Australia Model Code of Practice Managing the Risks of Biological Hazards at Work 5.3: Ensure no person is exposed to an airborne biological contaminant above the workplace exposure standard, monitoring air where needed for cotton, grain and wood dust, knowing the applicable standards and applying them in assessment and control, and transitioning to the workplace exposure limits from 1 December 2026

What does 5.3 require?

Organic dusts and some other biological hazards are airborne contaminants that damage health when inhaled. Beyond removing or reducing those risks so far as reasonably practicable, the WHS laws require the PCBU to make sure nobody at the workplace breathes an airborne contaminant at a concentration above the workplace exposure standard, and air monitoring may be the only way to prove that exposures to cotton dust, grain dust (oats, wheat, barley) and wood dust stay under the relevant figure. The PCBU must know which standards apply to the biological hazards on its site and should build them into its risk assessment and its controls. The current exposure standards give way to the new workplace exposure limits for airborne contaminants on 1 December 2026, and until then the existing standards still bind.