When your company is processing bulk solids at any point, chances are that you’ll be looking to solve dust issues. Dust does not only have a negative impact on health and working conditions, but can be an environmental pollutant and has the potential risk of being explosive when forming dust clouds. Beside health and safety issues there is also a clear economical motivation to manage the dust in your production processes : dust effects the wear and efficiency of most processing equipment, and creates spillage when the dust is valuable end product.
Solutions
Handling and controlling dust is done by a dust extraction and filtration system or so called LEV (Local Exhaust Ventilation). One or several dust sources are equipped with dust hoods and connected to a dust filtration system with a fan. The correct identification of the dust sources, their related extraction air flow, as well as the design of the hoods and the ductwork are crucial and will strongly influence the “environmental” end result in and around the production line.
The dust-laden air is channeled to a dust filter, where dust and gas are being separated. The applied filter technology depends on product and process characteristics. A well designed installation will sufficiently filter the air from the product, so the air can safely be reinjected into the environment. The captured product can be considered waste or can be reinjected into the production line as a valuable product stream.
When working with explosive powders, a dust extraction and filtration system will help to minimize or inhibit the creation of explosive hazard zones in the production environment. The extplosion risk is tranferred into the filter that is designed to contain or safely discharge an occuring explosion, creating a safe working environment.
