To this end the existing Groups will be re-emphasised, and then refreshed during 2018 as Special Interest Groups. At the same time plans were developed to create new Groups for the wider membership in additional areas of interest, and the first of the new Special Interest Groups, for Measurement and Instrumentation, held its inaugural meeting in September 2017.

The Group immediately found common interest in a specific area where a gap in user understanding may be putting lives at risk unnecessarily, and a guidance document has already been developed to first draft text and layout stage, with agreement to progress being a subject for discussion at the second meeting in February.

Measurement & Instrumentation

The new Measurement and Instrumentation Special Interest Group brings together manufacturers, distributors and service providers for personal and fixed monitoring equipment in areas such as gas detection, noise monitoring, air quality sampling, and essentially any electronic devices utilised to protect workers by monitoring their work areas and making them and their supervisors aware of any changes in atmospheric conditions which could lead to an increased hazardous condition.

The meeting was well attended and many areas of interest were discussed. One common theme which affects a number of different types of these products and their markets is the fact that while product performance standards exist, many specifiers are not generally aware of these and they are therefore not demanded by the customer base. The meeting agreed that if awareness could be raised and demand for certified products by users increased, the overall quality of products in these markets would inevitably be raised.

The major issue that they agreed would clearly benefit from industry-based guidance for users revolves around a common gap in good practice in gas detection. Personal gas monitors should have a brief functional test before every use to prove their performance capabilities ‘on the day’. This is known as a ‘bump test’, which can verify the ability of the monitor to detect and warn the wearer of what may become life threatening conditions. The test is straightforward and not time consuming, and yet a significant proportion of users simply don’t bother to do it.

The manufacturers and suppliers at the meeting all agreed to provide their own user instructions on bump testing, and these will be distilled into a short, bulleted document providing informative guidance for users on the importance and obvious value of bump testing, comparing the time and effort involved in carrying it out with the potential outcome of an unchecked monitor not warning the wearer of a life-critical change in their working atmosphere.

Guidance from the Group will be generic and of great use as third-party independent reference information for users. It is anticipated that the Group’s second meeting will finalise the text and layout to allow the guidance to be ready for publication in the first quarter of 2018.