Why It Matters

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration does not have any specific standards addressing outdoor or indoor heat exposure, according to a Congressional Research Service (CRS) report updated on August 18. Instead, OSHA relies on a general enforcement tool to cite employers for heat-related violations.

Workers in construction, agriculture, bakeries, warehouses, and steel mills may be exposed to heat conditions that can result in heat stroke, organ failure, and chronic kidney disease. In 2024, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 48 employment-related deaths due to environmental heat exposure, above the 42-year average of 42 deaths annually between 2011 and 2024.

OSHA published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking for a heat exposure standard on August 30, 2024, drawing over 43,000 public comments. The proposed standard would require employers to provide water, rest, and shade to workers, and establish heat action protocols.

But on January 20, 2025, the Trump administration froze most Biden-era rules, and in July 2025 proposed rolling back 25 existing OSHA standards. The federal unified regulatory agenda includes no target date for final action on the heat standard.

The Big Picture

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) has recommended since 1972 that OSHA officially announce a heat exposure standard, although OSHA is not required by law to do that.

Instead, the agency has enforced heat exposure violations using Section 5(a) of the Occupational Safety and Health Act, known as the general duty clause. For example, in March 2021, OSHA cited Valley Produce Harvesting and Hauling Company for a willful general duty clause violation related to heat exposure, initially assessing a maximum civil monetary penalty of $136,532 that was later reduced through settlement to $81,919.20.

Between 2022 and 2025, OSHA conducted an average of 2,400 heat-related inspections per year, representing 6 percent of all federal OSHA inspections. An average of 50 heat-related inspections per year during that period were inspections of possible workplace fatalities.

OSHA began a National Emphasis Program on heat exposure in April 2022, which included a goal of increasing annual heat-related inspections by 100 percent above the fiscal year 2017 through fiscal year 2021 baseline.

The 2026 National Emphasis Program, in force through April 2031, significantly narrowed the agency's focus. It removed the 100 percent inspection increase goal and does not include a numeric inspection target. The 2026 program removed 46 industries from the target list of high heat-hazard industries while retaining 33 industries and adding 22 new ones, resulting in a net loss of 24 targeted industries. State plans are strongly encouraged, but not required, to adopt the 2026 program.

Some states have moved independently. California, Maryland, Nevada, and Oregon have state occupational safety and health standards covering both indoor and outdoor heat exposure. Washington covers only outdoor heat exposure, Minnesota covers only indoor heat exposure, and Colorado has separate regulations governing outdoor heat exposure in agriculture.

The Bottom Line

H.R. 4443 and S. 2298, introduced in July 2025 and titled the Asunción Valdivia Heat Illness and Fatality Prevention Act of 2025, would require OSHA to propose and promulgate a heat exposure standard. Named after a California farmworker who died from heat stroke in 2004, the bills represent a direct legislative response to the Trump administration's regulatory retrenchment.

Whether Congress acts will determine whether workers nationwide receive the protections that some states have already implemented, or whether heat exposure remains governed by a general enforcement tool that has existed for decades without producing a dedicated standard.

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