At Shu Powders Africa, our core principles are built around maintaining a safe and sustainable working environment. One of the greatest challenges we’ve faced in providing such an environment is cobalt dust exposure, which impacts not only our operations but the entire sector in which we operate.
Instead of being weighed down by the challenge, we seized it as an opportunity to create an innovative new approach to the Cobalt industry.
In this blog, we share our journey to combat Cobalt dust in our Cobalt powder plant through continuous innovation and engineering.
Using insight management to minimize conformances
The key component of our strategy for dealing with dust management has been the investigation of Cobalt in the urine non-conformance. When we registered 16 non-conformances in 2013, we immediately started implementing new processes and set to work improving existing ones. This marked the launch of a proactive plan that has helped us achieve zero non-conformance 3 years in a row.
Daily dust monitoring and digital data collection in Shu’s Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system.
The advent of a much tougher non-conformance limitation standard, which was at least three times more rigorous than the earlier standard, proved particularly prudent. This alteration, compacted with the employment of new workers who were adequately trained but were unfamiliar with dust management and hygiene regulations, introduced new obstacles.
In 2024, however, we once again achieved the goal we had set and cut non-conformance levels to 7 cases. This is based on the new standard that investigates processes on a far more granular level than the previous standard where Shu Powders had achieved zero non-conformances.
Even though this represents significant progress and stellar conformance, Shu Powders continues to refine its processes to lower non-conformance even further.
Engineering solutions: Tackling dust at the source
Proactive engineering processes support the foundation of our dust reduction strategy. Over the years, we’ve implemented several key solutions to tackle Cobalt dust at its source:
2017: Automated furnace feeding and automated packing machines were introduced to reduce the dust emissions resulting from the manipulation operations.
2019/20: The first two phases of the pneumatic powder conveying system were implemented:
Phase 1: Connecting the thermal reduction to the deagglomeration process step
Phase 2: Connecting the deagglomeration to the homogenizing step
Phase 1: Pneumatic powder conveying
Phase 2: No more trolleys to transport powder between processing steps
2024/25: Last year saw the launch of Phase 3, which will link the homogenizing step with the granulation step as well as the packaging step. This ultimately concludes a complete dust containment system.
Not only do these solutions decrease dust exposure for employees, they also increase operational effectiveness by providing a cleaner and safer manufacturing environment.
Beyond Engineering: Comprehensive Dust Management
Although engineering processes are at the core of our solutions, we know that controlling Cobalt dust calls for a multi-pronged, practical, and hands-on strategy. Here are some of the additional measures we’ve taken:
Industrial Plant Cleanup: An outsourced company was appointed to carry out high level cleaning of the factory in April 2024. The purpose of the high-level cleanup was to remove any historical dust from surfaces that cannot be cleaned using traditional cleaning methods. This included light fittings, ceilings, dust collectors, and most plant machinery. The thorough cleaning of the plant ensured that all residual dust was removed, preventing future accumulation and exposure.
Employee Training: Training sessions covered essential safety and protocols, including proper mask usage and maintenance, education on the risks associated with Cobalt dust, and Proactive Job Observations (PJOs) and APEX external audits for real-time detection and resolution of risks.
Ongoing Initiatives: To ensure these efforts have the greatest impact possible, we are constantly exploring new methods and technologies to enhance our dust management strategy.
A Safer Future
The pursuit of reducing exposure to Cobalt dust is an ongoing one, and we are firmly committed to Zero Harm. Using a combination of engineering, detailed standard operating procedures, strict surveillance, and thorough employee training, Shu Powders Africa is establishing the standard for dust control in the Cobalt manufacturing sector.
We are proud of what we’ve achieved and the work we’ve done, but we know there’s still hard work ahead if we want to maintain the safety of our environments. But together with our dedicated team, we know we’re building a safer, cleaner future for everyone involved.
