Canopy air curtains show promise for improving respirable dust control
by steve fiscor, editor
At the Society for Mining, Metallurgy, & Exploration’s (SME) annual conference, which was held during February in Minneapolis, researchers from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) discussed the use of canopy air curtains (CACs) to deliver more fresh air to operators working in room-and-pillar coal mining operations. They used several methods to compare dust concentrations for operators working on a roof bolter at the Lively Grove mine in central Illinois. While they debated the accuracy of dust-measuring systems, they did determine that CACs could be an effective dust-control device.
