HAZARD AND RISKS IN ORGANIC CHEMISTRY

The difference between hazard and risk

1 Many organic substances, including those you might come across in the school Jab, require
special handling because they are hazardous and carry a risk of harm to people using them.
2 In everyday conversation the words hazard and risk may be taken to mean much the same
thing — that something is potentially dangerous. However, in chemistry these words have
very specific meanings:
3 Hazard — the hazard presented by a substance or an activity is its potential to do harm.
This potential is absolute. For example, some chemicals are flammable and some are toxic.
Their tendency to burn, or to poison, are tested and calculated and will always be the same. –

4 Risk - the risk associated with a particular hazard is the chance that it will actually cause
harm.
(a) Risk is affected by a number of things, in particular the nature of the hazard involved
and the level of exposure to it. The level of exposure in turn is dependent on factors
such as the expertise of the person working with the chemical, the volumes being
used, the conditions in which it is used and the protective clothing and equipment
available.
(b) A hazardous substance can be safe to use if the risks are minimised. For example,
you know that petrol is hazardous — it is flammable and poisonous. However, the risk
of coming to harm when you fill a car with petrol is very small. On the other hand, if
you spill petrol on your clothing and then light a match, the risk of harm is high. The
hazard presented by petrol is the same however it is used — but the risks of harm
changes considerably depending on how the petrol is handled.

5 How can you reduce the risk associated with using hazardous chemicals? Some strategies
are listed below:
(a) Working on a smaller scale — for example, there is less risk of inhaling fumes with
smaller amounts of chemicals because there are fewer fumes. ‘When the quantities
are small it is easier to contain the reaction in closed apparatus, and to carry out
the reaction in a fume cupboard. If heat is given out (exothermic reaction) this will be
less for smaller quantities of reactants, and smaller quantities are easier to transfer
from one container to another without spillage.
(b) Taking specific precautions or using alternative techniques depending on the
properties of the hazardous substances you are using — for example, one way of

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reducing risk is to use the lowest possible concentration of a solution to achieve a

particular reaction. Using. a low concentration considerably reduces the risks for a
hazardous solute. The lowest suitable concentration of any particular reagent will vary
from reaction to reaction, eg in many laboratory reactions 0.4 mol dm -3 or even 0.1 mol
dm-3 acids and alkalis are quite adequate. At these concentrations the chemicals are
irritant rather than corrosive, so the hazard level is reduced. This in turn reduces
the level of risk. However, there are other reactions, particularly at AS and A2 level,
that require 1 mol dm-3 and even 5 mol dm-3 solutions to be used. Although the hazard
level is higher, the risk can be kept low by careful planning and risk assessment.
(c) Careful use of safety measures — such as fume cupboards to remove toxic or
flammable fumes, and personal protection such as safety goggles, considerably
reduce the risk of carrying out reactions using hazardous chemicals.
(d) Changing the conditions under which a reaction takes place – for instance, lowering
the temperature of a reaction mixture will slow the reaction down. This can
substantially reduce the risks of the reaction mixture overheating and/or excessive
fumes being given off, though cooling may change the equilibrium position and so
affect the proportion of reactants and products in the final mixture. For example, the
reaction between sodium thiosulfate and dilute hydrochloric acid is often used to show
the effect of increasing temperature on the rate of a reaction. However, the sulfur(IV)
oxide, SO2 given off can trigger asthma attacks in vulnerable individuals. By carrying
out the experiment in closed vials and reducing the temperature immediately after
readings have been taken, the amount of gas given off can be greatly reduced and
almost all students can carry out the investigation without suffering any ill effects.
(e) Using alternative methods with less hazardous substances — sometimes it is
possible to substitute chemicals and still study the same basic reaction. In many cases
the alternative chemicals are not as effective as the original, more hazardous ones.
The reaction may be slower or the yield may be lower but if the risk is also
substantially lower these disadvantages are worthwhile. CLEAPPS (the Consortium of
Local Education Authorities for the Provision of Science Services) is an advisory
service providing guidance on practical science teaching in schools and colleges. They
have produced a list of alternative compounds which can be used in organic chemistry.
For example, tetrachloromethane was the best solvent to make a non-aqueous
bromine solution because the solution would keep for a long time. However,
tetrachloromethane has a high hazard rating (it is toxic). Cyclohexane can be

