A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
Study on mitigating ammonium nitrate fertiliser explosion hazards
Ammonium nitrate (AN) is widely used in the fertiliser industry and is one of the most concentrated forms of nitrogen fertiliser. However, AN is associated with several types of hazards, including fire and explosion, which have occurred time and again in the past century; one example is the West fertiliser plant explosion that occurred on April 17, 2013, in West, Texas, USA. The explosion killed 15 people, injured at least 250 people, and damaged many buildings and homes. During the past century, there have been approximately 40 accidents associated with AN throughout the world. Despite specific regulations and rules on AN from various agencies, the accidents continue to occur. Extensive research has been conducted on this area; however, limited understanding exists of the underlying causes of detonation of AN. AN explosivity can be reduced by various conditions, such as the existence of specific additives (some materials change the chemical reaction pathways, inhibiting explosion) or the effect of thermal pre-treatment history. The main objective of this research is twofold: first, to look into the behavior of AN with sodium sulphate as an additive; and second, to examine the effect of its thermal history to determine how the storage temperature and its variations will affect decomposition of AN. The Reactive Systems Screening Tool (RSST) has been employed to study the runaway behavior of AN with sodium sulphate or pre-treated AN sample. The sample weight that the RSST can handle is approximately 3 g - 10 g, larger by approximately 3 orders of magnitude than the capacity of the Differential Scanning Calorimeter (DSC) which can measure a few milligrams of sample. Important parameters from the experimental results are reported such as "onset" temperature and self-heating rate. The results showed that both the presence of sodium sulphate and the thermal pretreatment of AN exert an inhibiting effect on AN thermal decomposition. The findings of this work agree with the work performed in literature which is essentially based on DSC experiments.
Study on mitigating ammonium nitrate fertiliser explosion hazards
Ammonium nitrate (AN) is widely used in the fertiliser industry and is one of the most concentrated forms of nitrogen fertiliser. However, AN is associated with several types of hazards, including fire and explosion, which have occurred time and again in the past century; one example is the West fertiliser plant explosion that occurred on April 17, 2013, in West, Texas, USA. The explosion killed 15 people, injured at least 250 people, and damaged many buildings and homes. During the past century, there have been approximately 40 accidents associated with AN throughout the world. Despite specific regulations and rules on AN from various agencies, the accidents continue to occur. Extensive research has been conducted on this area; however, limited understanding exists of the underlying causes of detonation of AN. AN explosivity can be reduced by various conditions, such as the existence of specific additives (some materials change the chemical reaction pathways, inhibiting explosion) or the effect of thermal pre-treatment history. The main objective of this research is twofold: first, to look into the behavior of AN with sodium sulphate as an additive; and second, to examine the effect of its thermal history to determine how the storage temperature and its variations will affect decomposition of AN. The Reactive Systems Screening Tool (RSST) has been employed to study the runaway behavior of AN with sodium sulphate or pre-treated AN sample. The sample weight that the RSST can handle is approximately 3 g - 10 g, larger by approximately 3 orders of magnitude than the capacity of the Differential Scanning Calorimeter (DSC) which can measure a few milligrams of sample. Important parameters from the experimental results are reported such as "onset" temperature and self-heating rate. The results showed that both the presence of sodium sulphate and the thermal pretreatment of AN exert an inhibiting effect on AN thermal decomposition. The findings of this work agree with the work performed in literature which is essentially based on DSC experiments.
Study on mitigating ammonium nitrate fertiliser explosion hazards
Han, Zhe (author) / Pineda, Alba (author) / Sachdeva, Sonny (author) / Mannan, M. Sam (author) / Papadaki, Maria I. (author)
2014
14 Seiten, Bilder, Quellen
Conference paper
English
Explosion hazards of ammonium nitrate under fire exposure
| TIBKAT | 1966
Analysis of Explosion Combustion Phenomenon with Ammonium Nitrate
| British Library Online Contents | 2008