CSB Removes Older Incident Reporting Data

Earlier this week I had reported that the CSB had revamped their Incident Reporting Rule Submission Information and Data page, decluttering the page by placing much of the information in pull down blocks. One of those blocks was the CSB's Accidental Release Reporting Rule Data. Today, when I checked that block of data it only provided a link to the most recent version of the incident reporting spread sheet, instead links to each of the nearly quarterly updates that the agency had reported since May of 2022.

While the current spread sheet spans the full period of the time that the CSB has been receiving its chemical incident reports, I have previously reported (see here for example) a number of instances where incidents had been added or removed from the previous report. That information is no longer publicly available from the CSB data. I will continue to report on such additions and deletions as newer versions of the spreadsheet become available.

It looks like the old data download links still work, so here they are for posterity’s sake:

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (January 16, 2025)

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (October 23, 2024) 

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (July 23, 2024) 

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (April 19, 2024) 

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (January 25, 2024) 

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (October 1, 2023)

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (June 30, 2023) 

CLICK HERE to download the  list of reportable events (January 25, 2023)  

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (December 28, 2022

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (October 26, 2022)

CLICK HERE to download the list of reportable events (July 27, 2022)   

 

OMB Reinstates CSB Incident Reporting ICR - 6-13-24

Yesterday, the OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) announced that it had reinstated the Chemical Safety Board’s information collection request (ICR) for the CSB’s Accidental Release Reporting. An earlier reinstatement notice had reinstated the collection at the earlier burden estimate levels. Yesterday’s action changed the approved ICR to the new levels requested by CSB.

Burden Estimate	Previous	New
Responses	201	100
Burden (hrs)	50	25
Cost	$1850	$925

CSB reported in their Supporting Document provided to OIRA that the change in the burden estimate was due to a review of recent historical records, not an actual prediction of a decrease in number of reportable incidents.

The current ICR approval will remain in force through June 30^th, 2027.

Review - CSB Updates Accidental Release Reporting Data – 4-19-24

Yesterday in preparation for their quarterly business meeting tomorrow, the CSB updated their published list of reported chemical release incidents. They added 26 new incidents that occurred since the previous version was published in January and inserted eight ‘new’ incidents that occurred before January. These are not incidents that the CSB is investigating, these are incidents that were reported to the CSB under their Accidental Release Reporting rules (40 CFR 1604).

The table below shows the top four states based upon the number of reported incidents since the January update was published.

 

For more details on the new information in the database, including a new top ten chemical incident States list, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/csb-updates-accidental-release-reporting-fae - subscription required.

Review - CSB Updates Accidental Release Reporting Data – 1-25-24

Yesterday in conjunction with their quarterly business meeting, the CSB updated their published list of reported chemical release incidents. They added 37 new incidents that occurred since the previous version was published in October. These are not incidents that the CSB is investigating, these are incidents that were reported to the CSB under their Accidental Release Reporting rules (40 CFR 1604).

The table below shows the top four states based upon the number of reported incidents since the October update was published.

For more details about the reported incident data, and a listing of incidents that probably should have been reported, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/csb-updates-accidental-release-reporting-65d - subscription required. 

Review - CSB Updates Accidental Release Reporting Data – 10-1-23

Yesterday in conjunction with their quarterly business meeting, the CSB updated their published list of reported chemical release incidents. They added 36 new incidents that occurred since the previous version was published in July. These are not incidents that the CSB is investigating, these are incidents that were reported to the CSB under their Accidental Release Reporting rules (40 CFR 1604).

 

For more details about the reported incident data, and a listing of incidents that probably should have been reported, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/csb-updates-accidental-release-reporting - subscription required.

Review - CSB Updates Release Reporting Rule Database – 6-30-23

Yesterday, the CSB updated their published list of reported chemical release incidents. They added 35 new incidents that occurred since the previous version was published in January. Four new incidents were added to the list for dates before . These are not incidents that the CSB is investigating, these are incidents that were reported to the CSB under their Accidental Release Reporting rules (40 CFR 1604).

The CSB also published an updated version of their Investigation Closure Plan, outlining the schedule for the Board’s clearance of the investigation backlog. The location of this version was reported in a comment by Rosearray on an earlier post of mine. There is no specific mention of the update on the site.

The new version of the database adds 43 new incidents reported since the January 25^th version of the data was published. The 43 incidents include eight incidents where deaths were involved, 21 with serious injuries and 24 where significant property damage was reported. Once again, Texas lead with the most reported incidents (14) with Louisiana in a distant second with four.

 

For more information on the new data, including list of incidents inserted in earlier portions of the list and incidents that are apparently missing from the reporting list, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/csb-updates-release-reporting-rule - subscription required.

Review – CSB Incident Reporting Rule Submission Information and Data – 10-26-22

Last week the Chemical Safety Board updated their published list of reported chemical release incidents. They added 32 new incidents that occurred since the previous version was published in July. Two events from 2011 were also added to the list. These are not incidents that the CSB is investigating, these are incidents that were reported to the CSB under their Accidental Release Reporting rules (40 CFR 1604).

 

For more details about the data being reported by the CSB, including my list of incidents that perhaps should have been included in the list, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/csb-incident-reporting-rule-submission - subscription required.

Review - CSB Releases Chemical Incident Data from Reporting Rule - 7-29-22

Yesterday, coincident with their July 2022 quarterly meeting, the Chemical Safety Board (CSB) released the latest tranche of data resulting from their Chemical Incident Data reporting rule. The spread sheet released by the Board shows an additional eight serious chemical release incidents since the Board last made this information public in May. The new data brings the total to 162 reported incidents since March 2021 with 25 involving at least one fatality, 92 involving serious injury, and 68 involving substantial property damage.

An interesting difference between the two data releases is how the announcement was made. The first data release was done with a very limited press release; just a couple of dry explanatory paragraphs and the link. Yesterday’s press release is bit more of an activist announcement. It includes separate quotes from both Board Members, Steve Owens (recently nominated to fill the Chair position) and Sylvia Johnson.

Both comments pointed to community’s right to know about chemical incidents in their backyard. Unfortunately, I do not think that the information provided to the Board is generally much more useful for communities than that found in the local press. That is not what the reporting rule was intended to do after all. What will be more important as these two new Board members put their mark on the CSB will be how they allocate their investigation resources. If they want to help chemical facility neighbors, they will be concentrating on more incidents with off-site consequences.

 

For more details about the new information included in the data release, see my article in CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/csb-releases-chemical-incident-data - subscription required.