• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.85-96
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• 2001

The objective of this study is to develop the water spraying which can effectively by applied to the control or suppression of the fugitive dust generated from the scrap metal handling area at the Port of Inchon. As a first step toward this goal, we carried out some preliminary analyses on the chemical composition, physical shape, and particle size distribution of the sample dust. Next, to quantitatively investigate the effect of adding surfactants to the spraying water on the wettability of the sample dust, the Standard Sink Test was carried out for four different surfactants and at six different concentrations using the surfactants considered in this study. Results of from the preliminary analysis indicated that the main chemical component consisting of the sample dust is Goethite(FeO(OH)) and that the particles smaller than 10 ${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$ in geometric diameter occupy about 36% of the sample dust in mass. This result implies that the fugitive dust generated from the scrap metal handling area at the Port of Inchon should affect the environment nearby more than we have expected. This is because of relatively large mass percentage of the small metal particles less than 10${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$ in geometric diameter, what we may call respirable particles. As for the results of the Standard Sink Test, higher surfactant concentration tends to result in the higher wettability of the sample dust for the surfactants considered in this study, which in turn ensures the high particle collection efficiency of the droplets generated from the water spraying system. Based upon this preliminary results, studies to develop more sophisticated scaled model for dynamic test in underway and the effort to find the best surfactants as well as the optimum operating conditions are being made at the same time.