Search

Determining occupational health and safety risks posed by emerging technologies is difficult because of limited statistics. Nevertheless, estimates of such risks must be constructed to permit comparison of various technologies to identify the most attractive processes. One way to estimate risks is to use statistics on related industries. Based on process labor requirements and associated occupational health data, risks to workers and to society posed by an emerging technology can be calculated. Using data from the California semiconductor industry, this study applies a five-step occupational risk assessment procedure to four processes for the fabrication of photovoltaic cells. The validity of the occupational risk assessment method is discussed.