Safety Office, Commissary Building
University of Waterloo
200 University Avenue West
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3G1
Phone 519 888 4567 Ext. 33587
Fax 519 886 8082
Email: safety@uwaterloo.ca
This page provides more information on chemical inventories, labeling, and SDS management at the University of Waterloo.
Risk and Safety Solutions is also available on mobile. Search "UC Chemicals" in your mobile app store to download. Log in using your WATIAM.
Chemical inventories must be input into the Safety Office supplied inventory module by all research facilities or upon request of the Safety Office. These inventories must be maintained and verified on a minimum of a yearly basis. All labs are to have their inventory uploaded and certified by the end of Winter 2023!
Completion of these inventories aids in:
For inventory items that do not have SDSs automatically linked, the PI must upload an SDS to the inventory module.
Laboratories may choose to use another software (such as Quartzy or Excel), or process to store their inventory in, but they will still be required to complete the annual inventory reconciliation process on Risk and Safety Solutions. As a result, they will want to ensure they store all mandatory bulk upload fields (yellow) from the Inventory Template for Importing a Laboratory Inventory in their other software system for easy annual uploading or tag their inventory using RFID tags. If an alternative is used, ensure that SDSs are readily available at all times in the laboratory. It is recommended that laboratories download their customized bulk upload form from their laboratory inventory page for use for uploading. Contact kaverste@uwaterloo.ca to discuss your options if you want to use two systems.
Getting started
For those starting your laboratory inventory review, here are a couple recommendations to help with the process:
Follow the steps below to develop an inventory. Refer to the drop-downs in each step for instructions.
To get your group added to the Chemical Inventory system, book a Part 1 meeting for an introduction to the system and have your customized group created.
To get to the Group Management section:
How do I add someone to an existing group?
How do I remove someone from an existing group?
How do grant the Delegate role to someone in my group?
What can Delegates do in a group?
How do I remove the Delegate role from someone in my group?
To see what a PI or Delegate vs a User can do, see this chart on Understanding Chemical Inventory Roles .
To get to the Group Management section:
How do I add a location to a group?
How do I remove a location from a group?
Sublocations are mandatory for the system to work. A lab either uses unique sublocations that define areas in their room such as flammable cabinet, shelf A, room number, or they may choose to use one generic sublocation for everything to meet the mandatory field requirements, for example, John Smith's Lab.
See the video below on how to complete the to tasks, or see the written instructions in the Getting Started Guide.
View the handout on Adding a Chemical to your Inventory view the videos below.
Add a chemical to your inventory on your desktop computer.
Add a chemical to your inventory on a mobile device.Alternatively, you can add chemicals with the bulk upload feature using the Inventory Template for Importing a Laboratory Inventory as per the How to Bulk Upload instructions. To do this with the Safety Office, book a Part 2 meeting.
How to add a novel compound to your inventory:
How to create a custom chemical name:
How to add a commercial chemical product (For PI's and Delegates) (i.e. when the chemicals isn't in the list):Chemical container:
Refers to one physical bottle, jug or vial that holds a hazardous chemical. Each
container should be added so that the amount of physical containers you have matches the amount on
hand in your virtual inventory in Chemicals. The chemical container gets 'moved' around within your chemical inventory.
Container Options:
Available for every container in your inventory.
Watch this video on container options:
Watch this video on reassigning containers:
To search for a chemical container: From the Chemicals homepage, select Search Chemicals
This software has the ability so you can search chemical across campus to request to borrow small components to avoid purchasing a whole new bottle. If you do not want other labs to see your containers, mark them as Private either on your bulk upload sheet, or when they are added to your inventory using the online system.
We encourage you to always send a copy of your borrowing request to chemsafety@uwaterloo.ca. This allows the Safety Office to email the individual directly, rather than send an email only through the system.
Watch this video on borrowing containers:
Watch this video on sharing containers:
Adding RFID to your inventory has two advantages:
Note: RSS uses barcode and RFID interchangeably inventory file is imported or added, all containers are available for barcoding based on their sublocation. All users can share the task of barcoding.
Laboratories may book a Part 3 meeting to have an Safety Office individual add RFID tags with them to help the inital tagging process go faster. For these meetings:
The safety office will provide access to RFID tags to labs free of charge. Request tags from chemsafety@uwaterloo.ca. Existing manufacturer barcodes cannot be used for scanning or reconcilliation, but they can be placed in the Custom Barcode section to allow them to be a searchable text.
To scan the RFID tags, book the Safety Office to come and scan your lab. Prior to the visit, ensure:
During the visit, a laboratory member must be present for the scan. With this visit, the Safety Office will provide you with an excel document of all the tags scanned.
After the visit, finish the reconciliation process:
If you have any questions, email chemsafety@uwaterloo.ca if you are interested.
Ensure laboratory inventory is up to date and current SDSs are available
Provide SDS log-in/access to all workers
Regularly inspect chemicals for as per safety and storage requirements
The following templates and manuals will help you navigate and use the chemical inventory system. Please open the appropriate links below to continue:
Safety Office, Commissary Building
University of Waterloo
200 University Avenue West
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3G1
Phone 519 888 4567 Ext. 33587
Fax 519 886 8082
Email: safety@uwaterloo.ca
The University of Waterloo acknowledges that much of our work takes place on the traditional territory of the Neutral, Anishinaabeg and Haudenosaunee peoples. Our main campus is situated on the Haldimand Tract, the land granted to the Six Nations that includes six miles on each side of the Grand River. Our active work toward reconciliation takes place across our campuses through research, learning, teaching, and community building, and is centralized within our Office of Indigenous Relations.