Off-gas Analysis 1

[Engineer6512]

I have a solid petroleum compound being handled in a process building and would like to determine what gases are being "off-gased" from it and at what rates - purpose of which is to supply adequate ventilation. Can anyone tell me the type of chemical analysis I am looking for? And possibly recommend a lab that can perform this analysis for me?

 

[pmover]

well, let me think about this for a moment . . .

no, simply because insufficient information has been provided. what is the solid petroleum compound? what process occurs to solid such that off-gases are released and released to? lab? can't answer that matter either.

should you want an answer, more information would be helpful.

good luck!
-pmover

 

[dcasto]

A piece of solid material Could be given to a lab. They could heat the material in hot water to 120 F, so I'd send it to them on ice. They could place it in a bag and pull a vacuum on it. They could run the gases through an extended analysis GPA 2177 and 2186. If they got a larger piece I suppose they could put the chunk in a bag (cold and pull a vacuum on it) then heat the sample up and measure the volume that the bag expands.

 

[Engineer6512]

Thanks for the replies. Following is some more detailed information.

The solid is bitumen ore (aka tar sand) from a mining operation. The tar sand is being transported inside of closed buildings via open conveyor belts, and there will be odour and fume generation from the material as a result. I want to determine exactly what chemical components this ore is off-gasing into (so that I can reference published TLVs) and also their generation rates (so that I can properly determine a ventilation rate to maintain concentrations below the TLVs).

Does this help?

Thanks.

 

[pipehead]

I've seen vacuum samples pulled from spills of hydrocarbons on the ground and taken to the lab to analzye for BETX.

 

[JimCasey]

To answer you question specifically,
1. Take a sample and run it through a Gas Chromatograph. It'll separate out the butanes, propanes, methanes, octanes......and give you relative concentrations.
a. There are LAB GCs that process a sample at a time.
b. Process GCs suck a stream of sample out of the stuff going by the probe, so you'll know if concentration changes in near real-time.

To address your actual need, if what you really want to know is whether you are accumulating explosive vapors, stick a bunch of flammable gas monitors in the buildings....Floor mount for heavier-than air fractions, and rafter-mount for Lighter fractions.

 

[Engineer6512]

Thanks for the reply JimCasey. That's exactly the information I was looking for and the way that I will proceed.