This posting is in no way meant to replace, or be used as a substitution to, a proper hazmat training course. Any company dealing in shipment and storage of chemicals is required to provide their employees training in a hazardous materials course.

However, if you are just a member on the sales team, a bidder on a solicitation, you may or may not get the privilege of spending consecutive days reading and understanding the ever exciting and exhilarating information offered in a hazmat course (I sometimes use sarcasm to mask the pain of disturbing memories). As a bidder on a government solicitation, whether or not you’ve had a hazmat training course, you need to know if the item you are bidding is considered hazmat.

Why is it important to know if your item is hazmat for bidding purposes? Well, there is always the added costs that hazmat adds to the shipping fees (inbound and outbound). Sometimes there are special packaging requirements that need to be accounted for in the cost work-up. But, for the purposes of this post, there is the requirement that you provide your solicitor (in our case, the US Government) with a copy of the SDS itself.

So, here is a quick top level overview of how to tell if your item is considered hazmat.

First, let’s dispel the belief that if your NSN is preceded by a “1HM”, “1H”, or any variation of number with an “H” behind it, this does NOT mean your item is hamzat. The purpose of that “HM” (or other variation) has to do with the control of the item on the end user’s side. You can just ignore it for now.

The best way to know if your item is considered hazmat (hazardous material) is to read the Safety Data Sheet (SDS), also previously referred to as the MSDS (Material Safety Data Sheet).

Open your SDS to Section 14, this is the Transportation Regulatory section. Most of the time there are four regulatory classifications listed and, without getting too deep into the weeds, those categories each over transportation by land, sea, and air.

If there is a “UN” number (i.e. a literal four digit number set preceded by the letters UN) listed under the transportation category that you would be using (such as land transportation) then, honey, you have yourself a hazmat item. Of course, anyone with hazmat training knows there are continued circumstances and exceptions as to whether the item will truly be shipped hazmat, but that is too deep into the weeds for this short posting. What we are concerned with as a bidder on the sales team is, do I need to provide a SDS with my solicitation?

In the case of there being a “UN” number on your SDS, then yes you need to provide the SDS with the solicitation.

What happens if you are looking at a solicitation, you do not have a SDS yet but you still want to know whether the item on the solicitation is considered hazmat? You can always look and see if the government has designated it as hazmat via information provided in the NSN data.

Pull up the item’s NSN data. Look for the Hazardous Material Indicator Code (HMIC). This code will be a one position alpha code that identifies a hazardous item. There will be one of the following letters under the HMIC section and this is what they mean:

• D – Indicates there is no information in the HMIRS; however, the NSN is in a FSC in table I of Federal Standard 313 and a MSDS (i.e. SDS) should be available to the user.
• N – Indicates there is no data in the HMIRS and the NSN is in a FSC not generally suspected of containing hazardous materials.
• P – Indicates there is no information in the HMIRS. The NSN is in a FSC in table II of FED STD 313 and a MSDS (i.e. SDS) may be required by the user. The requirement for MSDS is dependent on a hazard determination of the supplier or the intended end use of item.
• Y – Indicates information is in the hazardous materials information resource system (HMIRS).

So, there you have it. A very simplified, bird’s eye view, of the weed entangled mess of the determining hazmat items. Use this information as a starting point, then move on to understanding the ins and outs of hamzat determinations, shipping requirements, and exceptions.