Simplifying Chemical Inventory Management in the Lab

A chemical inventory is the list of all of the chemicals in the lab and their associated chemical hazards. It ensures regulatory compliance and improves productivity in the lab. 

There are many ways to document the lab’s chemicals, ranging from old-fashioned paper-based systems to Excel spreadsheets to modern digital systems. The more manual the chemical inventory is, the more time, energy, effort, and cost are required to complete all the different activities associated with the inventory.

Key concerns and decisions lab managers face around chemical inventory

Most of the activities around tracking chemicals in the lab are required by regulations. As the lab manager, you need to decide how your lab will fulfill the requirements. Every lab has a different range of chemicals, which will lead to different approaches.  Here are five key chemical inventory activities that must be accomplished:

Communicate chemical hazards to lab staff

Organizations have a duty to inform lab staff about the hazards of using the chemicals in the lab. A good starting point to understand a chemical’s hazards is the safety data sheets (SDS) and globally harmonized system (GHS) labels. 

Communicate chemical hazards to emergency responders

For emergency responders—like fire fighters—to enter the building during a crisis, they need to understand the chemical hazards present in the lab. The risk of not having this information is that fire fighters might not be able to enter the building to put out a fire.

Fulfill fire code and safe storage obligations

Following safe storage requirements and maximum allowable quantities are requirements for the lab. 

Locating chemicals in the lab

Finding chemicals in big and busy labs can be a challenge and a frustration for scientists. Lost chemicals result in wasted time, wasted money in ordering duplicates, and extra costs for disposal of unused materials.

Auditing the inventory

The chemical inventory must be kept up to date to be valuable. Auditing the locations, amounts, containers, and expiration dates is a key activity. This is a physical verification, not something that can be done solely through software. Different approaches to the chemical inventory will significantly impact the amount of time, work, and rework that is needed to keep the inventory up to date.

The core of deciding the best way for the lab to comply with regulations is around spending time versus spending money. If maintaining the chemical inventory is a manual process, then staff will be spending time managing it, and their personnel cost is the largest item in the lab’s budget. If you choose a digital system for chemical inventory management, then the lab needs to invest in an appropriate product that best meets its requirements. 

Benefits of working with the safety team

As lab managers tackle the decision of how to best comply with the regulations, they can greatly benefit from cooperating with safety professionals on chemical inventory activities. Most labs have support for lab safety, either as a role within the lab or as safety experts serving the broader organization. For labs with little previous interaction with their safety experts, arranging a lab tour with the safety teams and discussing the activities in the lab is an excellent place to start. For labs without organizational safety assistance, it can be very productive to create a safety role within the lab. Focusing safety training on an individual or a small team will enable everyone in the lab to benefit.

Safety professionals can help in several ways with chemical inventory activities. Here are a few  examples

• Contribute to any decision around investing in a digital system that has the required features to ensure regulatory compliance
• Ensure that sufficient chemical hazard information is available to help keep the staff safe
• Provide guidance so that the lab understands their responsibilities regarding regulatory compliance
• Help the lab establish effective and safe chemical handling and storage practices
• Aid the lab to have unique identifiers for each chemical so that the appropriate safety information is shared for the right material

Benefits of collaborating with centralized stockrooms 

Having an effective chemical inventory allows for better storage options for the lab. Centralized storage reduces the number of storage locations, the cost of safely storing materials, and the complexity of inventory audits. It also helps narrow scientists’ search to find specific chemicals needed for their experiments. Training specific stockroom staff also focuses knowledge about safely handling, storing, and disposing of chemicals for the lab.

A well operating stockroom also saves the lab money. The stockroom professionals can better analyze and track the patterns of chemical usage. These patterns can minimize the amounts of chemicals used and ensure that the right chemicals are available at the right time. This approach can save money by ordering just what chemicals are needed. 

Using the central stockroom as the designated receiver of new chemicals coming into the lab also ensures that they are checked against the orders, properly included in the chemical inventory, have SDS information available, have the proper safety labels, and are made available to all scientists who need them.

Important considerations when envisioning a new chemical inventory program

Some key features of a new chemical inventory system to consider include:

• The importance of container tracking features like barcode/RFID 
• The flexibility to uniquely identify chemicals in the lab
• Notifications, like expiration dates or storage limits
• The ease of use for the lab staff and the safety professionals
• A need to scale the system for lab growth
• Compatibility with existing systems, like a LIMS or ELN
• Data security requirements
• The detail required for compliance and audit reports
• The need to integrate the inventory with chemical purchasing 

One element of changing to a digital chemical inventory system that can be overlooked is the positive changes for the lab staff. Clearly communicate the benefits felt by the individuals— what’s in it for me? Showing staff that a new approach to chemical inventory will solve problems important to them, like ensuring they can easily locate the chemicals they need or that overall cost savings will be reinvested to help them will encourage them to embrace the benefits of working through the changes. 

Having a functional digital chemical inventory will provide labs with the right data to make better decisions about chemical use. It will also allow for excess materials to be safely disposed of, prevent the use of expired chemicals, and improve the cost efficiency of buying chemicals. All of these benefits will make the work around chemical inventory easier and more efficient, which allows scientists to spend more time doing science and less time doing inventory work.