Appropriate Mask Selection Study for Nuclear Industries Activities

The pollution control is one of the major aims to a factory for preserving employee's health and outside environment. The best way to control the dust is to design machines in such a way that either producing the dust is prevented or the amount of produced dust which goes to the environment be less than a defined limit. If dust control is not possible, other ways such as blocking the production area, using localized air control system, and personal controls can be applied. In this work, an attempt was made to examine the quality of different disposable personal masks to be used in industry, especially in nuclear industries. To accomplish the purpose of the study, 21 samples were collected from 10 different companies. In order to choose the most appropriate mask, these masks were examined for their effectiveness with the atmospheric particle method. The quality factor was calculated by examining the pressure drop. This research indicated that there was a significant difference between the qualities of the examined masks. The lowest, average and highest quality factors for different masks, are about 0.002. 0.044 and 0.247, respectively.