14 replies to this topic

[Dian Yodana]

Hi everyone,

 

Does anyone here have experience with flour in woven sacks? How do you package flour to prevent dust?

 

If the woven sacks are sewn with inner plastic bags, sometimes during storage (stacking on pallets) the inner plastic bags are damaged/broken, and the flour becomes dusty. How do you prevent this dust?

 

Could you share your experience?

 

Thank you.

 

[MDaleDDF]

I work with flour based products.   Simple answer:   Lots of cleaning.

[jcieslowski]

Not flour, but I worked with raw and processed sugars.  They were also quite messy.  Answer was, as previously suggested, lots of cleaning.

 

I'd just like to remind that small powder is a HUGE fire risk (even explosion risk depending on confinement) so please put extra efforts into ensuring your cleaning procedures are cleaning even hard to reach spaces and that accumulations of flour on horizontal surfaces is removed frequently and kept to a minimum.

[MDaleDDF]

I'd just like to remind that small powder is a HUGE fire risk (even explosion risk depending on confinement) so please put extra efforts into ensuring your cleaning procedures are cleaning even hard to reach spaces and that accumulations of flour on horizontal surfaces is removed frequently and kept to a minimum.

Meh...... it is in certain conditions, but little bits like this on warehouse shelves, etc, it's not.   It has to be airborne just right, so in silos, dust collection systems, etc, yeah it is, and can cause quite an explosion.   But not in an example like this.   It has to be airborne in particles.   If you dump a bag of flour on the flour and hit the pile with a blowtorch, nothing will happen.   Also, it's not flour, it's dust so it can happen with corn, grains, etc.   The best example video on youtube is actually a corn silo explosion.  But there are plenty of videos on there showing what flour will do when under the right circumstances!

 

There was a flour complex in Hillsdale MI that blew up when I was a kid from that tho!   Silo explosion.

Edited by MDaleDDF, 02 February 2026 - 02:29 PM.

[jcieslowski]

I've got to be honest MDaleDDF, I'm not sure why you're downplaying the fire risk.   There are, on average, 28 dust explosions or fires annually.  If someone is new to safety, I think that it's something worth mentioning.   You downplay "an example like this" but Dian doesn't mention anything about current cleaning methods so we can't really know what level of dust is in their plant.   Better safe than sorry.

[MDaleDDF]

I appreciate your honesty.   Yes, dust explosions happen.  I didn't mean to downplay it.   I just meant by the measuring stick given by the op, flour explosion was not a concern.   Perhaps in other parts of their plant it is, but flour leaking out a tiny bit like that isn't a dust explosion/fire risk.   Nowhere does the op state they're "new to safety", and they're working around flour based product, so I must assume they are informed about dust explosions.   Dust explosion issue quite simply, was not the Op's question, so I guess that's why I kind of sluffed it off....

[Dian Yodana]

Dear All,

 

Thank you for your suggestion. What I talking about dust during the storage. So it is small dust, not in silo.

And thank you all for your concern.

[GMO]

Extraction systems and opening methods are both worth looking at. The chemist in me is going to baulk at the description of it being an explosion because strictly speaking, explosions are from branching chemical effects rather than the high surface area in contact with oxygen. As my chemistry lecturer used to say though "a flour explosion is actually a fast burn but you wouldn't really care if you were running away from it."

 

Can you get a more robust liner to these bags as there will also be a plastic / foreign matter risk if you don't? And thinking about it, if flour dust can get out when these bags get damaged, SPIs can get in.

 

Also is it worth considering a silo which reduces the risks? After all it's not just the "explosion" risk but also risk to stored product insects feeding on the dust and also your staff. There is a condition called "baker's lung" which is a form of occupational asthma caused by repetitive inhalation of flour. By buying in silo or at least large pallecon bag quantities, you will reduce exposure of your staff, reduce fire risk and reduce pest risk. All while also saving on labour and costs of installing extraction equipment and PPE. So worth thinking about.

Edited by GMO, Yesterday, 09:59 AM.

[SHQuality]

Meh...... it is in certain conditions, but little bits like this on warehouse shelves, etc, it's not.   It has to be airborne just right, so in silos, dust collection systems, etc, yeah it is, and can cause quite an explosion.   But not in an example like this.   It has to be airborne in particles.

Sure, it may not be a fire or explosion hazard in those cases, but product on shelfs and floors show a lack of hygiene that risks the attraction of pests which opens an entirely different can of worms.

[MDaleDDF]

Sure, it may not be a fire or explosion hazard in those cases, but product on shelfs and floors show a lack of hygiene that risks the attraction of pests which opens an entirely different can of worms.

For sure, flour bugs is the no 1 thing you're fighting when you're fighting dust in a flour based facility.   (I didn't deep dive on dust explosions, bugs, etc, as the op works in a flour based facility, I'm sure they are keenly aware, so I didn't want to point out the obvious.)   I have over 20 years in a flour based facility, so I've seen pretty much every hurdle there is specific to them.

