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4 2 Pallet C e nt ral • S e ptem be r- O ctobe r 2 0 26 OSHA BY ADELE L. ABRAMS, ESQ., ASP, CMSP Implications of OSHA's New (De)Regulatory Agenda I n the normal course of business, the federal government issues a "semi- annual regulatory agenda" twice a year, updating its progress on developing regulations and alerting the public to new items on its long- term agenda for which input will be sought. e regulated community has the right to notice of any agency rulemakings—and the right to comment and to request a public hearing under the Administrative Procedure Act. e Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) follows this procedure as well. But these days are anything but the "normal" course of business. President Trump's Executive Order 14192, "Unleashing Prosperity rough Deregulation," directed all agencies to streamline regulatory obligations by repealing outdated or redundant standards, reducing compliance costs, and "fostering economic growth." e semi-annual agenda has morphed into an annual release, and the new agendas of all federal agencies were quietly released over the July 4, 2026, holiday weekend. e first agenda under the Trump 2.0 Administration was issued July 1, 2025, and the Winter 2025 and 2026 agendas were skipped entirely. e overarching 2026 Regulatory Plan says that OSHA would finalize the heat illness prevention standard "with a view toward avoiding excessive burdens that commenters identified." OSHA also announced plans to finalize its controversial proposed rule for emergency responders to ensure that they are adequately protected when performing lifesaving duties. Recent developments discussed below may undermine the agency's ability to complete work on the heat illness rule, however, and leave it with only the General Duty Clause as an enforcement tool. Significantly, OSHA committed to modernizing the lockout/tagout standard to recognize new technologies that will improve safety, reduce costs, and ensure regulations do not stand in the way of innovation. is last item would certainly impact the pallet industry's lockout programs as well as guarding methods for pallet assembly and disassembly equipment. OSHA has now scheduled a series of informal public hearings for many of the deregulatory actions proposed in July 2025, with hearings beginning on August 19, 2026, and continuing on subsequent weekdays. ese can be observed online, but the deadline for filing a Notice of Intention to Appear was July 6, 2026. Most of the items covered in these hearings address modifications to the respiratory protection requirements for a number of hazardous chemicals and air contaminants. While most of these do not apply to the pallet, warehousing, or transportation sectors, items on the list include asbestos, benzene, cadmium, ethylene oxide, formaldehyde, arsenic, and lead. Some products used in the industry could contain these ingredients, so expect updated Safety Data Sheets to follow any changes for these chemicals. One item of relevance concerns proposed changes to the fixed ladder requirements for OSHA's general industry walking- working surfaces standard, which was last modified in 2016. OSHA is considering removing the requirement to replace existing fixed ladders in order to provide

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