Industrial Fire Prevention

From WoodworkingNetwork.com How to Prevent Comdust Combustible Sawdust - How to Protect Your Workers Your Business Posted: 04/01/2015 4:04PM EDITOR’S NOTE: This information was presented in the webcast “Combustible Sawdust - How to Protect Your Workers Your Business,” which broadcast in March. Presented by Air Handling’s Jamison Scott, and sponsored by GreCon, the full webcast can be heard on-demand at WoodworkingNetwork.com/webcasts .  Combustible dust continues to make headlines. One of the top health and safety issues in the woodworking industry, it impacts companies of all sizes. OSHA defines combustible dust as “fine particles that present an explosion hazard when suspended in the air, in certain conditions.” For a combustible dust explosion to occur, five factors must be present: fuel (combustible dust), ignition (heat or spark), oxygen (air), dispersion (dust suspension) and confinement.  Removal of any ...

"the design and installation of the new dust collection system was done so poorly that it overheated within a few days of being activated, ignited spontaneously and caused an explosion that then released a fireball on seven workers." The Record: Worker safety January 18, 2015    Last updated: Sunday, January 18, 2015, 1:21 AM The Record A US Ink worker being treated by an EMT after the explosion in 2012. A FEDERAL investigation found that a series of mistakes led to a dangerous fire at an East Rutherford ink factory involving combustible dust in 2012. New Jersey needs stronger regulations to avoid potential disasters in the future. The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, an independent federal agency that looks at industrial chemical accidents and makes recommendations to governing bodies, released a report Thursday detailing the problems at the US Ink facility. According to the report, the design and installation of the new du...

Excellent article below from our friends at The Harrington Group, LLC But first, I want to make a few comments about safe design of these pellet plants: Here in general terms are current best practices for wood pellet mills based on NFPA 664 and over 3 decades of experience protecting wood, sawdust and wood flour processes. As a primary consideration, understand that these wood pellet plants are making fuel, that plant operations and maintenance personnel are constantly working around fuel. Consider wood flour as dangerous as gasoline. Utilize inherently safer equipment and process design. Separate, segregate and isolate various hazardous processes and equipment from each other. Risk is defined as probability of occurrence and severity of consequence. You will want to design in various layered engineering controls to reduce risk of probability of occurrence as well as severity of consequences in pellet mill processes. We reduce risk by reducing probability of occ...