of Advocacy, the proposed rule applies across employers and does not account for their size, industry sector, geography, or employee risk. Among the concerns described in the letter are “understated expected compliance costs” and “exaggerated cost savings assumptions.” The letter urges OSHA to “revisit its estimation of risks associated with occupational heat exposure and re-evaluate the appropriateness of the proposed rule.”
OSHA’s latest regulatory agenda lists two planned actions for proposed rule related to prevention of heat-related injury and illness: a supplemental notice of proposed rulemaking to be released in December 2026, and a “final action” to take place in October 2027.
The letter also expresses concerns related to what the Office of Advocacy characterizes as “an increasingly complex regulatory landscape as the EPA and OSHA exercise overlapping authority over workplace chemical safety.” The letter stresses that EPA does not have jurisdiction over workplace hazards and explains that small businesses’ confusion about this issue stems in part from exposure limits, monitoring approaches, and compliance obligations that differ between EPA and OSHA regulations.
“Two agencies should not set limits for the same chemical,” the Office of Advocacy states. “OSHA should exercise its jurisdiction and not defer to the EPA on setting occupational safety and health standards for chemical exposures and medical surveillance programs.”
Other recommendations in the letter concern OSHA’s lockout/tagout standard, portable container labeling requirements in the hazard communication standard, requirements related to oxygen levels in the respiratory protection standard, OSHA’s proposed rule on emergency response, and its construction standard for respirable crystalline silica. The letter also discusses the tracking of workplace injuries and illnesses, the worker walkaround designation process, injury and illness recording and reporting, tree care operations, and walking-working surfaces.
“Advocacy commends the DOL and OSHA for its deregulatory reform proposals and the deregulatory actions taken thus far,” the letter reads, referring to deregulatory efforts that began in July 2025. “Advocacy hopes that these recommendations will provide new opportunities to review and reform burdensome, costly, and inefficient regulations.”
More information can be found on the website of the Office of Advocacy, where the letter is available as a PDF.
Related: Articles in the digital Synergist focus on AIHA’s response to the evolving role of the Toxic Substances Control Act in occupational health and safety and possible changes to TSCA implementation based on court decisions, administration policies, and potential legislation. Synergist coverage of an educational session at AIHA Connect 2026 discusses TSCA as “a major source of tension between EPA and industry OEHS professionals.”