Exposure to Total Dust in 6 Terminal Grain Elevators

摘要

In 6 Canadian west coast terminal grain elevators, area as well as personal total suspended particulates measurements were performed for 4 different years. Prior to analysis the personal total dust measurements were grouped by job title, elevator and year. The area total dust measurements were grouped by area, elevator and year. The variation in measured total dust levels over the years and elevators was considerable. This fact was partly caused by the high geometric standard deviations for most job titles and areas. A relatively high percentage of measurements for the different job titles exceeded the proposed TLV of 4 mg/cu m. The mean dust exposure for a sweeper was significantly higher in comparison to most other job titles, whereas a foreman was exposed significantly less. Two areas were identified which were significantly different statistically from the others: the track-shed measurements were lower than the others and the cleaner floor measurements higher.