Title: occupational exposure standard
Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - occupational exposure standard
DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.15934
Status: current

Definition
Level of exposure to substances, intensities of radiation, etc., or other conditions considered to represent specified good practice and a realistic criterion for the control of exposure by appropriate plant design, engineering controls, and, if necessary, the addition and use of personal protective clothing.
In UK, health-based exposure limit defined under COSHH Regulations as the concentration of any airborne substance, averaged over a reference period, at which, according to current knowledge, there is no evidence that it is likely to be injurious to employees, if they are exposed by inhalation, day after day, to that concentration, and set on the advice of the HSE Advisory Committee on Toxic Substances.

Related Terms
- exposed: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/15695
- health: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/15757

Source
- PAC, 2007, 79, 1153. 'Glossary of terms used in toxicology, 2nd edition (IUPAC Recommendations 2007)' on page 1273 (https://doi.org/10.1351/pac200779071153)

Other Outputs
- html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/15934/html
- json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/15934/json
- xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/15934/xml

Citation: Citation: 'occupational exposure standard' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.15934
License: The IUPAC Gold Book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) for individual terms.
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Disclaimer: The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) is continuously reviewing and, where needed, updating terms in the Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the IUPAC Gold Book). Users of these terms are encouraged to include the version of a term with its use and to check regularly for updates to term definitions that you are using.
Accessed: 2026-07-24T05:13:53+00:00