Hazardous materials and waste reduction management system

• US 6,097,995 A
• Filed: 11/30/1994
• Issued: 08/01/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 11/30/1994
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Chemmist Limited Partnership
• Original Assignee: Chemmist Limited Partnership
• Inventors: Coleman, David A., Tipton, David K., Gozy, Darren W.
• Primary Examiner(s): Gordon, Paul P.
• Application Number:
  US08/349,633
• Time in Patent Office: 2,071 Days
• Field of Search: 235/376, 235/385, 700/9, 700/21, 700/79, 700/80, 700/90, 700/91, 700/266, 705/28, 705/29
• US Class Current: 700/266
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 15/02 electric
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders

Abstract

A user controlled chemical management system for small-, medium- and large-sized organizations for use with a computer. The chemical inventory management system includes a chemical inventory control system allowing a user to manage chemicals from a central station, the plurality of combined receiving and outpost stations, to allow for the tracking of individual chemical containers throughout its life. In addition, an environmental, health and safety information system as contained in the chemical management system to allow the user create customized chemical storage groups that are color coded for a particular area. Also included is a safety equipment management system to allow accurate records to be kept of all safety equipment. Finally, an international chemical compatibility system is included with a compliance/education design to create compliance/education files for any country in the world.

Claims

1. A user controlled hazardous material management system for relatively small, medium and large size organizations comprising:

a computer;

data storage device coupled to said computer;

a display coupled to said computer that provides display screens;

a user input device coupled to said computer; and

hazardous material inventory control data stored in said data storage device enabling user selection of a selected one or a combination of (1) a central control station for a given organization that monitors the in-flow of enclosed hazardous materials to the station by means of unique identification of each hazardous material enclosure, the storage and use of said hazardous materials within the station, and the out-flow of said hazardous material from said central control station as waste;

(2) a plurality of individual hazardous material control stations for said given organization, each control station monitoring its in-flow of enclosed hazardous materials by said means of unique identification of each hazardous material enclosure, the storage and use of its hazardous materials and the out-flow of its waste hazardous materials; and

(3) a system for said given organization that enables tracking each individual hazardous material enclosure throughout its life by said means of unique identification and a transaction log for each enclosure of said hazardous material, said system including a multi-tier classification of hazardous materials based upon origin and composition.

2. A user-controlled hazardous material management as in claim 1 further including environmental, health, and safety information data stored in said computer representing user-created unique, customized hazardous material capability storage groups, said groups designating storage areas within said organization for hazardous materials and areas within said organization prohibited from being used for storage of said hazardous materials.

3. A system as in claim 2 further including safety equipment management data stored in said computer for generating a maintenance and inspection record of all safety equipment within said organization, including fume/exhaust systems and eye wash and safety showers defined according to government standards and including generic safety equipment that does not fall under the defined safety equipment.

4. A system as in claim 3 further including international hazardous material compatibility data stored in said computer and including multi-tier compliance/education design data for creating compliance/education files within said organization for any country in the world with means for enabling text conversions to the foreign language of a selected country.

5. A system as in claim 4 wherein said international hazardous material compatibility system comprises:

a user created compliance/education file in the language of any selected country in the world;

stored numerical data representing required compliance/education information concerning the hazardous materials in the system; and

said user created compliance/education file including a display in either the foreign language of a selected country or in one or more foreign languages to enable international review of said stored numerical data representing said compliance/education information across predetermined countries of interest.

6. A system as in claim 5 further including a text translator for receiving all text in said system, converting the text to a selected foreign language and storing the converted text.

7. A system as in claim 2 further including:

an unique password for each user having login access to the system;

a preset time after which said password expires; and

user-controlled password disabling means for disabling the password after a predetermined number of invalid login attempts.

8. A system as in claim 7 further including:

a user tracelog record of access to said containers of hazardous material, the record including the personal preference of the user of measurement data, such as gallons versus liters and kilograms versus ounces to be viewed on the user'"'"'s display; and

said user tracelog record maintaining the use, storage and disposal of said hazardous materials as controlled by the user.

9. A system as in claim 2 wherein said environmental, health, and safety information system storage groups further comprise an unalterable storage group for hazardous material containers that require special storage/handling precautions that are unique to a particular hazardous material because of compatibility with other hazardous materials or environmental/safety/health requirements.

10. A system as in claim 9 wherein any hazardous material designated in said unalterable storage group is provided a record, unique to that hazardous material, of special storage requirements that can be displayed.

11. A system as in claim 9 wherein said group arrangements include:

designated storage and nonstorage areas, including a particular building, a particular floor in a building, a particular room on said particular floor and as general or specific locations in said particular room; and

designated storage/use options for the selected locations, including hazardous material storage only, hazardous material use only, or hazardous material use/storage where both storage and use of the hazardous material may occur.

