Hazardous materials Worker Training and Jobs ARRA Successes 2011 WETP

This video, NIEHS Worker Education and Training Program Recovery Act Successes, highlights the NIEHS Worker Education and Training Program (WETP) and a number of the WETP programs funded with the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds it received. Each year, hazardous waste and emergency response personnel face dangerous exposures. In 2008 alone, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 89 worker deaths and approximately 5.5 recordable injuries per 100 full time workers in the Waste/Hazardous Materials Industry. In addition, many of the emerging green jobs in weatherization and retro-fitting involve work with hazardous material, waste, construction and deconstruction. To prevent injury, illness, and public exposures from hazardous materials, especially in the underserved, minority and lower wage workforce, targeted, job-specific training is paramount. NIEHS Recovery dollars are supporting health and safety training for target populations in the hazardous materials and green job sectors. Employees are receiving training about exposures in hazardous waste cleanups, large-scale construction, demolition, Brownfield-type redevelopment and public works projects, as well as commercial and residential weatherization, alternative energy development, green remediation, green construction and emerging industries like nanotechnology. The Recovery Act is supporting job creation and the prevention of work related accidents in underserved populations by assisting underserved populations with gaining employment in remediation and hazardous waste industries; training hundreds of workers to clean up newly funded hazardous waste sites in New York and New Jersey; training and placement of minority workers from low-income communities in Atlanta, Georgia and the four-county area surrounding Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Green supervisor training is also being provided to program graduates in Baton Rouge and Detroit. Green job training and education is an environmental public health imperative to avoid the creation of negative health impacts. During the past several years, the movement towards a "green" economy has offered new opportunities for the unemployed and underemployed. The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) Worker Education and Training Program (WETP) funds hazardous materials training in all 50 states and most U.S. Territories. For more information on the Worker Education and Training Program and its awardees, go to http://tools.niehs.nih.gov/wetp/ . This video can be viewed on the NIEHS website at http://www.niehs.nih.gov/recovery/success/index.cfm .

Category:

Education

Tags:

• NIEHS
• WETP
• ARRA
• green
• jobs
• environmental
• superfund
• hazwoper
• osha
• epa
• doe
• recovery
• act
• justice
• labor
• union
• worker