Combating Combustible Dust

Those types of dangers have always existed. And when maintenance becomes strained or relaxed it invites these problems until an incident occurs.

This has always been a problem and is one that the farming community has been aware of for centuries. Dust from grain blown into silos or elevators. Dust from hay and straw in barns. All are very combustible.

The simple answer, as it has been pointed out is maintainable cleaning of the facility.

When running several shifts this becomes difficult, and the health and safety issues of cleaning dust while machinery is operating is problematical at best. The solution is really quite simple, but I am not giving anything away. It's one of those 'out of the box' things.

Have a great day everyone

I remember from my childhood, some 30 years ago, that the factory where my dad worked blew up.

At first they blamed the solvents they used as it was a gravure printing place where they printed news papers and such but after the inspection it was a combination of paper dust and pigeon shit.

This latest incident does not make anybody aware of this problem except of the ones involved. Humans have a build in inability to learn from past mistakes.

That is a new thread I think

Your comment;

combination of paper dust and pigeon shit.

I believe pigeon sh#$ is high in potassium (K),.....guess what they use K for.

I will never call myself an expert pigeon sh#$, but when I grew up on a farm, being the youngest, I worked in it opening up silos and setting up silo unloaders.

My brothers were lucky I did not know about child labor laws.

I realise that salpeter is used in gunpowder and in particular the black gunpowder. I don't think that it is naturally produced from pigeon shit as first most the Kalium content is too low, and secondly the Kalium binds to easily with other elements before becoming salpeter. Kalium itself is very electro negative so it is notoriously difficult to extract from it's natural forms.

What was given as the most likely cause of the accident was the mixture of dried up pigeon shit, very dusty when dry, and building up paper dust from the in house mills. This dust can reach concentrations that would be considered explosive even if there are no combustible materials involved.

Strange thing, dust!

MY MISTAKE, not potassium rich, its nitrogen rich, among other things.

Maybe that is worse:

The more standard oxides, dinitrogen trioxide N₂O₃ and dinitrogen pentoxide N₂O₅, are actually fairly unstable and explosive-- a tendency which is driven by the stability of N₂ as a product. The corresponding acids are nitrous HNO₂ and nitric acid HNO₃, with the corresponding salts called nitrites and nitrates. Dinitrogen tetroxide N₂O₄ (DTO) is one of the most important oxidisers of rocket fuels, used to oxidise hydrazine in the Titan rocket and in the recent NASA MESSENGER probe to Mercury. DTO is an intermediate in the manufacture of nitric acid HNO₃, one of the few acids stronger than hydronium and a fairly strong oxidizing agent.

In other words part of rocket fuel! Now that will cause a bang and a half

case491,

WOW......was that just some by the way chit chat you were doing. I'm impressed.

I can understand some of it, as far as the oxidizers but I'm am not smart enough to verify it.

A new energy source. And a new problem to global warming....or cooling...or something

phoenix911

Using 'walnut shell' media is one possability. Whatever the application, walnut shell is all natural, DUST FREE, biodegradable and non-toxic. It's worth a try ... if it suits your job. You can contact Rebecca @ Eco-Shell, Inc. www.ecoshell.com for which ever mesh/grit or powder sizes you need.