12. A system as in claim 11 further including:

stored data representing an elevation view of said particular building indicating the floor or floors in which the hazardous materials are located, a plan view of particular floor in said building, and a plan view of the particular room in which the hazardous materials are located illustrating the location of the hazardous materials in said room; and

said user input device enabling display of the desired one of said elevation views and said plan views for use by appropriate personnel in the case of an emergency that might affect said hazardous materials.

13. A system as in claim 3 wherein said safety equipment management system includes:

an inventory of all user-selected system safety equipment items;

stored test data of equipment check procedures that ensure proper safety equipment operation;

stored data representing printed survey forms for inspection of said safety equipment, said survey forms listing equipment elements that require inspection; and

printed compliance labels containing compliance data for each item of safety equipment inspected.

14. A system as in claim 13 wherein said compliance data and said printed compliance labels represents a comparison of sampled data from an item of safety equipment compared to a set of standard criteria for performance of the item.

15. A system as in claim 2 wherein the environmental health safety system further comprises:

first stored data representing icons, training materials, and warnings regarding any particular hazardous material;

second stored data in said memory designating each system user, each user being designated as professional, experienced or a novice in handling hazardous materials; and

an inquiry screen containing icon prompts for selected use by a professional user of hazardous materials, icon prompts and warning materials concerning a selected hazardous material for an experienced user of hazardous materials, and icon prompts and a display of training materials required for a novice to review in the use of hazardous materials, said training materials requiring review of the selected training materials and warnings and requiring specific responses from the novice user before said novice can use said hazardous material in a process.

16. A user controlled hazardous material management system as in claim 1 further comprising hazardous material container classification data stored in said data storage device and including:

first data representing containers storing hazardous materials that are in-use;

second data representing containers storing waste hazardous materials; and

said first and second data representing said containers of the waste group of hazardous materials including four classes of information concerning the hazardous materials in said containers, including pure hazardous material, the trade name of the hazardous material, a preset mixture of hazardous materials, and a variable mixture of hazardous materials so as to enable said system to track said hazardous material in any one of said four classes of information from its beginning as an in-use hazardous material through its disposition as a waste hazardous material.

17. A system as in claim 16 further including:

third data representing containers storing surplus hazardous materials; and

said third data representing said surplus of hazardous materials, including said four classes of information concerning pure hazardous material, the trade name of the hazardous material, preset mixes of the hazardous material, and variable mixes of the hazardous materials so as to allow management of the hazardous materials from the in-flow to the out-flow.

18. A system as in claim 17 wherein:

said term "pure" hazardous material denotes the hazardous material with a recognized scientific name and hazardous material that originates from an outside vendor;

said term "trade name" denotes the designated commercially known name of the hazardous material that originates from an outside vendor;

said term "preset mix" denotes hazardous material originating from a mixture of in-house hazardous materials; and

said term "variable mix" represents a mixture of hazardous materials not normally maintained in stock such that every container of hazardous material is tracked from in-flow to out-flow.

19. A system as in claim 18 further comprising:

a first stored record giving a first unique identification to a first container of a first hazardous material;

a second stored record giving a second unique identification to a second container of hazardous material taken from said first container;

an n^th stored record giving an n^th unique identification to an n^th container of hazardous material taken from the n-1 container; and

a special stored record giving an additional unique identification to a container having a mixture of said first hazardous material from one of said n containers and a second different hazardous material from another container so as to maintain a genealogy of the hazardous material stored in any container such that the unique origin and history of each hazardous material in a given container is known, each of said stored records being identified by a unique code.

20. A system as in claim 17 wherein said data representing surplus hazardous materials is available for display to every user of the system to reduce unnecessary purchasing of hazardous materials already in surplus.

21. A system as in claim 17 further including:

icons appearing on any selected display screen representing in-use, surplus, or waste hazardous materials; and

each of said icons giving a visual representation of a warning relating to each particular hazardous material.

22. A system as in claim 21 further including:

training material data stored in said computer pertaining to at least one of said hazardous materials; and

a particular icon on said display screen that enables the user to select said training materials relating to said hazardous materials for display.

23. A system as in claim 1 further including:

at least one enclosure having multiple individual containers of hazardous material;

a stored data record identifying each hazardous material enclosure that has multiple individual containers of hazardous material inside thereof; and

an inventory data record of an individual container of hazardous material created by entering into said computer said identifying data when any one of said containers is removed from said enclosure.

24. A system as in claim 1 further including:

data representing containers storing surplus hazardous materials; and

said data representing said surplus hazardous materials including pure hazardous material, the trade name of the hazardous material, preset mixes of the hazardous material, and variable mixes of the hazardous materials so as to allow for cradle to the grave management of the hazardous materials.

