Commercial ports – an exposed air environment
Port environments can be particularly exposed to air pollution, both in gaseous form and as particles. The ships are an obvious source, but both activities related to the unloading and loading of goods and land traffic to and from the ports can also contribute. Monitoring the concentration of air pollutants can be done both in order to monitor the environment in general and to map the sources. In the case of emissions from ships, it may be of particular interest to monitor sulfur dioxide (SO2) levels near the stacks to confirm that low-sulfur oil is being used or that desulfurisation is activated.
AN IDEAL PRINCIPLE FOR MONITORING IN PORTS
There can be many individual emission sources at ports. This means that traditional monitoring systems that analyse air at a certain point can easily show values that are either too high or too low to represent the overall air quality.
The OPSIS gas analysis system works differently. The monitoring takes place with the help of one or more light beams that are sent through the air and the reported concentrations are average values along the beams. Thanks to the non-contact technology, the light beams can also be sent close to the ship's stacks and thus any sulfur dioxide emissions can be detected from a distance, without direct access to the ship.
OPSIS also offers systems for particulate analysis, both in real time and with collection of particles on filters for precision measurement and for laboratory analysis of particle composition.
MONITORING OF AIR POLLUTION WITH OPSIS
There are multiple reasons for choosing OPSIS as supplier of systems for gas analysis. Among the key benefits of the methods and solutions offered by OPSIS are:
- a monitoring technology well suited for remote monitoring of SO2 emissions from ships
- high availability of data
- cost-effective, non-contact technology with open monitoring path
- representative data
- calibration of gas analysers only once a year
- low energy consumption
- long maintenance interval
- certified by German TÜV, U.S. EPA, and others.
