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This bonus episode is jam-packed with brilliant takeaways. Dan Bowen from DuPont explains the process of obtaining a National Fire Protection Agency (NFPA) garment certification and what each standard includes. For technical information on any of the garment classes covered in this episode, check out DuPont’s SafeSPEC™ website.
Complete Show Notes
Re-introduction to Dan Bowen
- Received his B.S. degree in from the Rochester Institute of Technology in 1984
- Currently a Technical Marketing Specialist for DuPont
- Has worked for DuPont since 1990 and has held positions in technical marketing, product management, sales and research and development across a variety of businesses
- Helps educate the safety industry on standards, hazards, and protective materials used to protect industrial workers and first responders against chemical and fire hazards
- Speaks extensively on these topics and utilizes the DuPont Thermo-Man demonstration unit to educate safety professionals and wearers on the performance characteristics of various industrial garment systems
2:05 What Are the Standards a Competent Hazmat Technician Needs to Know to Make a Good Decision?
- 3 main NFPA standards come into play when we talk about chemical protective apparel for first responders:
- NFPA 1991 – Standard on Vapor-Protective Ensembles for Hazardous Materials Emergencies and CBRN Terrorism Incidents
- Think Level A
- NFPA 1992 – Standard on Liquid Splash-Protective Ensembles and Clothing for Hazardous Materials Emergencies
- NFPA 1994 – Standard on Protective Ensembles for First Responders to Hazardous Materials and CBRN Terrorism Incidents
- Squarely focused not on the broad-spectrum hazmat space, but instead on CBRN incident response personnel
- NFPA 1991 – Standard on Vapor-Protective Ensembles for Hazardous Materials Emergencies and CBRN Terrorism Incidents
3:50 What Happened to NFPA 1993?
- NFPA 1993 – Standard on Support Function Protective Clothing for Hazardous Chemical Operations
- NFPA numbers are applied sequentially by the NFPA Commission and don’t indicate when they were created
- NFPA writes standards for a wide range of industries
- They keep up with developing technology, new materials, events that lead to new standards, etc. – when bad things happen in the world, NFPA standards committees are quick to respond (i.e. 9/11)
7:10 What Do We Need to Know About these Standards as Operators?
- You need to realize what these standards are – and what they’re not
- They’re fairly rigorous quality assurance tests that manufacturers have to pass to have their garments certified
- ASTM protocol test procedures ensure every independent lab performs testing the same way and certifies the results in the same way
- However, just because a garment has passed a standard doesn’t mean it can protect you from every single chemical you might encounter – there’s a finite level of chemicals they’ve tested for
- Use your best judgment and don’t assume you’re protected – remember that these standards and garments offer the minimum level of protection
- End users can contribute ideas for NFPA standards – committees welcome input from end users, so don’t hesitate to contact them if there are things you’d like to see improved
10:20 Are NFPA Standards Revised More Frequently than the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Is?
- Standards are sometimes revised and updated quickly and easily, but it can also take a long time if there are a lot of conflicting agendas
- Standards committees are made up of a wide range of people with expertise – industry, garment manufacturers, military personnel, government personnel, academic institutions, end users, fire departments, etc.
- The NFPA Committee’s goal is to revise standards on a 5-year cycle, but there’s no hard and fast rule – can be shorter if something significant has changed in the field or longer if it gets bogged down in discussion
- There has to be 75% consensus for any standard to be ratified
- No more than one-third of the interest groups listed above can be on the committee at any given time
15:45 NFPA 1991
- This is the Standard on Vapor-Protective Ensembles for Hazardous Materials Emergencies and CBRN Terrorism Incidents
- Includes permeation testing, which is a test that measures how much of a chemical is getting through a suit
- Tests for 21 toxic industrial chemicals and 6 chemical warfare agents
- Testing for toxic industrial chemicals lasts 1 hour – measures how much of a chemical gets into that suit during that 1 hour
- When you open a permeation guide or database, you see the number of minutes a particular fabric is rated against for a particular chemical – this is the number of minutes it takes for the chemical to be coming through the fabric at a rate of one-tenth of a microgram per square centimeter per minute
- It may take longer than 1 hour for the chemical to come through the fabric, but that doesn’t mean it’s not permeating – it’s just not coming through as fast as one-tenth of a microgram per square centimeter per minute
- In addition to breakthrough time, testing for chemical warfare agents includes cumulative dose measurements for each agent
- Once you reach a concentration of more than 1.25 micrograms of sarin or 1 microgram of mustard gas, the agent will start to permeate the suit
- Two optional certifications manufacturers can pass: liquefied gas escape option and flash fire escape option
- Liquefied gas escape – important because we come into contact with substances that can cause cryogenic damage to our skin or other materials
- Put into a freezer that has to -13 degrees Fahrenheit or colder and put into direct contact with a block of dry ice
- Sits on the dry ice for 15 minutes and then undergoes a flex test
- In a flex test, the material is flexed 100 times (horizontally and twisted) at a rate of 45 flexes per minute
- If a suit is certified for liquefied gas, it won’t crack when you’re working in very cold temperatures
- Abrasion test – abrade 25 cycles with a drum abrader with 600 grit sandpaper with 5 pounds worth of weight
23:55 NFPA 1992
- Standard on Liquid Splash-Protective Ensembles and Clothing for Hazardous Materials Emergencies
- Two variations of liquid splash-protective suits – hooded (SCBA on the outside) and encapsulated (SCBA on the inside)
- If the leak is above your armpits, you need to wear an encapsulated suit to keep your SCBA dry
- Undergoes an incredibly demanding liquid integrity test, but there’s no permeation testing – penetration only
- This means there’s no real chemical performance standard, which is troublesome if you’re dealing with anything other than dirty water
- Standards frequently come into play when grant money is involved, and NFPA 1992 in particular
29:00 NFPA 1994
- Standard on Protective Ensembles for First Responders to Hazardous Materials and CBRN Terrorism Incidents
- Developed and focused specifically on CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear) incidents
- Intended for people who have to work in a potentially contaminated environment, but don’t have to actually touch the hazard
- Man in simulant tested (MIST) – surrogate test for chemical warfare agents
- In this test, a human puts 30 pads on their body and wears the suit in a chamber filled with oil of wintergreen
- They drag a mannequin, walk, crawl, etc. to simulate what we do on hazmat runs
- Afterwards, the pads are tested to see whether the oil of wintergreen came through – it’s a surrogate for some of the chemical warfare agents
- Concentrations are less – permeation testing for NFPA 1994 is measured at 10-20 micrograms per square centimeter per minute
- Designed for an atmosphere where there are droplets of chemical warfare agents on the skin or the material – not as heavy-duty as NFPA 1991-tested garments
31:10 Updates to NFPA Standards for 2018
- NFPA 1991 flash fire escape option – all suits now have to be single skin
- Can’t use adhesive tape like duct or chem tape over a closure system to plug a leak to pass a test
- All zippers have to have flaps over them
- Must be able to get your hands in and out of gloves 5 times in 2.5 minutes
- Added a cumulative concentration (6 micrograms per square centimeter per hour) for toxic industrial chemicals – used to just be for chemical warfare agents
- Added 2 new chemicals to NFPA 1992 (now 9 total)
- Added new hazardous materials to the scope of NFPA 1994 testing to address new chemical warfare agents being used
- Radically expanded the range of options – there used to just be 3 classes of suits in NFPA 1994, but there are now 7 classes
- Also added concentration of material and range of shower tests to NFPA 1994 to accompany the new classes of suits
35:15 Contacting Dan
- Email: Dan Bowen
- Phone: (302) 559-8931
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