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CHAPTER-6
Industrial Hygiene

KNC 3253
Occupational Safety and Health

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Learning Objectives:

What is Industrial Hygiene

Government regulation

Identification of Industrial Hygiene

Industrial Hygiene Evaluation

Industrial Hygiene Control

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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What is Industrial Hygiene

 Industrial hygiene is a science devoted to the identification, evaluation
and control of occupational conditions that cause sickness and injury.
 Typical project involving Industrial hygiene are
i. Reducing toxic airborne vapors through the use of ventilation.
ii. Selecting proper personal protective equipment to prevent
worker exposure.
iii. Developing procedures for the handling of hazardous
materials.
iv. Monitoring and reducing noise, heat, radiation and other
physical factors to ensure that workers are not exposed to
harmful levels.

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Industrial Hygiene
• The three phases in any industrial hygiene project are
 Identification: determination of the presence or possibility of
workplace exposures.
 Evaluation: determination of the magnitude of the exposure.
 Control: Application of appropriate technology to reduce workplace
exposures to acceptable levels.

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Government Regulations
Law and regulations are major tools for protecting people
and the environment.
How creating a law:
A law created with three step process:
Step-1:a member of congress proposes a bill. A bill is a document that,
if approved, becomes a law.
Step-2: If both houses of congress approve the bill, it is sent to the
president, who has the option to either approve it or veto it. If approved
it becomes a law that is called an act.
Step-3: the complete text of law is published in the United States
Code(USC). The code is the official record of all federal laws.

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Government Regulations
• The process for creating a regulation has two steps:

• Step-1: the authorized organization or agency decides when a

regulation is need. The organization than researchers, develops and
propose a regulation. The proposal is listed in the federal register
(FR) so that the public can evaluate it and send comments to the
organization. These comments are used to revise the regulation.

• Step-2: after the regulation is rewritten, it is posted in the federal

register as a final rule and it is simultaneously codified by publishing it
in the code of federal regulations(CRF)

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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OSHA: Process Safety Management

On February 1992, OSHA published the final rule process
safety management (PSM) of highly hazardous chemicals.
The PSM has 14 major sections:
 Employee participation
 Process safety information
 Process hazard analysis
 Operating procedures
 Training
 Contractors
 Pre-startup safety review
 Mechanical integrity
 Hot work permits
 Management of change
 Incident investigations
 Emergency planning and response
 Audit and trade secrets

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Industrial Hygiene: Identification

 One of the major responsibilities of the industrial hygienist is to
identify and solve potential health problems within plants.
 Many hazardous chemicals are handled safely on a daily basis within
chemical plant.
 To achieve this operating success, all potential must be identified and
controlled.
 The identification step requires a through study of the chemical
process, operating conditions and operating procedures.
• The quality of this identification step is often a function of the number
of resources used and the quality of the questions asked.
• In this identification step, it is often necessary to collate and integrate
the available information to identify new potential problems resulting
from the combined effects of multiple exposures.

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Material Safety data sheets

 Materials safety data sheet (MSDS) is the most important references
used during an industrial hygiene study involving toxic chemicals.
 The MSDS lists the physical properties of a substance that may
required to determine the potential hazards.
 MSDSs are available from the chemical manufacturer, a commercial
sources and a private library developed by the chemical plant.
 The industrial hygienist must be know the physical properties and
toxicological properties to determine the hazards associated with a
chemical.
 These determination is used to develop a strategy for the proper
control and handling of these chemicals.

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Evaluation

 The evaluation phase determines the extent and degree of employee

exposure to toxicants and workplace environment.
 For example Chronic effects, however, arise from repeated exposures
to low concentrations, mostly by small leaks.
 To establish the effectiveness of existing control.
 Develop the long term and permanent control.

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Problem.
• Industrial hygiene is the science of protecting and
enhancing the health and safety of people at work and in
their communities. Evaluation is always needed to
determine the extent and degree of employee exposure to
toxicants and physical hazards in their workplace. A direct
method for determining worker exposures is by
continuously monitoring the air concentrations of toxicants
on-line in a work environment. Develop equation(s) for
evaluating exposures to volatile toxicants by using the
continuous monitoring method.
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Evaluating Exposures to volatile Toxicants by Monitoring

• A direct method for determining worker exposures is by continuously

monitoring the air concentrations of toxicants on-line in a work
environment.
• For continuous concentration data C(t) the TWA ( time weighted
average) concentration is computed using the equation:

1 𝑡𝑤
TWA= ‫׬‬0 𝐶 𝑡 𝑑𝑡 … … … … … … … … … (1)
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Where, C(t) is the concentration(in ppm) of the chemical in the air

tw is the worker shift time in hours.
If a worker is exposed for 12 hours to a concentration of chemical equal
to the TLV-TWA, than TLV-TWA has been exceeded.

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Evaluating Exposures to volatile Toxicants by Monitoring

 If we assume that the concentration Ci is fixed or averaged over the time period ti
, the TWA concentration is computed by

𝐶1𝑇1+𝐶2𝑇2+⋯…………….+𝐶𝑛𝑇𝑛
TWA= ……………………(2)
8ℎ𝑟
All monitoring systems have drawback because (i) the workers move in and out of
the exposed workplace and (ii) the concentration of toxicants may vary at different
locations in the work area.
If more than one chemical is present in the workplace. The combined exposures
from multiple toxicant with different TLV-TWAs is determined from the equation.