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used instead if it can be stored out of the light (eg in a dark bottle or in a clear bottle in
a labelled cardboard box). However, plastic screw tops or bungs will be affected if it is
stored for over a month. In a clear bottle, noticeable deterioration will occur within two
days. So there is often a safer alternative, even though it may not perform quite as
well.
Wearing a mask while spraying helps to avoid any risk of inhaling the chemical.
However, the risks of starvation and malaria are far higher than any potential risks
from pyrethrin sprays. On the other hand, there are other much more effective
pesticides that can kill many more pests and so save many more people from
starvation.
(e) Synthetic pesticides can be very effective at destroying pests — often organic
compounds, they help prevent the destruction of millions of tonnes of food every year.
However, they can be expensive, and there are some significant risks associated
with their use. The chemicals are often very persistent in the environment. They are
not broken down readily in biological systems and so they build up in food chains
until they reach a level where they are harmful to humans or other animals. They can
also be toxic to the farmers who work with them. This is a particular problem in the
poorer countries of the world, where pesticides are often still applied by hand. In
China, for example, up to 500 farmers die each year from acute pesticide poisoning.
Careful use of the chemicals, wearing protective clothing and breathing equipment —
even a simple mask — can reduce these risks. If several farmers get together they
may be able to afford a vehicle to spray the pesticide.
The comparative risks of natural and synthetic pesticides can be hard to balance.
Applying synthetic pesticides gives good pest control — but at a high price in terms
both of cost and of toxicity to the farmer and the environment. Natural pesticides are
less toxic to the environment and may be cheaper — but they are still hazardous to
those who use them and less effective as pesticides, so make a more limited
contribution to solving the worlds food shortage. It is a dilemma which has not yet been
solved.

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It isn’t possible to eliminate risk form life completely – everything you do carries some element of risk,
however small. However in a chemistry lab you are more likely exposed to hazardous materials than
in other places. As a result, people in labs take precautions, use safety features and behave with care
to reduce the risks. Because of this laboratories are generally very safe environments. In contrast,
people jump into cars and drive every day with little or no thought for the hazardous nature of what
they are doing – and often make little effort to reduce the risks. There are a number of hazards
particularly associated with organic chemicals. Many of these chemicals are poisonous and/or
carcinogenic (they cause cancer). Many are flammable, As a result, when working with organic
chemicals it is very important to carry out a full risk assessment. The purpose of this is to identify the
risks of using hazardous chemicals and reduce them as far as possible.
To carry out a risk assessment you follow the steps below.
1 Identify any hazards of the chemicals you want to use and the procedure you plan to carry
out.
2 Quantify the risk associated with the way you want to use the hazardous substance, eg how
much of the hazardous substance do you need to use, will it be used by trained personnel, are
- fume cupboards available?
3 Identify who is at risk.
4 Identify any control measures which you can put in place to reduce the risk.
5 Quantify the risk that remains and decide whether it is now at an acceptable level. If so record
your risk assessment and carry out your procedure

Providing food to feed the population of the world is not an easy task, made more difficult by the fact
insects and fungi destroy up to 30% of the food that is grown. To prevent insect pests from destroying
crops as they grow, farmers around the world use pesticides — chemicals that kill the pests.
There are two main classes of pesticide used. Natural pesticides are derived from plants. Many
plants have evolved chemicals in their leaves and flowers that are toxic to insects and other pests.
People have extracted some of these chemicals and used them as pesticides. The best- known
natural pesticide is pyrethrin, an organic compound originally extracted from pyrethrum flowers.
Chemists have made a number of closely related chemicals that we even more effective. Natural
pesticides like pyrethrum e usually broken down relatively quickly in the environment both by sunlight
and within the bodies of many animals. Pyrethrum is also effective against malaria mosquitoes, which
cause disease and death to millions of people every year. However, there may be health risks to the
people who use it — in the US it has been classified as a likely human carcinogen by the

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Environmental Protection Agency. Because low levels of pyrethrin are broken down in the human
body, the best way to reduce risk from the pesticide is to spray the lowest effective amount.

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