Glass Fibre Dust, Itching & PPE

We get asked often enough about glass fibre making people itch that we thought it justified to create an article about it.

Anyone that’s ever-handled glass fibre loft insulation knows all too well it is pretty itchy stuff, whilst the glass fibres THS use (primarily E-Glass fibres) in its products are quite different to loft insulation. It is true of all glass fibres they can make you itch, but hopefully this article can help allay some general worries end users have about glass fibre.

It is important to start with the following:

Glass fibre is not classified as hazardous according to Regulation (EC) 1272/2008 as amended. REACH – Fibrous glass, continuous filament EC: 266/046-0, CAS: 65997/17-3

Nor is glass fibre classified as an irritant – although it might often feel like it should be.  Glass fibres are better characterised as a ‘nuisance fibre’.

The product most often in question is glass fibre needlemat, although woven glass, particularly texturised fibre products can also cause itching. Glass needlemat is by far the most fibrous product we supply, and the therefore the itchiest. 

Our experience with our own employees, and those of our customers generally follows a similar pattern, especially when handling glass fibre needlemat. There is an initial sensitivity to those handling glass fibre for the first time, but for most individuals a tolerance is acquired within a relatively short space of time – but this obviously is not the same for all. 

We manufacture using these E-glass fibres on site, and we have over the years seen the full range of individual’s different reactions to these products. A variety of control measures can be deployed to either lessen skin contact or reduce the amounts in the environment in the first place.

There are two main substances to consider when addressing control measures and PPE: fibres and dust.

Many questions relating to itching and general safety of these products are about the actual fibres, released from products as small strands and filaments. Dust is created through the chopping, cutting, mechanical abrasion and particularly crushing of glass fibre.

In the UK there are 2 measures of Workplace Exposure Limits (WEL) for Machine Made Mineral Fibres (MMMF), of which glass fibre is classified. In a recent dust survey of our weaving plant which weaves exclusively glass fibre, and does include several mechanically abrasive processes, such as winding, weaving, and cutting of glass fibres, levels of MMMF were found to be extremely low – it should be noted that these readings were taken without the running of any extraction. 

	Limit	Actual Readings at THS
WEL (8hr TWA reference period)	5mg/m3	0.2mg/m3
WEL (8hr TWA reference period)	2 fibres per ml	<0.01 fibres per ml

Of course every factory is different, and if there are concerns then dust surveys should be carried out, but we include these figures to give a reference point of a factory producing woven glass fabric. Other than those in the GRP industry where resin/glass fibre composites are subject to grinding/sanding etc. we think it would be incredibly difficult to get anywhere near the limits where PPE is mandatory.

Through visiting many of customer’s factories, in particular those customers using E-glass needlemat we have seen a variety of control measures used to try and limit exposure:-

-Extraction, lots of it.

-Disposable boiler suits, with hoods, elasticated cuffs and head openings.

-Disposable medical type gloves – nitrile etc – pulled over the arms of the suits

-Dust masks, to cover nose and face

-Advising employees to wash exposed areas of skin with COLD water – warm water can open the pores and cause any lodged fibres to penetrate further, causing more discomfort.

-Advising employees to change into clean clothes on site at the end of shifts + washing clothing with glass fibre contamination at home separately from their normal laundry.

The most effective measure in the end though is time, time for employees to adjust and build up a level of tolerance.

Author

Adam Charnock

Operations Director