To prevent workplace accidents, drivers' health and attentiveness are essential. Therefore, it is crucial to control air quality, especially in mining regions. It is possible to measure air parameters to provide vital data for managing air quality and warning drivers and fleet management.
Typically truck drivers operate for long hours and at times in highly polluted environments like mines. Driver health and alertness while driving is key to avoid accidents at work site. Sometimes air quality deteriorates inside the cabin, and this could lead to driver fatigue. So come up with a solution that can detect air quality level inside the cabin, and at the same time alerting the driver as well as fleet management.
- The mercury used in mining causes a number of different health problems, including neurological disorders and kidney diseases. Besides mercury poisoning, people living around mines are polluted by lead, zinc and copper.
- The negative consequences of mining for human health include respiratory
complications such as pneumoconiosis, asbestosis, and silicosis caused by
inhaling fine particles from the large amounts of dust generated by mining
activities such as blasting and drilling.
Air flow simulation was carried out on ANSYS to study the air flow pattern inside the
cabin to determine the optimal location for placing the sensors to measure the pollutants
and to get accurate results.
The MQ-135 Gas Sensor can identify dangerous gases and smoke, including ammonia (NH3), sulphur (S), benzene (C6H6), and CO2. This sensor, like the others in the MQ series of gas sensors, has a pin for both digital and analogue output. The digital pin turns high when the amount of these gases in the air exceeds a predetermined threshold. The on-board potentiometer can be used to adjust this threshold value. An analogue voltage that is produced by the analogue output pin can be used to approximately determine the concentration of various gases in the atmosphere. The MQ135 air quality sensor module requires about 150mA and runs at 5V.
Until now, it has proven difficult to guarantee sufficient air quality inside the cabins of trucks used in mines. In order to detect the contaminants present inside the cabin of trucks operating in mining areas, an effort has been undertaken to develop an air monitoring system. The fleet management team and the driver can both receive alerts from the suggested device concerning the cabin's air condition. In order to analyse the air flow pattern inside the cabin and choose the best place for the sensors to monitor the pollutants, an air flow simulation was performed using the ANSYS software. According to the simulated air flow in the truck cabin, the air velocity inside the cabin rises to 1 m/s as the inlet velocity does. This displays the areas (blue region) where the air is moving at a velocity of around 0.06 m/s and the sensor can measure the pollutants accurately. Finally, it was agreed to install the sensor at some height and stay away from places where external sources could significantly affect the air quality. Since the sensor's response time is 1 sec, we decided to position the device where air flow velocity is almost at 0 or in a state of near stagnation.
