ABSTRACT
Looking up at the sky, we would never guess that our atmosphere
contains between one and three billion tons of dust and other
particles at any given time.1 Wind assists in keeping this dust
airborne, but gravity wins most of the time, forcing the dust
particles earthward, proving the old adage: “what goes up, must
come down.”
Precipitant dust levels in the Western Cape do not follow the same
pattern as the precipitant dust levels in the summer rainfall areas of
South Africa. Due to the very dry summer conditions in the
Western Cape, the precipitant dust levels can be very high,
especially if sources of fugitive dust are ignored.
An environmental consulting company positioned precipitant dust
monitoring units at strategic locations, taking process and open dust
sources into account. Both wet and dry depositions have been
reported on in this report as one figure. Seasonal changes in, and
long-term trends of, the amount of precipitant dust were
documented and statistically analysed to determine if the precipitantdust levels were above the South African legislated action levels.
The particle size analysis performed on the precipitant dust
indicated that the dust was predominantly less than 100_μm and that
about 22 percent of the particles by volume were under 15_μm.
No significant decline in the precipitant dust levels around the
calcining industry was noted. Recommendations are that they
increase the dust control measures on site, especially near to the
DHF sampling location.
There was a significant decrease in the precipitant dust levels to the
north and south of the smelting industry from October 2001 to April
2005, p-value 0.005 and 0.048. The recommendations for the
smelting industry are that they continue to eliminate fugitive dust
sources and that they continue to maintain a high awareness of dust control.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:wits/oai:wiredspace.wits.ac.za:10539/4792 |
| Date | 12 May 2008 |
| Creators | Loans, Christopher |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | 1026462 bytes, application/pdf, application/pdf |
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