Passive personal air sampling of dust in a working environment—A pilot study

Figures & data

Figure 1. Measurement setup: Each worker had one respirable cyclone (3) and two UNC samplers (1 and 2) fastened to their workwear.

Table 1. Overview of activities during the nine measurement events.

ID	Shift	Workplace	Tasks	Comments
1	Morning	All locations	Indoor and outdoor tasks	Dusty and dirty work, used a respirator at times, possibility of sprays of water
2	Morning	All locations	Indoor and outdoor tasks	Dusty and dirty work, used a respirator at times, possibility of sprays of water
3	Night	Concentrator	Concentrator operator	Mostly in the operator room, about 1.5 hr out in the concentrator
4	Evening	Concentrator	Concentrator operator	Mostly in the operator room, about 1.5 hr out in the concentrator
5	Morning	All locations	Indoor and outdoor tasks	Dusty and dirty work, used a respirator at times, possibility of sprays of water
6	Morning	Concentrator	Concentrator operator	In the concentrator 2.5–3 hr
7	Morning	Concentrator	Concentrator operator	In the concentrator 2.5–3 hr
8	Morning	Laboratory	Lab work	Worked with some dusty samples
9	Evening	Crushing station	Crushing station operator	30–40 min dusty work, used a respirator

Figure 2. The whole UNC sampler collection surface imaged with a SEM. The particles were deposited heterogeneously, with a higher particle surface loading in a circular shape at the edge of the collection surface.

Figure 3. Four example particle collection surfaces imaged from different UNC samplers with a SEM. The particles almost exclusively resembled gravel. Panels (a), (b), and (d) show particles at the edge of the collection area, and panel (c) shows particles from the center of a deposition surface. The particle surface loading on the surface edge was generally higher than on the center of a deposition surface.

Figure 4. Normalized mass concentration distributions (dM/dlogd_a) for the 18 UNC samplers calculated using the (a) mesh factor and (b) area factor.

Figure 5. (a) Mass concentrations of the respirable cyclone vs. the UNC sampler. (b) Mass concentrations of the respirable cyclone vs. the UNC sampler mean mass concentrations, with the respirable cyclone outlier (high concentration) removed.

Figure 6. Mass concentrations for the seven paired measurements for the UNC sampler Position 1 vs. the UNC sampler at Position 2 with the respirable cyclone outlier (see Figure 5a) removed. The points for ID 3 and 4 overlap.