25. A system as in claim 1 wherein said monitoring of said use of said hazardous materials further includes:

a stored designation for each particular container of hazardous material at least some of which is to be taken out of said container for use in a process; and

a display screen for monitoring said hazardous material taken from said designated particular container and used in said process, said display screen having a first area for entering consumption data including data representing a percentage of said hazardous material consumed in said process, a second area for entering data representing a percentage of said hazardous material transferred to the atmosphere during the process, a third area for entering data representing a percentage of the hazardous material that is disposed on-site essentially as a liquid during the process, and a fourth area for entering data representing a percentage of the hazardous material that is retained as residual waste from the process so that a complete cradle to the grave tracking of each container of hazardous material is possible.

26. A system as in claim 25 wherein said screen includes a fifth area for entering data representing a particular container in which said residual waste is disposed.

27. A system as in claim 25 further including a preprocessing display screen for use with repetitive processes, said preprocessing screen enabling automatic recording of said consumption percentage data by said computer for hazardous materials used in said repetitive process.

28. A system as in claim 25 further including:

multiple containers of different hazardous materials to be used in a process; and

a display screen that allows a user of the process to enter by-products of said process on said screen and link an appropriate portion of each of said by-products to each of said hazardous materials used in the process.

29. A system as in claim 28 further including a preprocessing display screen for use with repetitive processes using multiple containers, said preprocessing display screen enabling automatic recording of consumption percentage data by said computer for hazardous materials used in said repetitive process.

30. A system as in claim 1 wherein the hazardous material management system further includes:

said data storage device storing data representing in-flow and out-flow of said hazardous materials;

a plurality of host platforms, each at a plurality of different locations within said organization; and

a program format in said computer enabling any one of the host platforms at any one of the plurality of different locations within said organization to connect to said storage device and to display data monitoring said in-flow and out-flow of said hazardous materials.

31. A system as in claim 1 further comprising:

a plurality of groups of identical hazardous materials, each group of hazardous materials having different manufacturers and/or international designations;

a synonym representing each of said groups of identified hazardous materials; and

means for displaying all of a group of hazardous materials and inventory without reference to said particular designation by selecting said synonym for said selected group.

32. A user-controlled hazardous material management system for relatively small, medium and a large size organizations comprising:

a computer;

a data storage device coupled to the computer;

a display device coupled to the computer;

a user input device coupled to said computer; and

a hazardous material container classification system stored in said data storage device for access by said user through said input device and including;

first data representing containers storing hazardous materials that are in-use;

second data representing containers storing hazardous materials that are classified as waste hazardous materials; and

said first and second data representing said containers of in-use hazardous materials and waste hazardous materials being designated as pure hazardous materials, as the trade names of the hazardous material, as a preset mixture of hazardous materials, or as a variable mix of hazardous materials so as to enable such system to track each container of hazardous material in any one of said designations from its beginning as an in-use hazardous material through its disposal as a waste hazardous material.

33. A system as in claim 32 wherein:

said term "pure" hazardous material denotes a hazardous material with a recognized scientific name that originates from an outside vendor;

said term "trade name" denotes the designated commercially known name of the hazardous material that originates from an outside vendor;

said term "preset mix" denotes hazardous material originating from a mixture of in-house hazardous materials; and

said term "variable mix" represents a container with a mixture of hazardous materials not normally maintained in stock such that every container of hazardous material is tracked from the in-flow to the out-flow.

34. A system as in claim 33 further comprising:

a first stored record giving a first unique identification to a first container of a first hazardous material;

a second stored record giving a second unique identification to a second container of hazardous material taken from said first container;

an n^th stored record giving an n^th unique identification to an n^th container of hazardous material taken from the n-1 container; and

a special stored record giving an additional unique identification to a container having a mixture of said first hazardous material from one of said n containers and a second different hazardous material from another container so as to maintain a genealogy of the hazardous material stored in any container such that the unique origin and history of each hazardous material in a given container is known, each of said stored records being identified by a unique code.

35. A system as in claim 34 further including:

a display screen having an icon representing any particular container;

a scale displayed along side said icon representing a predetermined original level of hazardous material in said container; and

pointing means movable by the user to said scale for causing said icon to visually represent the level of hazardous material actually in said particular container as determined visually by said user to approximate the amount of hazardous material in said container at any given time when compared to the predetermined original amount of hazardous material in the container.

36. A system as in claim 34 further comprising:

a printer coupled to said computer; and

said computer automatically printing labels with all government requirements for said hazardous material in all individual containers created in said genealogy.

37. A system as in claim 36 wherein, if said label for any container is damaged, a replacement label is generated by said computer when said name of said hazardous material or the container unique code is entered into said computer.

38. A management system as in claim 32 further comprising a three-tier hierarchy user function access that supports a different restriction of user function access in each function tier.

39. A management system as in claim 38 wherein the three-tier hierarchy function access comprises:

a division with predetermined users designated as the top level of access;

a department that is a part of a division and having users designated as the mid-level of access;

a user who is in a division or department and who is designated as the bottom level of access; and

said administrator function allowing an administrator to restrict access at each level to predetermined users.