Arc Flash & Electrical Safety News

Thursday, January 14, 2010

Using Ultrasound To Prevent Electrical Failures

An article by Mark Goodman, UE Systems, Inc., showing how ultrasound can be used to detect electrical failures, appears in Reliable Plant Magazine. It describes how portable instruments can detect potential failures and reveal arc flash conditions -- allowing the arc flash to be prevented.

The article opens by describing how this is possible:

"Arcing, tracking and corona emissions produce ionization. Ionization, a process by which a neutral atom or molecule loses or gains electrons, thereby acquiring a net charge and becoming an ion, occurs as the result of the dissociation of the atoms of a molecule in solution or of a gas in an electric field. Ionization has by-products: ozone and nitrogen oxides. These combine with moisture to produce nitric acid, which is destructive to most dialectics and certain metallic compositions, resulting in corrosion. Airborne/structure borne ultrasound technology is ideally suited for detecting these emissions since the ionization process produces ultrasound."

You can find out how this works and read the entire article in Reliable Plant Magazine.

Labels: Arc Flash, Electrical Safety, Preventing Arc Flash Accidents