Clean Air a Must for Manufacturing
In most cases, having clean air is a basic and fundamental requirement for product quality and worker safety in just about any industry or manufacturing sector in Australia - in fact, some have even argued that it is nothing less than a basic human right.
Furthermore, air contamination within a production process can and will lead to product recalls, production losses, financial imposts, a fall in consumer confidence, possible regulatory penalties and not to mention the potential and far-reaching implications on worker safety, says Melissa Phelps, general manager of ducting specialist company Eximo.
Conversely, says Mrs. Phelps, the numerous by-products of a manufacturing process may also contaminate the very air needed by production staff to function properly, a situation that could lead to grave implications.
It is a fact that efficient labour throughputs bear a direct relationship on a company’s bottom line, as well as on workers health and a perception of comfort and safety within the actual working environment. Contaminants such as airborne paper dust, aerosols, wood dusts, oil mist, ink dust, food additive residues, metal dusts, chemical fumes and the like can cause eye, throat and skin irritations which over time can lead to permanent hyper sensitivity of workers and staff alike.
For many Australian companies, up until now, the costs associated with their air quality management have been high, requiring numerous inputs from specialist consultants, maintenance companies and equipment suppliers. If not done correctly, managing and coordinating this effort can turn into a time consuming and costly task. Mrs. Phelps says that these costs can be easily mitigated and the potential for not only safety disaster but also product contamination can be greatly minimised by the use of efficient, well-designed and cost-effective ducting.
“Using our standard Eximo Optiflow system for example on current average electricity prices around Australia, costs about 16 cents per kilowatt hour to operate”, says Mrs. Phelps. During peak times, on a typical working day, Optiflow requires 165 kW of operating power and at non-peak times - such as night shifts - operating power requirement drops right down to 65 kW.
Apart from providing users with a very safe way of handling waste clippings and dust, Mrs. Phelps, says that the Optiflow system also “eliminates any unnecessary and potentially dangerous physical work normally used to manually shift waste. Integrated with an overall pressure-driven extraction system, the Optiflow is a unique concept built especially for dust extraction and transportation”, she notes.
"It creates a negative pressure chamber across an entire factory or processing plant to eliminate the total static pressure of the whole system by as much as 50 per cent. Thus it provides a positive power consumption advantage as it is proportional to the total static pressure”, says Mrs. Phelps.
Mrs. Phelps also notes that the Optiflow waste handling system is “starting to make its mark on Australian manufacturing lines”.
