A
CHARGE TO THE COMMITTEE
The U.S. Department of State charged the Academies with the task of producing a protocol for development of standard operating procedures (SOPs) that would serve as a complement to Chemical Laboratory Safety and Security: A Guide to Prudent Chemical Management and would be added to the 2010 toolkit (see Box 1-1). To accomplish this task, the Academies formed a committee of experts with experience and knowledge in good chemical safety and security practices in academic and industrial laboratories and awareness of international standards and regulations.
To assemble this Guide to Developing a Standard Operating Procedure, the committee gathered information from a variety of sources including discussions with chemical safety experts from trade organizations and industry during a public data-gathering meeting; published literature, including the 2010 reference guide and toolkit; and existing SOP templates that are publicly available on the Web sites of many universities in the United States. This new product will enhance the use of the previous reference book and the accompanying toolkit, especially in developing countries where safety resources are scarce and the experience of operators and end users may be limited.
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