One question we often get is, “How do you handle all the dust when recycling?” To that, we usually joke, “What dust?”

But seriously, there is a lot of dust involved in recycling materials.

The daily dust you deal with while chopping gets collected by the dust collector or bag house. However, the real issue comes from the lighter dust that escapes into the environment—fibrous dust that floats around unnoticed but accumulates on surfaces over time. If you are not careful, you will eventually walk in and see how dirty everything in your facility has become.

To address this, we try to install a dust collection drop at every exit point where dust could escape. Additionally, we use a man lift and blowers to clean the rafters once a month. Some companies use fans that constantly blow the dust down from the rafters. This is especially important if you are chopping aluminum, as aluminum dust is highly explosive. While copper dust is heavier and tends to settle on the floor, it is still essential to keep a clean environment for the safety and well-being of your employees.

Dust control involves more than just dust collectors. We also have a large bag house dust collector, and maintaining it is a big task. You can check out a video we did on it here for more details.

Now, dealing with battery dust, particularly from lithium-ion batteries, is a whole different challenge. This dust is incredibly light and gets into everything. It is crucial to have a system under negative pressure to manage this dust effectively. In our battery systems, we even pressurize the electrical cabinets to keep the dust out. If you open a cabinet under pressure, you will feel air pushing out, ensuring that no dust can get in. This is vital because even though battery dust (black mass) is not as conductive as copper dust, it can still cause shorts and equipment failures.

For battery processing, it is also important to avoid using cartridge dust collectors. Cartridge filters do not work well with the fine, fibrous materials from wire chopping or batteries. The fibers clog up the pleats in the filter, and even with advanced blowback systems, the filters can get clogged over time. Instead, bag or sock-style filters work much better for collecting these fine particles.

We hope this helps answer your questions on dust collection in recycling settings! Please contact us with any questions or comments you have.