DSS082: Combustible Dust Safety in Brazil and 2020 Conference Review with Monica Remonato

In this episode of the DustSafetyScience Podcast, we talk to Monica Remonato from Remonato Fire Protection Engineering in Curitiba, Paraná, South Brazil, about her experience with industries handling combustible dust in Brazil.

Monica has over 20 years’ experience as a fire protection engineer. She started out as a civil engineer and moved temporarily to the U.S. to learn more about fire protection. She returned to Brazil four years later and opened her own company because one of her U.S. customers bought a large operation there and needed someone who was fluent in Portuguese as well as the NFPA standards and FM Global guidance.

In recent years, Monica has been focusing on combustible dust safety in Brazil because the knowledge there is comparatively scarce. After attending the 2020 Digital Dust Safety Conference, she shared her new knowledge with others and applied the lessons learned to projects she has been working on.

In this interview, she answers the following questions:

What made you want to attend the Digital Dust Safety Conference?
How are you implementing fire and explosion safety solutions in your current projects?
How is this training being received?
Are there any other challenges that you see in your work?

What made you want to attend the digital dust safety conference?

“I needed to learn more,” Monica said. “We don’t have a lot of this information back in Brazil.”

When she worked with clients in Brazil, they would often ask her which supplier had the best product for a given application. When she realized that leading dust safety equipment suppliers would be presenting at the conference, she jumped at the opportunity to learn from them.

“I was so amazed at the knowledge that these guys shared,” she said. She also appreciated the fact that she could watch replays of all the presentations and interact with the presenters in the forums. If she had questions about the dust safety equipment that the suppliers sold, it was so easy to get the answers she needed to advise her clients.

How are you implementing fire and explosion safety solutions in your current projects?

Monica is currently working on large projects that involve multiple silos, dust collectors, and conveyors. She began one project in September 2019 and, after attending the conference, immediately started applying the lessons learned.

“The customer almost killed me after the conference, because I changed a lot of stuff,” she laughed. “When they asked me why, I could answer all their questions with what I learned from the conference.”

She said that there are problems with combustible dust awareness in Brazil. “Every time I talk about combustible dust and how to prevent it, it’s challenging. We need to educate the engineers, followed by their chief, and then the chief of the chief! It can take a long way to get the purchase order approved, but we keep going. We never give up.”

How is this training being received?

According to Monica, the standards in Brazil are basically a translation of NFPA 654 and NFPA 68. What makes education challenging is that people don’t want to read dense scientific texts.

To help them understand both the risks and the solutions, she shows them YouTube videos. This strategy is supported by Dr. Chris Bloore, who noted in Episode #40 that people don’t believe something until they see it. Live tests and videos can have an impact that texts alone can’t always achieve.

Monica said that she knows people in Brazil who want to learn about combustible dust, but the training needs to take a ‘baby steps’ approach that includes the fundamentals.

“When they better understand their risk, they’re going to look for more information and make an effort to learn English or at least Google translate the information. But they’ve got to have the kick-off. This is what happened to me. This is what happened to other engineers that I know too.”

Are there any other challenges that you see in your work?

Monica admitted that pricing is often an issue when buying dust safety equipment in Brazil.

“The taxes are really high. We don’t have a Brazilian industry that can make this spark detector or that fire suppression system. I don’t know why the taxes are so high. So this is the real challenge: the price.”

She expressed hope that as awareness increases, some vendors will start manufacturing in Brazil and, hopefully, make their equipment more affordable in that country.

Conclusion

When asked about her future plans, Monica confirmed that she would continue to try and improve safety in Brazilian industries handling combustible dust. “I will never stop studying and I will spread knowledge as much as I can. I understand the equipment options better and will continue to make the right recommendations in a way they understand.”

If you would like to discuss further, leave your thoughts in the comments section below. You can also reach Monica Remonato directly:

Email: [email protected]
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/m%C3%B4nica-remonato-fireprotection/

If you have questions about the contents of this or any other podcast episode, you can go to our ‘Questions from the Community’ page and submit a text message or video recording. We will then bring someone on to answer these questions in a future episode.