Natural Sources of Airborne Molecular Contamination
When we think about the natural world, we often picture pure, uncontaminated beauty. We don’t think about gas-phase contamination that can affect people, processes, and products. Unfortunately, the natural world – even if it is completely untainted by pollution – still frequently produces chemicals that can have a negative effect on commercial and industrial facilities.
Sometimes, airborne molecular contamination (AMC) forms as a result of human-caused pollution – smog in the atmosphere, for example. Other times, there are natural sources of contamination that can affect your people, processes, and products. These include oceans and salt lakes, freshwater lakes and wetlands, and atmospheric interactions. Here’s what to look out for depending on where you work.
Oceans and Salt Lakes
Is there anything better than an ocean view? If you run a sensitive facility, the view isn’t what you should be worried about. The ocean contains huge amounts of both bacteria and phytoplankton, and their waste gases often contain sulfur. Dimethyl sulfoxide and dimethyl disulfide are both contaminants produced by oceanic life, and they can be highly corrosive in their pure forms – plus they can react in the atmosphere to form other gases.
In addition, the ocean produces salt spray, which is corrosive by itself, but can also form acidic gases such as hydrogen chloride or nitric acid. Salt lakes, such as Utah’s Great Salt Lake, can also produce the same corrosive emissions in high wind conditions.
Worldwide, almost 40% of the human population lives within 100 km (approximately 60 miles) from a coastal area. Incidentally, AMC from oceanic sources can also penetrate up to 100 km inland. Even if you don’t have oceanfront property, you still may need to be concerned with oceanic AMC.
Freshwater Lakes and Wetlands
Just because a nearby body of water isn’t salty, it still can emit contaminants that are bad for your facility. Lakes, rivers, swamps, and bogs can all emit varying amounts of hydrogen sulfide (H2S). This chemical is a major concern for data centers and microelectronics plants because it is highly reactive with copper.
When in the presence of copper, H2S forms tiny, whisker-like structures known as dendrites. Dendrites can cause short circuits if they accidentally bridge copper traces together, which is a serious issue given the compact circuitry found on electronic circuit boards. What’s more, H2S can also cause solder connections to deteriorate, creating intermittent contact problems with electronic components. This necessitates more frequent maintenance or equipment replacement.
Atmospheric Interactions
Every emission above takes place within our atmosphere, which can best be understood as a vast laboratory for interactions between sunlight, gases, particulates, and surfaces. Uncontrolled atmospheric chemical reactions can produce emissions that are worse than their constituents. Organic gases and nitrogen oxides can have negative impacts on their own, but they produce smog when mixed together, which can be very unhealthy and reactive.
Again, while some of these reactions are caused by atmospheric pollution, others are caused by naturally occurring chemicals. Even if you move your facility to a place that has never seen a smokestack, you still may find your products, processes, and employees affected.
Mitigating Natural Sources of AMC
It’s hard to get away from the atmosphere, but you can mitigate the way that it intrudes into your facility with AMC filtration. Using Entegris’ See it. Control it. approach we can detect the mixture of chemicals that affect your environment – from both natural and artificial sources – down to the parts-per-trillion level. Then, we’ll build custom filters with adsorbents specifically designed to target those contaminants. This results in a safer environment for your employees and better outcomes for your processes and equipment. The idea of an uncontaminated natural wilderness might be a myth, but you can still enjoy an uncontaminated facility!
Visit our Commercial Air Quality solutions page to learn more about how Entegris’ filtration approach can enable advanced technologies, products, and health standards.