Date of Graduation

2017

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Type

MS

College

Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources

Department

Industrial and Managements Systems Engineering

Committee Chair

Xinjian He

Committee Co-Chair

Steven E Guffey

Committee Member

Eun Gyung Lee

Abstract

Reliably sampling worker exposures to aerosolized particulates is an integral part of many industrial operations. The production of inhalable particulates in the presence of workers is a common issue and one that should be closely monitored by health and safety professionals. Regulatory agencies such as the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the Mine Safety and Health Administration have specific standards that are legally enforceable pertaining to particulate aerosol exposure limits. Therefore, in many industrial operations, air sampling of workers is an essential part of maintaining regulatory compliance.;Although many airborne particulates can pose significant health risks, the costs of air sampling are prohibitive to gathering data from every worker in many workplaces. In order to help mitigate the costs of exposure assessment, a disposable sampler was designed in order to collect inhalable aerosols. The sampler has been evaluated in a laboratory setting, but this study compared the performance of the newly developed disposable inhalable aerosol sampler to the current models in an industrial setting. The industrial environment utilized for this study was a large copper electrorefinery. Workers were fixed with two pumps, one attached to the current technology (IOM sampler by SKC) and the other to the newly designed disposable sampler. Samplers were attached to opposing lapels of workers and they were monitored for the duration of their work shift. Area samples were also collected where aerosol particulate exposures have been consistent and measurable. The faces of the samplers were placed next to each other for the area samples, collecting data from the ambient air conditions. This study found differences between the DIS and IOM sampler for exposure measurements---with a p-value of 0.005, the ANOVA statistical analysis rendered a rejection of the null hypothesis, which states that the two samplers are not different on a statistically significant level. Using a linear regression analysis of the data, the adjusted R2 value was 0.1622 and the Pearson's correlation coefficient was 0.423 for the 51 sample pairs, further substantiating the differences between these samplers. Changes to the design are suggested to make the disposable inhalable sampler more user friendly prior to commercialization.

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