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A $50.6 million fine has been levied by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration on BP PLC in connection with its failure to repair safety hazards at its refinery in Texas City, Texas following an explosion in 2005. It will also invest $500 million in safety improvements at the facility.

Samsung Electronics Co. has tasked an environmental firm, Washington, D.C.-based Environ Holdings Inc., to do a year-long review of its semiconductor factories located in Seoul, South Korea. The review is in response to a number of leukemia cases reported at the facilities.

In response to the massive BP PLC oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, President Barack Obama issued a moratorium on offshore oil and gas well drilling, a move which angered the industry and raised the specter of large-scale unemployment and loss of income. Now, Obama will allow shallow-water oil and gas drilling to go ahead with new safety requirements.

As the investigation into the mine explosion in West Virginia that killed 25 miners continues, it is thought that something ignited methane that had built up in the mine. The mine in question, the Upper Big Branch coal mine of Massey Energy Co., has had more than 100 citations this year alone so far for mine safety violations. Some of those violations include the failure to control levels of methane adequately.

MGM Mirage Inc.'s planned $9.2 billion CityCenter development is the focus of regulators after the deaths of six workers since 2006. Questions of safety standards have resulted in an intensive safety inspection of the project.

The volatility of sugar dust and its potential for explosions has been long-known but not regulated. This will change, following and explosion at Georgia's Imperial Sugar Co. which resulted in 13 deaths.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined Cintas Corp., an industrial laundry, $2.8 million in relation to the death of a worker. The company if often cited for workplace safety issues and the case points to a general lack of safety for workers in the industry.

An investigation into an explosion at a BP PLC refinery reveals that executives believe that industrial cost-cutting measures may have been a contributing factor in the explosion.