Gas Detection Updates

CoGDEM (UK) is the Council of Gas Detection and Environmental Monitoring, a trade association with a membership of over fifty companies involved in the gas detection industry. We are pleased to now have ILM/ETP (the publishers of this IET magazine) join us as an Associate Member, so we will place a regular column of news from the gas detection industry in IET magazine.

All gas detection equipment used anywhere in Europe needs to be CE marked to show that it complies with all the relevant EU Directives. One of these is the EMC Directive, ensuring that sensitive safety equipment is not affected by nearby sources of electromagnetic radiation, such as radio transmitters, noisy mains supplies or discharges of static electricity. Gas detection equipment needs to comply with a specific EMC standard EN 50270, and CoGDEM experts are now part of the European Working Group which is updating the 2006 edition of the standard. This ensures that as well as equipment being immune to the effects of electromagnetic radiation, gas detectors will not act as a source of interference themselves.

There is renewed interest within the UK of standards for the performance of carbon dioxide (CO₂) monitoring equipment. Over recent years, CoGDEM has been involved with the creation of two relevant standards for the performance and testing of handheld portable CO₂ detection instruments (BS 8494 and EN 50543), but it is now fixed equipment for permanent installation that is being discussed.  Within the catering industry, the ventilation systems in commercial kitchens have to be interlocked with the supply of piped gas which fuels the burners and ovens. Unless there is sufficient ventilation to protect the air supply of the kitchen workers, the cooking appliances cannot be turned on. In the past, monitoring the operation of the ventilation fans themselves or the flow of air in overhead canopies was the most usual technique, but it is now more prevalent to see CO₂ monitoring equipment performing this role. As the reliability and accuracy of the equipment will be directly linked to the safety of the workers, it is sensible that such equipment should comply with a relevant standard, so CoGDEM is currently involved in preliminary discussions to produce a relevant standard. This may well use similar performance requirements to those in the standards for portable equipment listed above.

During this year’s summer months there will be several campaigns running to alert the UK public as to the risk of carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning in their homes. Some of the campaigns are aimed at heating engineers, so that they can cascade messages down to the homeowners, tenants or landlords that they visit in the course of their work. There will be a couple of Gas Safety Weeks, one run by Gas Safe Register and focussing on the general public, and another run by the Gas Industry Safety Group. There will also be a motorhome attending festivals and outdoor shows, covered in CO safety messages, organised by the Dominic Rodgers Trust, in memory of a young boy who died from CO poisoning 9 years ago.