Atomizing Systems Inc.

About Dust Control

Cold Fog^® Dust Suppress System

What Is Dust

Dust is generated by a wide range of manufacturing, domestic, and industrial activities, such as grinding, crushing, dumping, loading, transferring, or material handling. Dust consists of tiny solid particles carried by air currents. A wide range of particle sizes can be inadvertently produced during manufacturing operations. Particles that are too large to remain airborne settle while others remain in the air indefinitely.

Dust is generally measured in micrometers (commonly known as microns). Some common objects and their size in microns are listed below. Even forklift tires can easily remove the top surface of concrete floors creating dust problems within the space.

Why Dust Control

After dust is formed, control systems are used to reduce, capture and drop dust fines from the air. A well-designed dust-control system can protect workers and often provide other benefits, such as:

• Preventing or reducing risk of dust explosion or fire
• Increasing visibility and reducing probability of accidents
• Preventing unpleasant odors
• Reducing cleanup and maintenance costs
• Reducing equipment wear, especially for components such as bearings and pulleys on which fine dust can cause a "grinding" effect and increase wear or abrasion rates
• Increasing worker morale and productivity
• Assuring continuous compliance with existing health regulations

Proper planning, design, installation, operation, and maintenance are essential for an efficient, cost-effective, and reliable dust control system.

Fog Dust Suppression - Airborne Dust Capture through Water Sprays

Fog suppression is one technique to optimize the application of water to capture dust fines floating in the air. In this approach, very fine water droplets are sprayed into the air after the dust becomes airborne. Fog systems provide highly effective, inexpensive dust capture combined with low cost of both installation and operation. When the water droplets and dust particles collide, agglomerates are formed. When these agglomerates become too heavy to remain airborne, they settle.

The fog system breaks water down into very fine droplets that join with the similarly sized particles of airborne dust. Fog systems supply micron-sized droplets that maximize the capture potential of the water, while minimizing the amount of water added to the product. The low flow of water added through ColdFog^® nozzles, typically at 0.01 to 0.05 percent by weight of the processing material and will not degrade the performance of the material.

The spray nozzle is the heart of a fog system. The following factors should be considered in selecting the nozzle location:

• It should be readily accessible for maintenance.
• It should not be in the path of flying material.
• For wet dust suppression systems, nozzles should be upstream of the transfer point where dust emissions are being created.   Care should be taken to locate nozzles for best mixing of material and water. 
• For airborne dust capture, nozzles should be located to provide maximum time for the water droplets to interact with the airborne dust.

Cold Fog^® unique technology

ColdFog^® system produces an ultra-fine water fog, a high concentration of 1-15 micron fog droplets, that effectively attracts and holds dust particles from 0.1 to 1000 microns to be removed from the work place and other environmentally sensitive areas.

ColdFog^® Systems meet or exceed the EPA PM 10 standards for dust suppression. Refer to EPA website for PM-10 details:
http://www.epa.gov/oar/aqtrnd97/brochure/pm10.html.

ColdFog^® systems are custom designed for effectively eliminate airborne emissions control applications. All systems are custom designed with corrosion resistant components. All pump stations and controls are UL and CE rated.

ColdFog^® nozzles are the world’s only PATENTED ruby-orifice fog nozzles with laser-drilled ruby-orifice diameter tolerance of ±0.0002" (±. 005mm). ColdFog^® ruby-orifice nozzles have Lifetime Unconditional Orifice-Wear Warranty.