Methane monitoring

To handle the methane gas generated from the 42.5-acre site, an active interior gas collection system was installed as shown in Figure 11. The installation consisted of 42 recovery wells, a gas collection header system, condensate traps, blower station and a flare station. In addition, a methane monitoring system consisting of thirty-two 2-inch wells was installed around the site (U.S. EPA, 1987). 

Yagi K., Tsuruta H., Kanda K.-I., and Moinami K. (1996) Effect of water management on methane emission from a Japanese rice paddy field automated methane monitoring. Global Biogeochem. Cycles 10, 255—267. 

Methane monitor An electronic instrument often mounted on a piece of mining equipment, that detects and measures the methane content of mine air. 

According to the citation, this particular stopping line separated the No. 4 return from the longwall bleeders which contained the methane monitor (Childers et al., 1990, p. 50). Childers et al., 1990, p. 49. 

Finally, courts can overturn an inspector s decision if they believe that inspectors made unsupported judgments about the condition of equipment or monitoring devices. In NORT 76-114-P, an inspector observed a broken indicator light on a methane monitor but did not determine whether it was still operative. The inspector s notice was overturned. In PITT 75-398-P Rushton Mining Co. September 22, 1975, an inspector observed that the sensoring head of a methane monitor was covered with coal dust. The inspec-... 

In their physical investigation of the mine following the disaster, MSHA investigators had discovered a methane monitor covered with a greasy rag. This physical evidence constituted a clear violation of the Mine Act, but investigators needed to determine who had ordered the monitor to be covered and who had put it into practice. 

Q Did you ever have any problems with the methane monitor on your shift ... 

Have you ever seen a cloth or rag placed in the methane monitor snifferi No sir. 

Thus, it comes almost as a complete surprise when one miner, Donnie Mullins, explained very matter-of-factly why he put a water repellent rag on the methane monitor. According to Mullins, water mist from the spray on the continuous mining machine had caused the monitor to produce false readings that would shut down the mining machine. Mullins described how he tested the monitor after putting the oily rag on the sniffer. The detailed reasoning and honest enthusiasm in his testimony makes it obvious that others would have to have noticed the presence of the rag. ... 

The reason 1 put that rag in there, that spray there in that pan, when you cut down that water mist that cutter frame and, which they ain t that much can get in there in that, no big er hole than that was. I d say two, two and half inch diameter hole. But two or three drops on that sniffer will mess that methane monitor up. It cause it to, you know, to start reading. And just like I told them up there at West Virginia when 1 went up there and watched it, every test that they run on it. When he saturated that rag and screwed it back down on that sniffer, just as soon as that water hit it, that thing went to reading. And it. it d read back and forth and it d finally settled on eight (8) tenths percent. But the rag was oily, it was water repellent, you know. And like 1 said, when I put it in there, I went and got my bottle, I checked it, it read out, it gassed off. It read at nine (9) tenths. The low light come on at one point nine (1.9). It kicked the power out and it read to two point four (2.4). (pp. 28-29)... 

Most of the required science for most mining hazards is now well understood (with one or two notable exceptions, for example, rock bursts in deep hard rock mines). However, even when the science is known and the necessary control measures are fiiUy understood and documented for all to follow, the real control and the everyday rehability of risk management, hes in the hands of the people at the mine. If methane monitoring standards are not maintained, if effective dust control measures are not introduced, if PPE is not worn, if mles and procedures are not used, etc. then all the hard won knowledge which, theoretically, allows us to control risk will have been wasted. 

Concrete judgements those which have a standard measurement procedure and defined criterion values for action (for example, methane monitoring and ventilation etc.) ... 

Charleston, West Virginia (April2010). Twenty-nine miners were killed when methane gas and improperly managed coal dust ignited in the Massey Energy Company s Upper Big Branch mine. The company had previously been cited 17 times for lailure to maintain methane monitors in proper working order at the mine. Investigators also discovered that it had kept two sets of books—one set for MSHA inspectors that deleted critical information contained in another set prepared for company executives. ... 

For complexes with P-donor ligands, metallation often occurs in solution with elimination of an alkane and such reactions also occur in the solid state. For example, the solid state cyclometallation of [PtMe2 PMe2(l-naphthyl) 2l has been investigated. When heated to 200 C, the complex evolved methane (monitored by IR spectroscopy) and gave a product cyclometallated in the 8 (peri) position, containing a stable five-membered... 

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