Pellet storage warning

heinbloed

http://www.offalyexpress.ie/news/local/man-dies-in-portarlington-tragedy-1-2364494

and

http://csai.ie/


HSA warning about pellet stores
27 May 2011
The Irish Health and Safety Authority have asked us to draw your attention to a significant danger of gas poisoning from stored wood pellets following a fatal accident where a householder entered a pellet store.
http://www.hsa.ie/eng/Topics/Safety_Alerts/Wood_Pellet_Feed_Hoppers_Tanks/


In case someone has more information on the issue let me know:

How large was the pellet storage in Offaly, m3, tonnes? Was it a DIY construction? Have similar cases been reported?

Thanks.

DGOBS

It is a relation of a very good friend of mine that it happened to it that case.

As I was told, the pellet stove wasn't operating correctly, due to damp pellets stuck in the auger, he climbed into the store to try do something with it, but didn't know there was smoldering pellets further down (I do not work on these so don't know much about them) CO filled the pellet store and he was overcome.

His wife found him, and tried to pull him out, only to be overcome herself, and was lucky a visitor arrived to the house and saved her life.

I can't 100% say how correct this all is, but this is how it was told to me.

heinbloed

Thanks, DGOBS.

The issue arises now on the EU continent, several cases of accidental death caused by CO poisoning had been reported after people entered pellet storages.
The phenomena is already known to the global pellet industry:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=search&term=18397907[uid]

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=search&term=15191943[uid]

http://www.toxi.ch/upload/pdf/Karlson_Stiber_Holzpellets.pdf


Installers and owners of pellet storages, frequently these are DIYers, seem to ignore the risk. CO not only occurs with an incomplete combustion in the boiler but as a natural process within the storage. With timber as well as with coal.

Hence my question if there was a report published by competent persons on the Offaly case. The reason - faulty boiler or natural decay of the pellets - should be investigated.

Whilest the HSA (http://www.hsa.ie/eng/Topics/Safety_Alerts/Wood_Pellet_Feed_Hoppers_Tanks/) is not specific in their report the chimney sweeps seem to have identified the CO source as the pellet silo (http://csai.ie/):

27-05-2011

The Irish Health and Safety Authority have asked us to draw your attention to a significant danger of gas poisoning from stored wood pellets following a fatal accident where a householder entered a pellet store

The German safety organisation TUeV recommends ventilated pellet storages. For existing ones in household size (up to 10 tonnes) which are not ventilated yet a new ventilated lid is recommended.


In case some detailed technical information on the Offaly case is published somewhere please let me know. Thanks.



Advise on pellet storage here:

http://www.depv.de/uploads/media/WoodPellets_storage_120322.pdf

DGOBS

I wasn't aware of any Tecnical report, or even the inquest outcome, but I will ask when I see him again

Should they not make a CO alarm in the vicinity a requirement for installation?

heinbloed

DGOBS asks:

Should they not make a CO alarm in the vicinity a requirement for installation?

The technical difficulty offering protection in a pellet storage with fluctuating volumes would ask for a mobile, fixed-to-the-man CO sensor/alarm. A personal protection kit.

Fixed alarms would be burried in the pellets and going off all the time. Fixed to the ceiling of the silo they would give insufficient protection. A 'carpet' of CO sitting on the pellets followed by a layer of air would then not raise the CO alarm. The layering of the gases caused by temperature differences between top and bottom of the silo.
This was the case in the industrial accidents (see links), a layer of CO and it's concentration increasing down the stairs lead to losses of lifes.

A permanent ventilation of the silo with our humidity levels might lead to an increased decay, rot of the pellets. And a cooling (energy loss!) of the garage, shed, boiler room.

DGOBS

Was looking a bit more into this as it's first I had heard of the pellets causing the CO
and found:

"In addition to the combustion hazards, wood pellets also undergo oxidation to produce carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide. In a closed space such as an unventilated ship’s hold, this can lead to a dangerous reduction in the oxygen concentration in the hold as well as the development of a dangerous concentration of carbon monoxide which is toxic (and flammable). In a recent case a carbon monoxide concentration of approximately 1% was measured in a sealed cargo hold of a ship containing wood pellets some 18 days after the cargo was loaded. The oxygen concentration at this time was less than 1%. Emission rates for carbon monoxide from wood pellets of 100 – 885 mg/ton/day have been reported in the literature."

WOW, is that 1% in atmosphere in the cargo hold, thats like 3 minutes to live!

link:
http://www.ukpandi.com/fileadmin/uploads/uk-pi/LP%20Documents/LP_Bulletins/Bulletin%20524.pdf

heinbloed

In 2010 the chief engineer of Europe's largest domestic pellet heating system died from CO after entering his silo.


http://www.solinger-tageblatt.de/Tragoedie-im-Pellets-Bunker-48c68170-e8d0-4661-a671-a12e89c2aad9-ds

(The building supplied with the pellet heating system in the background on the picture shown)

Google translate of the article here:



Tragedy in pellet hopper
REMSCHEID chief planner dies in his bunker heating. His colleague was just able to be revived in time.

Axel Richter

It was his heater, his project. He had let go of Europe's largest wood pellet heating in residential construction into operation. He was the lead engineer.

In the afternoon of yesterday, the 43-year-old man died from Wipperfurth in his bunker pellet heating system in Lennep. The odorless carbon monoxide gas had poisoned him. Him and his 52-year-old colleague from the Remscheid GEWAG housing cooperative. The Remscheid could reanimate the rescue workers of the fire department just in time. A helicopter flew the injured later in a special clinic for detoxification of the body. For the chief planner of Wipperfürth contrast, the help came too late.

How did it come to a tragic accident, according to the police, is not yet known. The fact is that the two men had left around noon for a tour of inspection. The level indicator showed an empty pellet hopper, in fact, he was bursting at the seams after two shipments of 150 tons. Investment of the 52-year-old then cried himself to the phone the emergency services.

The technical approval had nothing to complain about

While inside the system, the criminal investigation into its cause of accidents recorded, the board member Hans-Juergen GEWAG Behrendt was shaken. "It is inexplicable how come it was so." Only a week ago, the TÜV has tested the system and had no complaints.

Warned of the dangers of a wood pellet heating system in January 2009, the Swiss Toxicological Information Centre in Zurich: "The storage of wood pellets produced carbon monoxide, which is the lack of ventilation in a deadly danger. It is strongly cautioned not to enter without previous airing such container. "

DGOBS

It's a scary development, and both users and technicians should be made aware of it, but once again, or unregulated industry here falls down on this!

I don't work on pellet stoves myself, but always have my personal CO detector on either way (Eikon), which activates at 35ppm, every technician should have one

As talked about on a previous thread, have had it go off a few times where I wouldn't have thought it would!