Like any facility, each present their own unique issues.  Sanitation is the answer to the op's question.   Really good sanitation.    Just like any other food manufacturer, just specialized to specific needs.   The op's question was how to prevent the dust:   

 

The reality is you probably can't 100% without going past cost effective.   No matter what you do in a flour based facility, it gets everywhere and penetrates the smallest cracks and crevices in your building.   So cleaning it up every day is the best answer imho.    But it all depends on unknown factors, and only the op has the info needed to make that decision.   Op says bags are being ripped open.   If the bags are being ripped open because a fork truck pokes them, a thicker bag won't help, etc.  Kind of an example of what's termed a 'wicked problem'.   

 

So clean it up well, move on...  just my opinion.  Yours may vary.   

[GMO]

The reality is you probably can't 100% without going past cost effective.   No matter what you do in a flour based facility, it gets everywhere and penetrates the smallest cracks and crevices in your building.   So cleaning it up every day is the best answer imho.    But it all depends on unknown factors, and only the op has the info needed to make that decision.   Op says bags are being ripped open.   If the bags are being ripped open because a fork truck pokes them, a thicker bag won't help, etc.  Kind of an example of what's termed a 'wicked problem'.   

 

So clean it up well, move on...  just my opinion.  Yours may vary.   

 

Have to admit I wasn't considering forklift damage but even then, it's a long time since I've seen bag and box damage from forklifts. A combination of better environments and forklift truck sensors and automated reporting systems for if there was damage etc I suspect rather than some massive cultural improvement (call me cynical). Although I've seen plenty of damaged posts and racks. Perhaps they've just been placed better nowadays so they get damaged rather than the ingredient?

 

Sorry, my assumption when suggesting thicker liners was that they were so fragile as to resulting in damage just from movement not a fork sticking in it. Sorry if my idea was stupid.

Edited by GMO, Yesterday, 10:37 PM.

[SHQuality]

You can prevent much dust-related issues by shielding production lines, but if the packaging allows dust formation when the product is stored or moved, there's really no way to prevent it other than switching supplier or packaging material.

 

Sorry, my assumption when suggesting thicker liners was that they were so fragile as to resulting in damage just from movement not a fork sticking in it. Sorry if my idea was stupid.

 

It sounds like a reasonable option to me.

[MDaleDDF]

Have to admit I wasn't considering forklift damage but even then, it's a long time since I've seen bag and box damage from forklifts. A combination of better environments and forklift truck sensors and automated reporting systems for if there was damage etc I suspect rather than some massive cultural improvement (call me cynical). Although I've seen plenty of damaged posts and racks. Perhaps they've just been placed better nowadays so they get damaged rather than the ingredient?

 

Sorry, my assumption when suggesting thicker liners was that they were so fragile as to resulting in damage just from movement not a fork sticking in it. Sorry if my idea was stupid.

Not stupid at all.   If the premise is indeed that the bags are ripping simply from moving them around I agree 100%.   Perhaps even a different kind of liner if that's the case?   Again, only the op knows the specifics, so it's hard to know exactly what they need to do in order to fix the problem of ripping bags.

 

The shielding product lines is good too, yup, we have curtains around everything, rooms separated as much as possible, but flour dust will still find it's way out.   

 

Hell, even with an awesome dust collection system we find flour dust up in the front office which is multiple rooms and glass doors and hallways away from production, so we have to clean it every week.   Even up above the ceiling of my lab!   We have to send a fella up there and vac every couple weeks just to keep that totally clean, and the only way it can get in there is to get between the ceiling tiles!   Lol.   It's just part and parcel of the biz.   Flour goes everywhere, no matter what you do.   Just gotta stay after it constantly.  My sanitation crew rocks.   Usually.

[GMO]

Ah I've never worked in milling I have in bakery though both bread and biscuits, wafers etc. Never found it got that bad. Perhaps we were just really good at cleaning it or the extraction worked better than I thought. Now I'm thinking though the flour mills I've audited had a REALLY good clean up before I arrived! 

[MDaleDDF]

Ah I've never worked in milling I have in bakery though both bread and biscuits, wafers etc. Never found it got that bad. Perhaps we were just really good at cleaning it or the extraction worked better than I thought. Now I'm thinking though the flour mills I've audited had a REALLY good clean up before I arrived! 

Yeah, I'm not in milling but dry blending.   The mills I've been to are also incredibly clean, agreed.   The last one I was in was insane, tubes runnin' everywhere!   Little notes written on the tubes in sharpie marker.   I asked the guy walking me through how they could remember where all the tubes went and he said "I have no idea, that guy knows" and pointed at some guy in a hard hat, who just smiled, lol.   

 

I would imagine you'd think my plant extremely clean too, every auditor that's been thru does.   I've walked thru plenty of facilities that produce multiple things, and I'd say ours is one of the cleanest I've ever been in.    But there's always that dust... 

Ever seen that movie the Beach with Leo Decaprio?   There's a cook that just can't get the smell of fish off his hands no matter how hard he scrubs?    That's us and flour.    No matter how much we clean, more flour....   But just light coatings on stuff, it's not like everything is coated in flour.   

 

Still, that little bit is where bugs will come from, so gotta be after it constantly.