Engineering

Materials science

Coal mining

Archaeology

Geology

Coal

Waste management

Environmental engineering

Dust control

Nanotechnology

Pneumoconiosis

Coal dust

Mining engineering

Geography

Emerging technologies

Environmental science

Fuel

Prolonged exposure to coal dust causes various lung diseases, including coal workers’ pneumoconiosis (CWP) which threatens miners’ health in underground mines as it is incurable. Solution spray and coal seam water infusion are widely applied to lower coal dust concentration in underground mining. However, a literature does not appear to show any systematical analysis of the differences and influencing factors of different dust control technologies and provide the coal mining industry with a clearly effective method. In this review, a description of coal dust control technologies based on water mediums was presented and a comparison of these technologies was highlighted. The influencing factors for the effect of dust control technologies based on water mediums were identified and analyzed, indicating that the solution wettability is not a single key factor. After, discussing the challenges and future research directions, it was suggested that the coagulation mechanism between dust particles and droplets should be investigated in addition to improving the solution wettability. Meanwhile, the formation methods of the spray field and the spatial distribution of droplets near the dust sources should be further investigated, being of great significance for improving the droplet number density of the dust removal spray.

Coal dust suppression based on water mediums: A review of technologies and influencing factors