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Directive 2010/21/EU of 12 March 2010 stipulates that, as of 1 November 2010, seed treatments containing the above-mentioned substances may be used only in seed treatment facilities which apply the best available techniques and technology that ensures to the greatest possible extent the seed is free of dust - right up to the time of sowing.

SATEC CONCEPT coating machines, combined with our overall plant design, fulfil these requirements, providing:

• effective, active dust removal upstream of the actual coating machine
• extremely accurate metering of seed, seed treatments, adhesives and coating/drying powders
• refined technology that provides excellent performance even when processing effective adhesives in large quantities
• an integrated recipe management system (ingredients and workflows) that provides easy access to tried and tested recipes with very high repeatability
• an effective Satec designed drying/screening system for pelleted or encrusted seed.
  

SATEC CONCEPT coating machines ensure the crops will comply with individual Heubach dust values.

In view of environmental concerns and the approval eligibility criteria for particular seed treatments, it must be hoped that the EU directive will be implemented into national law in a manner which is technically feasible.

However, even the best coating technology is no guarantee of a perfectly coated seed. It is also essential to ensure that equipment parameters are correctly set up, personnel are appropriately trained, the equipment is operated properly, workflows are well-planned and consistent controls are in place. Verification of these technical, organisational and personnel-related conditions will in the future become a mandatory requirement for the certification of seed treatment facilities.

These measures combined aim to minimise the risk of exposing seed to dust to ensure that virtually no environmental contamination can occur. The Heubach value is a measure of the level of dust contamination of seeds. The higher the seed rate, the lower the Heubach value per kg seed to ensure a specific dust level per hectare is not exceeded.

If the seed's level dust contamination exceeds the ceiling limit as defined by the Heubach value, the seed cannot be placed on the market.
Such a ceiling limit is already in place in Germany, where seed treatment approval stipulates a maximum Heubach value of 0.75g particulate matter/100,000 seeds for maize that has been treated with mesurol.
In future, the treatment of rape seed with neonicotinoids will be permitted only in listed, quality assured seed treatment facilities which comply with the maximum Heubach-test value for rape, which is 0.5g/700,000 seeds.

On the whole, these stringent dust control measures represent a considerable burden for seed producers in terms of both costs and human resources. In addition, they place increasing responsibility on staff members, since the financial implications of producing a faulty batch in terms of the Heubach value are enormous, even if no inappropriately coated seed is placed on the market.

To minimise the risk of producing a faulty batch of treated seeds, Satec Handelsgesellschaft has developed a technique that allows seed producers to obtain a reading of the expected level of dust contamination as early as during the process of seed treatment. After more than a year of development, we are now in a position to present a system which minimises the risk of faulty seed treatment, thus providing an excellent basis for obtaining a certification for the seed treatment facility: the Satec Dust Monitor.

This new dust monitor uses photometric technology to analyse dust levels in seed samples that are continuously drawn from current production and sampled immediately upstream of the bagging line.

The Satec Dust Monitor

• delivers results which correlate very well with Heubach values
• delivers them automatically - almost incidentally
• records the measurement results
• allows intervention in the control system of the coating machine (e.g. shutdown in the event ceiling limits are exceeded)
• shows the lowest dust concentration per kg seed, because it provides three different settings to adjust system sensitivity. This allows the operator to enter a fully variable trigger value.
• shows how product quality can vary over time, because rather than generating just one average value per batch, the dust monitor performs several partial measurements (the number is freely selectable) and specifies the exact time.
• is adaptable to virtually any brand and make of coating equipment
• integrates anywhere in the production system - e.g. this dust monitor can be installed upstream of the coating machine where there is a need to determine grain seed dust levels before applying a coating.
• has been approved by the Julius-Kühn-Institut, the Federal Research Centre for Cultivated Plants (approval no.: G1913).
  

The dust monitoring process:

An automatic sampler continuously draws samples from the production process. These samples initially collect in the storage hopper of the Satec Dust Monitor. As soon as a specific quantity of seeds is collected inside the hopper, the seeds are discharged down a pipe and into the final sample collection container, from where the average sample is taken. During this process, the dust level is measured photometrically and the measurements are recorded at regular intervals and plotted straight onto a curve. This process is repeated several times during a specific production process, which allows operators to conduct and record any number of measurements for each batch. At the same time, the monitor determines and displays mean and maximum values. Depending on the settings, it is therefore possible to select a very high number of readings during a single production process of a specific batch.

This high control frequency brings maximum peace of mind as early as during production, minimises the risk of faulty batches and relieves the staff of some of the added responsibility.

The Satec Dust Monitor is, of course, also suitable for operations other than seed treatment and also monitors dust levels in any type of seed sample and in a wide variety of bulk goods

From the very inception of our coating, encrusting and pelleting machines our maxim has always been to replace the principle of "hope" with that of "knowledge".

Measuring dust levels in seed by using the Satec Dust Monitor in the production process itself is a rigorous response to the challenges of creating dust-free seed.

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