σ𝑛𝑖=1 𝐶𝑖
𝑇𝐿𝑉−𝑇𝑊𝐴 𝑖
…………….(3)

n is the total number of toxicants, 𝐶𝑖 is the concentration of chemical i with respect

to the other toxicants and (TLV-TWA)i is the TLV-TWA for chemical species i

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Evaluating Exposures to volatile Toxicants by Monitoring

 If the sum in equation-3 exceeds 1, than workers are overexposed.

The mixture TLV-TWA can be computed from
σ𝑛
𝑖=1 𝐶𝑖
(TLV-TWA)mix= 𝐶𝑖 ……………………..(4)
σ𝑛
𝑖=1
(𝑇𝐿𝑉−𝑇𝑊𝐴)𝑖

Problem: Air contains 5ppm of diethylamine (TLV-TWA of 10ppm),

20ppm of cyclohexanol (TLV-TWA of 50ppm), and 10ppm of propylene
oxide (TLV-TWA of 20ppm). What is the mixture TLV-TWA and has this
level been exceeded?

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Evaluating worker exposures to noise

 Noise problems are common in chemical plants; this type of problem

also evaluated by industrial hygienist.
 Noise levels are measured in decibels.
 A decibels (dB) is a relative logarithmic scale use to compare the
intensities of two sounds.
 If one sound intensity I and another sound intensity Io , than the
difference in intensity levels in decibels is given by

Noise intensity (dB)=10log10(I/Io)

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Estimating worker exposures to toxic vapors

Enclosure Volume V Concentration of volatile, C (Mass/volume)
•
•
•
Volatile rate out, kQvC
•
Ventilation
•
Rate,Qv (Mass/Time)
(volume/Time)
•
•
•
•

Evolution rate of volatile Qm

(Mass/Time)

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Estimating worker exposures to toxic vapors

 Let,
C is the concentration of volatile vapor in the enclosere
v is the volume of the enclosure
Qv is the ventilation rate
k is the nonideal mixing factor
Qm is the evolution rate of volatile material
So,
Total mass of volatile in volume=VC
𝑑(𝑉𝐶) 𝑑𝐶
Accumulation of mass of volatile= =𝑉
𝑑𝑡 𝑑𝑡
Mass rate of volatile material resulting from evolution=Qm
Mass rate of volatile material out=kQvC
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Estimating worker exposures to toxic vapors

𝑑(𝑉𝐶)
• =Qm-kQvC………………………………(1)
𝑑𝑡
• At the steady state the accumulation term is 0 and equation 1 is solved for C
𝑄𝑚
• C= ………………………………………….(2)
𝑘𝑄𝑣
• Equation 2 is converted to the more convenient concentration units of ppm by direct application of
the ideal gas law. Let m represent mass, ρ represent density and subscripts 𝑣 and b donate the
volatile and bulk gas species respectively.
𝑉𝑣 𝑚𝑣/𝜌𝑏 𝑚𝑣 𝑅𝑔𝑇
• Cppm= ×106= ×106= × ×106………………(3)
𝑉𝑏 𝑉𝑏 𝑉𝑏 𝑃𝑀
• Where
• Rg is the ideal gas constant
• T is the absolute temperature
• P is the absolute pressure
• M is the molecular weight of the volatile species

𝑚𝑣
• The term is identical to the concentration of volatile computed using equation 2. Substituting
𝑉𝑏
equation 2 into equation 3 yield

𝑄𝑚𝑅𝑔𝑇
• Cppm= ×106………………………………..(4)
𝑘𝑄𝑣𝑃𝑀

•
KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health
Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Industrial Hygiene Control

 After potential health hazards are identified and evaluated, the
appropriate control techniques must be developed and installed.
 Designing control methods is an important and creative task because
during the design process the designer must pay particular attention
to ensure that the newly designed control technique provides the
desired control.
 Make sure that new control technique itself does not create another
hazard because sometime new technique more hazardous than the
original problem.
 Another two major control techniques are environmental controls and
personal protection.
 Environmental controls reduces exposure by reducing the
concentration of toxicants in the work place environment. This
includes enclosure, local ventilation, dilution ventilation wet methods
and good housekeeping.
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Chemical plant control techniques

Type of explanation:
 Typical techniques
Enclosures: enclose room or equipment and enclose hazardous
place under negative pressure.
 Enclose hazardous operation depend on the sample point such as
seal room, sewers, ventilation etc.
 Use analyzers and instruments to observe inside equipment
 Shield high temperature surface and convey dusty material.
Local ventilation: Contain and exhaust hazardous substances.
 Use proper designed hoods
 Use hoods for charging and discharging
 Use ventilation at drumming station.
 Use local exhaust at sample points.
 Keep exhaust systems under negative pressure.

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman
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Chemical plant control techniques

Dilution ventilation: Design ventilation systems to control low-level
toxics.
 Design locker rooms with good ventilation and special areas.
 Design ventilation to isolate operations from rooms and offices.
 Design filter press rooms with directional ventilation.
Wet Methods: use wet methods to minimize contamination with dusts.
 Clean vessels chemically vs. sandblasting
 Use water sprays for cleaning
 Clean areas frequently
Good housekeeping: keep toxicants and dust contained
 Use dikes around tanks and pumps.
 Provide water and steam connections for area washing.
 Provide lines for flushing and cleaning.
 Provide well-designed sewer system with emergency containment.
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Chemical plant control techniques

Personal protection: as last line of defense

Use safety glasses and face shields
Use aprons, arm shields and space suits.
Wear appropriate respirators.

KNC 3253 Occupational Safety and Health

Dr. Md. Rezaur Rahman