Part One - Why frac sand exhaust ventilation engineering controls can't contain all respirable crystalline silica
Part I – Physical Reasons Why Engineering Controls Cannot Provide 100% Containment of all Crystalline Silica
Part I – Physical Reasons Why Engineering Controls Cannot Provide 100% Containment of all Crystalline Silica
BELLWOOD, PA, October 10, 2013 — The Mobile Air Shower by HalenHardy (MASHH), which removes hazardous crystalline silica from workers clothes during industrial operations, won the inaugural Ben Franklin Shale Gas Innovation & Commercialization Center (SGICC) Environmental, Health and Safety Award at the Shale Insight Conference.
The Nation’s Largest Sand Producers Say a Proposed OSHA Silica Rule is Needed to Protect Workers |
Don’t Let Respirable Silica Dust You
By Donny Beaver, Co-Founder & CEO, HalenHardy
Part Seven in our series featured the July 2013 announcement by NIOSH about workers’ clothing being an eighth (8th) source of respirable silica in hydraulic fracturing. In addition, the HalenHardy team has identified 11 more areas of exposure before, during and after hydraulic fracturing including:
More than a year after listing the seven points of worker exposure to respirable silica dust in hydraulic fracturing operations, the same NIOSH researchers published an article outlining an eighth (8th) primary point of dust release and generation in the July 2013 American Industrial Hygiene Association magazine, The Synergist – “Keeping Up with the Oil and Gas Rush.” The authors, Eric Esswein and Ryan Hill, noted “work clothing (for example, flame retardant coveralls) contaminated with crystalline silica” is considered a dust release or generation point.
Thanks to its crush resistant attributes, silica sand is the preferred material used in hydraulic fracturing to prop open tiny fissures in shale formations that hold vast deposits of oil and natural gas. In fact, silica sand is so popular that a recent US Geological Survey Minerals Yearbook noted that frac sand demand has tripled in three years (from 20 to 60 billion pounds per year). Because the length of horizontal wells (laterals) continues to increase, more silica sand is used in nearly every well.
Comprehensive Guide to Minimizing Respirable Silica Dust Exposure in Hydraulic Fracturing
Part Three – Deadly Dust from Antiquity Stirs Up Challenges Today
Comprehensive Guide to Minimizing Respirable Silica Dust Exposure in Hydraulic Fracturing
Part Two – What is Silica and Why is it so Dangerous?