NFPA diamond

The NFPA created a diamond or a kind of code in order to protect the industries from fire; also it is used to communicate the type and the risk of every material that the companies use.

The diamond has four divisions and each division have a color; every single color has a meaning. When a chemical product represents a risk in the containers we can find the different colors that alerts and informs  that it represents some risk. Color blue refers to health risks, color red refers to inflammability, color yellow means reactivity and color white means especial risks. Each color has some different numbers and each number means the risk level. Below I want to show you how it works:

Color blue means health:

0.    No health risk.

1.    Materials that causes skin irritation.

2.    Substance can cause a minus damage.

3.    Substance causes permanent damage.

4.    Substance causes the dead.

Color red means inflammability:

0.    Material does not burn.

1.    Materials need a temperature of 200°F to burn.

2.    Materials need a temperature of 100°F to burn.

3.    Liquids and solids need a temperature of 83°F to burn.

4.    Materials burn quickly, the necessary temperature is 73°F.


Color yellow means reactivity:

0.    Material is stable, do not react with anything.

1.    Material is stable but it cans react with different temperatures or pressure.

2.    Material presents chemical changes.

3.    It cans explode with different temperatures.

4.    It can explode with normal temperatures.

Color white means special situations:

W: the element reacts with water.

OX: the element is an oxidant element.

COR: the element is corrosive.

BIO: the element has biological risk.

CRYO: the element causes cancer.

We must bear in mind that all chemical compounds are different,  it means that all substances have different risks, some substance can have white, blue and red color, another substance can have just white and red, the colors in the diamond depends of each special substance.

We like workers and health professionals to look in every container and take precautions as possible as they can to avoid lethal accidents.

We must be aware of prevention policies to avoid accidents and occupational diseases that can be caused for an exposure to some different substances.

 Here is the NFPA diamond:

Written by: Paulina Guillén Vargas.

Sources consulted: Soto, R. (12 de November de 2011). NFPA standard. San Jose, San Jose, Costa Rica.