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LEV testing - food and drink
Food and drink production looks clean and wholesome, but the processes throw genuine airborne hazards into the air: flour dust that can sensitise lungs, steam that carries heat and moisture, and cooking fumes from frying and roasting. These are real exposures that need controlling at source - which is where LEV, and the testing that keeps it honest, come in.
The short answer
Food and drink production generates several airborne hazards that need controlling. Flour and other food dusts are respiratory sensitisers - flour dust has a workplace exposure limit of 10 mg/m3 and can cause occupational asthma, one of the most common forms. Steam from cooking and cleaning carries heat and moisture that need extracting. Cooking fumes from frying, grilling and roasting at production scale carry particulate and irritants. LEV captures these at source, and a thorough examination and test confirms the LEV is actually controlling them - because a food process that looks clean can still be exposing workers to hazards they cannot see.
Clean-looking, but not hazard-free
Food and drink production carries a clean, wholesome image - bright rooms, stainless steel, wash-down surfaces. But the image can hide genuine airborne hazards. The processes that make food generate dust, steam and fumes, and those are real exposures for the people working in them, whatever the setting looks like. A spotless production hall can still have air carrying flour dust or cooking fume that workers breathe shift after shift. The cleanliness of the surfaces says nothing about the cleanliness of the air.
This matters because the health effects are real. Some food dusts are among the more significant occupational respiratory hazards precisely because they are so common and so easy to overlook. The wholesomeness of food work can lull a business into treating the air as a non-issue, when in fact several of the routine processes need genuine control. Recognising that food and drink production is not automatically hazard-free - that flour, steam and fume are real exposures - is the starting point for controlling them properly, which is what LEV is for.
Flour and food dust
Flour dust is the headline hazard in much food production, and it is a serious one. Flour is a respiratory sensitiser - repeated exposure can cause the airways to become sensitised, leading to occupational asthma, which is among the most common forms of the disease. It has a workplace exposure limit of 10 mg/m3, carrying the notation that marks it as a sensitiser, and the aim is to keep exposure as far below that as is reasonably practicable, because for a sensitiser there is no wholly safe level once someone is sensitised. Other food dusts - spices, additives, grain - carry their own risks.
The processes that release flour dust are routine in bakeries and food factories: tipping and sieving flour, dough mixing, dusting, and cleaning up spills. Each of these puts fine flour into the air, where it can be breathed. LEV controls this by capturing the dust at the point it is released - at the tipping point, over the mixer, at the sieve - so it is drawn away before it reaches the worker's breathing zone. Because flour dust is a sensitiser and the control target is low, the LEV has to be genuinely effective, not just present - which is exactly what a test verifies.
Steam and cooking fumes
Beyond dust, food and drink production generates steam and cooking fumes. Steam from cooking vessels, ovens, cleaning and washing carries heat and moisture into the air, and while steam itself is water, large volumes of it create an uncomfortable and sometimes hazardous environment - condensation, slip risks, heat stress - that needs extracting to keep the workplace tolerable and safe. Ventilation and extraction handle steam, drawing it away from where it is generated so it does not fill the space.
Cooking fumes are the other exposure. Frying, grilling and roasting at production scale generate cooking fume - a mixture of fine particulate, vapours and irritants driven off by heat, similar in nature to the fume that commercial kitchen extraction handles but often at greater volume in a production setting. This fume is a genuine respiratory exposure for workers over it all day, and it needs capturing at source over the cooking equipment. So a food production operation may need extraction handling several distinct things - dust at the dry-ingredient end, steam and fume at the cooking end - each captured where it arises.
Why testing matters here
Because these are real hazards with real health effects, the LEV controlling them has to actually work - and that is what a thorough examination and test confirms. For flour dust in particular, where the substance is a sensitiser and the exposure target is low, it is not enough for extraction to be present and running; it has to be capturing the dust effectively enough to keep exposure well controlled. The test measures the airflow and capture velocity at the hoods and confirms the system is achieving that, rather than merely appearing to.
The clean image of food production can work against this, because it is easy to assume that a spotless operation must have clean air too - so the extraction is trusted without being verified. But the surfaces being clean tells you nothing about whether the flour dust is being captured or the cooking fume drawn away effectively. The test cuts through the assumption with measurement: it establishes whether the LEV is genuinely controlling the airborne hazards or whether workers are being exposed despite the wholesome setting. In a sector where the hazards are easy to overlook precisely because the environment looks clean, that verification matters.
The takeaway
Food and drink production looks clean, but the processes generate genuine airborne hazards: flour and food dusts that are respiratory sensitisers - flour dust has a 10 mg/m3 exposure limit and can cause occupational asthma - along with steam that carries heat and moisture, and cooking fumes from frying, grilling and roasting at scale. These are real exposures for the people working in them, whatever the setting looks like.
LEV controls them by capturing each at source - dust at the dry-ingredient end, steam and fume at the cooking end - and a thorough examination and test confirms the LEV is actually doing it. The wholesome image of food work can lull a business into trusting the air without verifying it, but clean surfaces say nothing about clean air. Measuring the airflow and capture velocity is what establishes whether the workers are genuinely protected. In food production, the hazards are real precisely because they are so easy to overlook.
Questions
Several: flour and other food dusts, which are respiratory sensitisers; steam from cooking and cleaning, carrying heat and moisture; and cooking fumes from frying, grilling and roasting at scale, carrying particulate and irritants. Each is a real exposure needing control despite the clean-looking setting.
Because it is a respiratory sensitiser - repeated exposure can sensitise the airways and cause occupational asthma, one of the most common forms. It has a workplace exposure limit of 10 mg/m3 with a sensitiser notation, and exposure should be kept as far below that as reasonably practicable.
Routine ones: tipping and sieving flour, mixing dough, dusting work surfaces, and cleaning up spills. Each puts fine flour into the air where it can be breathed. LEV captures it at the point of release - the tipping point, the mixer, the sieve - before it reaches the worker's breathing zone.
Yes. Large volumes of steam from cooking, ovens and cleaning carry heat and moisture that make the workplace uncomfortable and can create condensation, slip and heat-stress hazards. Extraction draws the steam away from where it is generated to keep the environment tolerable and safe.
Cooking fume from frying, grilling and roasting is a mixture of fine particulate, vapours and irritants driven off by heat - a genuine respiratory exposure, not just water. At production scale the volume can be considerable, and it needs capturing at source over the cooking equipment, separately from steam extraction.
Because clean surfaces say nothing about clean air. A spotless operation can still expose workers to flour dust or cooking fume. A thorough examination measures the airflow and capture velocity and confirms the LEV is genuinely controlling the hazards - cutting through the assumption that a wholesome setting means safe air.
Our thorough examination confirms your food-production LEV is genuinely capturing the flour dust, steam and cooking fume at source - not just running while workers are exposed behind a clean-looking process.
