Protection performance evaluation of the respirators and personal exposure measurement in a Belgian viscose rayon factory

This paper presents the evaluation results of protective performance of the respirators (full face supplied-fresh air respirators and half-mask active charcoal filter) and personal exposure measurement (Infacepiece sampling) in a Belgian viscose rayon factory. With in-facepiece sampling technique and personal sampling method, we measured the CS₂ concentrations inside and outside of the different respirators. We found two kinds of the respirators have significant effect on decreasing the CS₂ exposure level for the subject, especially for the spinners. Full face supplied-fresh air respirator have good protective effect for the spinners and have limit protection for the high exposure job although the PF value is more than 10. It still need to improve more. In-facepiece sampling for all the subjects exposed to CS₂ in the factory found most subjects have exposed to low CS₂ concentration, most exposure levels were under the control range, but sulfuror are high exposure, the exposure level is higher than ACGIH TLV value. Supported by the Belgian Science Research Office, (DWTC, Belgium) under contact number ST/02/034 Tan Xiaodong: born in 1963, Associate professor, Medical doctor and Master of Public Health