Web Ready Monitor

Dylos Corporation’s DC1100 Air Quality Monitor is the first monitor on the market that has been developed and tested for consumer use. Up until now, the only particulate air quality monitors available for purchase were the extremely high priced units that were sold to hospitals, laboratories, clean room facilities, etc. The DC1100, on the other hand, was designed expressly to meet the needs of the home or office environment at an affordable price.

• True Laser Particle Counter
• Counts individual particles
• Sizes small and large particles
• Immediate response to changing environment
• Up to 30 days of stored history data

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I just received an E-Mail referring to detractors of Laser Particulate Monitors and their arguments against this sort of equipment. I thought you might find both his E-Mail and my reply interesting.

Hank,

Good work on this issue. Having looked into the issue of what sorts of monitors that could be used by Town governments and their engineering firm consultants to collect data that would be adequate to meet the evidentiary requirement for enforcing a silica dust standard, I find them telling me that the Dylos monitors you are using and other laser monitoring devices will not serve that purpose , nor will they provide data that will allow us to interpret the actual species of particulate matter that the monitors are recording. We actually need to know the levels Pm 4 or smaller crystalline silica dust particles. They fail to discriminate between toxic stuff like lead and asbestos fibers from pollen, water vapor, and dandruff from the back of a short haired dog etc.

Am I wrong about this? I have been discussing this issue for a few months with some of the leading air quality engineers and scientists in WIS. If I am wrong, we need to talk I think.

Bob
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Dear Bob,

Scientists and Air Quality Engineers want know everything about what they measure and put numbers on each component whether those numbers actually mean anything or not relative to the actual intent of the monitor.

For example the present DNR Air Monitors are simple vacuum cleaners that suck a measured amount of air and dust through a HEPA (High Efficiency Particulate Air) filter in a week or so and then weigh the bag. This makes the scientists happy since they can produce a very accurate number, and and if properly done is quite repeatable. They can then analyze the contents mechanically and chemically and produce other numbers to show the components and amounts of the particles in the bag. Thus the scientists can produce a professionally done report that arrives at the DNR or where ever it goes about a week after the bag is removed from the Monitor. We have been trying to get copies of the local DNR monitor report on site for some time without success.

From my standpoint this DNR Report might be interesting to a scientist, but if you are looking for information to Monitor and theoretically hold a point source of pollution (a sand plant or mine) to a pre-set standard then you need real time information, not a scientific report on a two week old bag of dust.

I am not saying that the DNR monitors are not producing anything of value, just that it is ancient technology and never designed to be used for this purpose.

1. The collection bag or filter does not collect particles smaller than 2.5 microns (or so I was told by the DNR).
If we are concerned about air quality, the particles smaller than 2.5 microns are exactly the ones we should
be interested in since they pass easily deep into our lungs and cause the real problems. Since these tiny
particles pass right through the bag, they are not collected or weighed.

2, The pile of dust collected is a total over time (a week) and is thus an average. Are we saying that for 4 days
of the week the plant can really exceed our air pollution “limits / standards” and then on the other three days
cut way back, so the average number meets specifications?

3. Assuming that the plant had a problem that their own sensors did not detect, (a ripped collection bag etc),
with clouds of nearly invisible pollution, the DNR report could be as much as two weeks behind in alerting us.

4. From the word “evidentiary” in your E-Mail, i see this heading toward lawyer talk meaning the Sand Plant
Lawyers have gotten into the writing of the air pollution standards so that somebody has to “Prove” beyond
a shadow of a doubt that the Silica Particle portion of dust emitted is above standards.

In any case from my readings of the so called standards, there has been no indication as to what happens should these standards be exceeded. What is the use of writing rules if there is no penalty for breaking them?
Somewhere it should plainly state that should the “fugitive dust” exceed xxxx mg/m3 then we shut down the
plant till it’s fixed. Needless to say the plant owners would fight such wording tooth and nail.

So now that you know where I stand on the DNR ancient technology, I will attempt to answer your question about the dandruff from the back of a short haired dog.

Assuming that the purpose of a monitor is to enforce a dust standard, and not to tell us what happened two weeks ago, we need a real-time monitor that can respond to changing conditions and warn us if pollution levels exceed allowable limits.

The Dylos Laser Air Particulate Counter is a tool that while not perfect, and certainly not definitive enough for our scientific friends can tell us what the general particulate level is and when placed properly around a point source of pollution can accurately measure the output of that source what ever the makeup of that pollution is.

If you look at the “Map of Locations” on the http://www.ccc-wis.com web site under Laser Air pollution Monitors, you can see the “Upwind” monitor is 1 mile NW of the EOG plant site, and “St Joseph’s Hospital” monitor is 1.5 miles SE.
Thus when the wind is blowing from the NW to the SE, one can subtract the “Upwind” reading from the “St Joseph’s” reading and see what particulate loads the plant is adding to our air. The wind often reverses itself in summer so we have a wind chart right below the pollution chart for information on direction and speed plus a relative humidity reading to get a feeling for how much water vapor is in the air.

From my extensive reading on the subject, I believe that ANY particles smaller than 2.5 microns in the air are bad, and Silica dust is especially bad. Out lungs will get clogged up and cease to function if we breathe dust laden air as what happens to miners (Black Lung) and asbestos workers (Mesothelioma) or Silica dust (Silicosis).

For your scientific friends, we know that Dr. Crispin Pierce is recommending levels of PM10 <30 ug/m3 (annual average) as a limit that should keep crystalline silica levels below the critical mark, assuming crystalline silica is less than 10% of total PM10, so we CAN use these Laser devices to let us know when we are in trouble.

Thus these relatively inexpensive Dylos monitors were never intended to determine what was in the air, only how many particles per cubic foot, and that, I propose, is very important.

Hank Boschen 715-226-1131

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. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. ..Web Site connected Laser Particulate Pollution Monitor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
A turnkey unit consists of:
A Dylos DC 1100 Air Quality Monitor,

A GuruPlug Computer

Serial to USB adapter.

Wireless adapter to connect to your server/modem
The unit will come set up to display output on the CCC-WIS.COM website assuming you have wireless or cable internet access.. All you have to do is plug it in and turn it on.

Best location for such a monitor is outside, tucked under a protective roof (to keep the rain off) and in a screened (spider-proff) container. It does need a source of AC power 120 volts.
I will place your verbiage around the Web display as desired by you.Should you wish to upload the display to your website, your webmaster can change the settings to accomplish that, or I can help you do it.
Cost will be no more than $$700.00 (Varies by installation). . . . . . Hank Boschen 715-226-1131 juiceguy@juiceguy.com