Fume Formation and Measurements in the Metal Production Industry

Airborne Particulate Matter (PM) is considered to be a major concern for both occupational health and the environment, and in the metal production industry, the level of such particles in the air can be considerable. This work focuses on obtaining a better understanding of the mechanisms of fume formation and the operational parameters affecting the fume formation rate, which may help in reducing and managing fuming, and is divided in three parts. The first part is aimed at investigating the evaporation rates of pure liquid manganese in an inert atmosphere given variations in the temperature and the flow conditions above the surface. The second part is aimed at investigating the effects of oxygen content and gas flow rate on the fuming rate and fume particulate properties for liquidhigh carbon ferromanganese. The third part is aimed at testing and evaluating distributed micro sensors for in-situ spatial monitoring of dust intensity in the metal-production industry, and to study the effect of various operational parameters on the measures fume levels.