SOP for Formaldehyde Emissions Sampling

SOP for formaldehyde emissions sampling

List of what to take with you:

· Bascom-turner gas analyzer with its instruction book

· Nitrile gloves

· Hard hats, FRCs, H2S monitors, steel toes, and safety glasses for each person

· DNPH cartridges. Keep them cool before and after sampling if you can

· GPS and knowledge of where you are going

· The whole setup for the trailer, including Fox flow meters

· Flow tubes (I mean the 2” and 3” pipes)

· Pipe wrenches and pipe dope

· Extra tubing and stainless and Teflon fittings, at least until the sampling becomes routine so you are reasonably sure you won’t have a big fail that requires repairs

· 3 generators

· extension cord

· full gas can

· garbage bags for garbage

· canned air for blowing off delicate things that get dirty

· plenty of permanent markers

· box of rags to wipe stuff off

· rope to hoist sample lines and stuff around with

· Duct tape

· Giant Teflon bags

· Full tank of UHP nitrogen

General to-dos at each well:

· Wear full PPE

· Wear clean, new nitrile gloves when you handle the DNPH cartridges.

· Keep the ends of the sample lines clean.

· Unless you have a reason to do otherwise, all samples should be 30 minutes in length

· At each well, collect one field blank, one calibration span sample, and one calibration zero sample

· At each well, collect 2 samples from each glycol dehydrator (if it has one), 2 samples from each tank that is actively being used, and 1-2 bag samples of a leak or a pump or valve.

o If sampling the tank thief hatch, do 1 sample with the hatch closed and two with it propped open.

o If your sample tube on a tank is downsteam of an Enardo or other pressure relief valve, talk to Seth when you sample and make a plan for how long to sample.

· If the well has a methanol injection pump, try to bag and sample the whole pump and methanol valve assembly attached to it.

Step-by-step

When you arrive on site:

Arrive on site, Put on hard hat, steel toes, FRC clothing as outermost layer, safety glasses, and H2S monitor.
Connect everything to and in the trailer, start up generators, etc.
Plug in heated lines and make sure they equilibrate to 50 C
Turn on 12V power switch on the wall to the right of the methane analyzer.
Turn on the computer and Loggernet. Connect to the Formaldehyde Campbell data logger. Check that variables are all looking okay.
Turn on the KNF explosion-proof pump
Do a leak check on both lines. Plug them at the ends of the 80 ft line and wait until MFC1 and MFC2 flows on the Campbell Connect Screen’s public table says less than 0.75. Fix the leak if you need to.
Start a new entry in the logbook. Write the date and time and your initials and what location you are at, and fill out other information as the logbook tables require.

If you are going to sample exhaust from a tank or dehydrator through a 3” or 2” flow tube

Connect the flow tube to the exhaust pipe of the tank or dehydrator
Connect the heated line and the Fox flow meter to the flow tube (you can do this before you connect the flow tube to the equipment exhaust if it works better)
For the Fox flow meter, insert its probe as far as it will go into the pipe, and then after it bottoms out, pull it back 0.8 inches off of the bottom of the pipe.
Turn on the power to the Fox flow meter, and check that its flow rate and temperature are working and make sense and are showing up on the Loggernet Connect screen.
Write the pipe diameter in the logbook, and write everything else the logbook asks for
With a DNPH cartridge used as a plug installed, plug in the green MFC. Allow gas to be pulled through the sample line for 5-10 minutes.
After 5-10 minutes of sample line flow, unplug Green MFC.
Go on to Step 38.

If you are going to sample a leak with a bag

Cut a bag out of the big Teflon bags we have
Wrap the bag around the thing to be sampled. As you wrap it, wrap the end of the N2 line and the heated line in place so their ends are in the bag. Seal it as well as you can. Make sure you use heated line 1 for bag sampling, because it is the one with the O2 sensor and tee for the Bascom Turner combustible gas analyzer.
Plug in the Alicat on the Formaldehyde instrument board, and turn on the N2. Make sure the Alicat says 10 lpm.
Plug in the green MFC for Line 1, with a plug DNPH cartridge installed and let air flow through the sample line
Watch the O2 sensor and make sure it drops. It doesn’t have to drop to zero, but it should drop below 10%. If it doesn’t, it probably means your bag doesn’t have a good enough seal. Wait for the O2 reading to stabilize before moving on to the next step. This should take 5-15 minutes.
Calibrate the Bascom-Turner gas detector and install it at the tee before the O2 sensor. Make sure it is giving reasonable readings, and make sure the O2 sensor reading doesn’t increase after the Bascom Turner detector is installed.
Record the reading on the Bascom Turner analyzer once every 2-4 minutes during sampling.
Go on to Step 38

If you are doing a calibration span sample

Plug in the power to the calibration Alicats and the two Teflon valves with yellow wires.
Open the calibration gas cylinder
Set the flow on the calibration Alicats if needed. They will retain the last flow setting given them, so you probably don’t need to do any adjustments.
Verify that the flows on the alicats are what you expect (i.e., the flow should equal the set flow). The “F” Alicat is the one that gives flow of cal gas. The “G” alicat is not used. The total flow of both alicats should be at least 2.0 lpm.
With a DNPH cartridge used as a plug installed on Line 2 (this is the line with the calibration gas capability), plug in the green MFC 2. Allow cal gas to flow and be pulled through the sample line for 5-10 minutes.
After 5-10 minutes of cal gas flow and sample line flow, unplug Green MFC 2.
Go on to Step 38

If you are doing a calibration zero sample

Plug in the power to the calibration Alicat that does zero air. Don’t plug in the two Teflon valves with yellow wires.
Don’t open the calibration gas cylinder
Set the flow on the calibration Alicat that does zero air if needed. It will retain the last flow setting given it, so you probably don’t need to do any adjustments.
Verify that the flow on the alicat is what you expect (i.e., the flow should equal the set flow). The flow should be at least 2.0 lpm.
With a DNPH cartridge used as a plug installed on Line 2 (this is the line with the calibration gas capability), plug in the green MFC 2. Allow cal gas to flow and be pulled through the sample line for 5-10 minutes.
After 5-10 minutes of cal gas flow and sample line flow, unplug Green MFC 2.
Go on to step 38

Regardless of whether you are doing flow tube or calibration or bag sampling

Unplug the green MFC that corresponds to the line you are sampling on.
Install a new DNPH cartridge in the line or lines you want to sample.
Give the cartridge a sample name and label it’s bag with that name.
Turn on the MFC for the DNPH cartridge you just installed, and plug the line downstream of the DNPH cartridge and wait until the MFC flow on the Loggernet Connect screen drops to less than 0.5. Then fully connect the DNPH cartridge into the sample line.
Write the time you connect the DNPH cartridge in the logbook. If you are doing a sample run with the Fox flow meter, also record the total flow at the time you connect the cartridge.
Record which line you are using in the logbook, along with anything else the logbook asks for.
After you are done sampling, unplug the green MFC and remove the DNPH cartridge.

At the end of the sampling day

Make sure every applicable part of the logbook is filled out.
Make sure all the DNPH samples are accounted for and labeled in a clear way.
Download the data from the Campbell, rename it with today’s date, and store it on BoxSync.
Make sure the logbook is saved on Boxsync.
Take everything down and pack up and leave