The monitoring of dust emissions during the production of urea pellets means: reliable measurement of low dust concentrations in gas emissions and no measurement errors due to possible droplet formation.

In Egypt, too, increased importance is being placed on a clean environment. The monitoring of dust emissions is firmly anchored in environmental specifications and is being introduced as a priority in production processes in the chemical and fertilizer industries. This is a measuring requirement that is new for many industries in Egypt. There were no reference installations and no empirical values. For this reason, HAK, SICK‘s Egyptian representative, has created and evaluated a detailed application questionnaire for selecting the best measuring principle for this application at MOPCO.

The gas temperature in the exhaust duct is below the dew point, which means that droplet formation is expected. Incorrect measurements are virtually inevitable. However, as the measurement results are forwarded directly to the environmental authorities online, the highest possible level of accuracy must be ensured. If limit values are not respected, there is a threat of severe penalties and the system will be shut down.

Scattered Light Measurement Technology for Very Low Dust Concentrations

The DUSTHUNTER SB100 from SICK is the solution. With the scattered light measurement technology – an optical measurement process specifically designed for detecting extremely fine dust particles – even the smallest dust particles can be detected. A high number of device functions ensure additional measurement reliability, including the automatic control cycle with zero measurement and reference measurement, and the device‘s internal contamination measurement and correction. With this measurement, the contamination of optical interfaces is detected by the device itself and the measured values are corrected in accordance with the degree of contamination. All in all, maximum availability and minimum maintenance are achieved.

The dust measurement is successfully calibrated using the SICK GRAVIMAT. All measured values have a 99.7% confidence interval. Thus, using a SICK dust measuring device, it is once again possible to verify the highest levels of measuring certainty – even in critical application conditions

A satisfied customer and a reference

One year later, MOPCO is very satisfied with the dust measurement and is also acting as a reference for other industrial systems that require efficient dust measurement. MOPCO enjoys exact measurement with long maintenance intervals of 3 months.

The success story is still going and on continuing for other fertilizers

Now after 4 years of successful 1st installation, currently most of Major Fertilizers Plants in Egypt are using DUSTHUNTER SB100 for measuring accurately their dust emission.