Simulation and Analysis of Fire and Explosion Safety in Chemical Processing Plants
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.29070/p1n41602Keywords:
Fire Accident, Fire safety, Explosion safety, Chemical processing plants, Simulation, AnalysisAbstract
The handling of flammable, explosive and toxic materials under high pressure and high temperature operation conditions creates some of the most severe hazards in chemical processing plants, which can be fire and/or explosion accidents. The goal of this study is to simulate and analyze different fire and explosion scenarios in chemical processing plants, to determine the propagation of the hazard, and to assess the effectiveness of different engineering safety measures. The release, dispersion, ignition, combustion, and thermal radiation of hazardous materials under representative operating conditions are simulated using numerical simulation techniques such as computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The simulation results show that the application of both active and passive fire protection systems have a significant effect in reducing the fire spread, thermal radiation intensity and the risk of domino effect spread. Results show that simulation-based risk assessment has the potential to give a significant contribution to accident prevention, emergency preparedness and safety system optimisation.
Downloads
References
1. Kletz TA. What went wrong? Case histories of process plant disasters and how they could have been avoided. 5th ed. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann; 2009.
2. Lees FP. Lees' loss prevention in the process industries. 4th ed. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann; 2012.
3. Crowl DA, Louvar JF. Chemical process safety: fundamentals with applications. 3rd ed. Upper Saddle River (NJ): Pearson Education; 2011.
4. Mannan S. Lees' loss prevention in the process industries: hazard identification, assessment and control. 4th ed. Oxford: Elsevier; 2014.
5. Pantousa D, Tzaros K, Kefaki MA. Thermal buckling behaviour of unstiffened and stiffened fixed-roof tanks under non-uniform heating. J Constr Steel Res. 2018;143:162-79. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcsr.2018.01.004
6. Pantousa D. Numerical study on thermal buckling of empty thin-walled steel tanks under multiple pool-fire scenarios. Thin Walled Struct. 2018;131:577-94. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tws.2018.07.021
7. Cai Z, Jiang J, Ding X. Discussion of the hazards in chemical industry park. Ind Saf Environ Prot. 2008;34(1):24-26.
8. Goldman GT, Lin S, Mulholland JA, Russell AG, Strickland MJ. Assessment of air pollution impacts and monitoring data limitations of a spring 2019 chemical facility fire. Environ Justice. 2021;14(6):433-42. https://doi.org/10.1089/env.2020.0069
9. Hsu CY, Chiang HC, Shie RH, Ku CH, Lin TY, Chen MJ, et al. Ambient volatile organic compounds in residential areas near a large-scale petrochemical complex: spatiotemporal variation, source apportionment and health risk. Environ Pollut. 2018;240:95-104. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2018.04.076
10. Soni V, Singh P, Shree V, Goel V. Effects of volatile organic compounds on human health. In: Sharma N, Agarwal AK, Eastwood P, Gupta T, Singh AP, editors. Air pollution and control. Singapore: Springer; 2018. p. 119-42. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-7185-0_6
11. Feng J, Wang T, Liu Q, Li Y, Zhang Y, Guo H, et al. Indirect source apportionment of methyl mercaptan using chemical mass balance and positive matrix factorization models: a case study near a refining and petrochemical plant. Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2019;26(23):24305-12. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-019-05687-7
12. Forest DD. Training the next generation of operators: American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers immersive learning. Process Saf Prog. 2021;40(4):219-23. https://doi.org/10.1002/prs.1230
13. Qu X, Nie X, Li Z, Jia X, Wang F. System-theory accident models and processes for fire risk management of chemical plants. Chem Eng Trans. 2023;103:367-372.
14. Zhou S, Wang Z, Li Q. A conceptual framework integrating numerical simulation with system theory based method for quantitative explosion process hazard analysis. Process Saf Environ Prot. 2022;166:202-211.
15. Alenezi H, Al-Qabandi O. A review of hazard management in petroleum/chemical facilities–fires and explosions. NeuroQuantology. 2022;20(5):4222-4240.
16. Lu Y, Wang T, Liu T. Bayesian network-based risk analysis of chemical plant explosion accidents. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2020;17(15):5364. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17155364
17. Saloua B, Mounira R, Salah MM. Fire and explosion risks in petrochemical plant: assessment, modeling and consequences analysis. J Fail Anal Prev. 2019;19(4):903-916. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11668-019-00711-0
