On October 24, members of the Cal/OSHA Standards Board and staff of the Board and it’s sister agency Cal/OSHA witnessed demonstrations of autonomous machinery including autonomous weeders, air blast sprayers, and tractors at the FIRA/Global Organization for Agricultural Robots (GOFAR) show at the Yolo County Fairgrounds in Woodland.

The Standards Board has considered and rejected three petitions over the last six years to revise existing Cal/OSHA regulations requiring that agricultural equipment operated in a workplace where Cal/OSHA had jurisdiction must have a human operator. Many autonomous machines are intended to be fully autonomous or nearly so, and often do not have a position for a human operator.

Just prior to FIRA Woodland, the Agency issued a memorandum indicating support for an advisory committee bringing together agricultural employer, employee, equipment manufacturer, and academic stakeholders to identify issues related to use of autonomous equipment for the purpose of determining the direction of Cal/OSHA regulation of such equipment. The Agency’s memo acknowledged that it has no jurisdiction where employees are not present but proposed limitations on the advisory committee’s scope to gathering safety data on machines weighing less than 500 pounds, having less than 50 horsepower, and operating at less than 2 miles per hour. Since there are practically no machines in use or likely to be used in the future fitting those criteria, the agency’s proposed advisory committee scope is concerning.

At the Cal/OSHA Standards Board’s October meeting, Board Chair Joseph Alioto, Jr. expressed strong interestin empaneling an advisory committee dealing with the issue. The Board may take up the issue at its meeting in November.