Over 190,000 illnesses and 50,000 deaths occur annually in the United States as a direct result of chemical exposure in the workplace. OSHA cites a paper published in 2006 by the California Policy Research Center titled “Green Chemistry in California: A Framework for Leadership in Chemicals Policy and Innovation” as the source of these frightening facts on the web page devoted to chemical substitution.

The process of systematically setting goals and priorities to reduce hazards, developing a chemical use inventory, evaluating alternatives, identifying preferable alternatives, and putting those alternatives into action is referred to as substitution planning. This course sheds light on importance of substitution methodologies to eliminate or reduce exposure to products that are toxic or pose additional hazards by replacing them with alternatives that pose a lower risk.