Control & Mitigation of
Flammable & Combustible Liquids Hazards
The Challenges in Controlling Flammable & Combustible Liquid Hazards
Flammable and combustible liquids are widely used not only in industrial facilities like chemical, pharmaceutical, paint, coating, adhesive, cosmetic, food, to name a few, but also other diversified occupancies, including homes.
These liquids, leaked out of process vessels, storage tanks or containers, can spread over large areas and cause severe fires and explosions resulting in catastrophic property damages and personal injuries.
The vapors of flammable and combustible liquids are extremely sensitive to ignition sources. For example a tiny spark of static electricity or an arc from an electrical device can ignite the vapors. Such an ignition often results in a flashfire in an open space or big room, however, the ignition can cause a vapor cloud explosion, which result in a significant explosion pressure damaging equipment and buildings and injuring people.
Flammable and combustible liquids can generate electrostatic charges on them, which can in turn ignite the liquids themselves.
To prevent flammable and combustible liquid fires and explosions, a systematic approach is needed to identify the hazards firs and explosions, assess the risks of these hazards, and based on the hazard and risk analyses, develop strategies and solutions to protect facilities and personnel against the fires and explosions.
In this process, many aspects of plant design, construction and operations have to be evaluated, which include building design, equipment selection and operation, electrical equipment selection, materials' fire and explosion hazard properties, processes and operations.
Based on the hazard and risk analyses, concrete safety measures (safeguards) and actions can be developed to prevent and to mitigate the effects of potential liquid fires and explosions.
What Do We to Help
We bring effective solutions to control the the treats of flammable and combustible liquid fires and explosions to your facilities through:
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Identify all the credible ignition sources inherent in equipment, processes and operations in your facilities;
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Identify liquid and vapor hazards in in equipment, processes and operations in your facilities;
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Assess risk of liquid fires and explosions by evaluating the ignition likelihoods and consequences;
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Recommend effective and practical hazard and risk control measures;
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Provide the supporting services to assist you in implementing changes and safety measures to prevent fires and explosions;
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Provide performance-based analyses in case the physical conditions prevent effective implementations of some safety measures/solutions.
Our fire and explosion hazard control services are supported by our extensive expertise on fire and explosion research and testing, and extensive hand-on experiences on hazard/risk assessments, incident investigations, litigation support/expert witness, and compliance reviews.
Our Approach
Our help begins with a hazard review/assessment of flammable and combustible liquid fire and explosion hazards:
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Reviewing or obtaining the fire & explosion hazard characteristics of the flammable & combustible liquid on your facility;
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Identifying scenarios in which liquid spills and explosible vapor clouds could happen;
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Identifying potential ignition sources that could be present under normal and foreseeable abnormal conditions;
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Evaluating all potential liquid fires and explosions in the processes and operations in your facility;
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Ensuring safety through properly defined fire and explosion prevention and protection measures – “Basis of Safety.
For some processes or operations, a systematic analysis, such as Process Hazard Analysis (PHA), will be performed to identify and evaluate steps of processes, components of an equipment, and/or operations that may cause releasing of flammable and combustible liquids, creating ignition sources, and consequences of liquid fires and explosions.
Our experts will assess the actual risks of liquid fires and explosions. Based on the risk analysis, resources can be allocated effectively for eliminating or minimizing the liquid fire and explosion risk.
Sometimes, some safety measures cannot be implemented due to plants' physical limitations or process conditions. In such a case, our experts offer performance-based analysis of the hazards and risks and work with clients to develop effective and cost-effective solutions for controlling the hazards and risks and complying with OSHA regulations, codes and standards.
We will work with you to learn more about relevant details of your operations and develop a plan for the most practical and cost-effective approaches to reduce the risk of gas explosions. We can also assist you to implement the recommendations effectively. Our supporting services cover all stages of the implementation process based on our more than three decades of process safety experience.
Why Work with Us on Gas Explosions?
Princeton Safety Solutions possesses over 35 years' experiences on gas, liquid and dust fire and explosion throughout the process industries globally. Our process industry experiences include hundreds of process safety projects. Our experts possess extensive expertise on dust explosion hazards and control that have been obtained from:
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Extensive experiences on liquid fire and explosion hazards assessments;
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Extensive liquid fire and explosion incident investigations;
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Solutions for controlling flammable and combustible liquid fire and explosion hazards;
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Successful expert consulting services to OSHA Citation cases related to flammable and combustible liquid hazards;
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Extensive experiences in laboratory and full-scale fire and explosion hazard testing and research;
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Both standard tests and specially designed tests to determine fire & explosion hazards under specific process conditions;
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Active participations of combustible dust standard making processes as a Principal (Technical Committee) Member of NFPA 484 - Standard on Combustible Metals, and NFPA 30B - Code for the Manufacture and Storage of Aerosol Products.
We have been recognized for our effective and cost-effective practical solutions for preventing and mitigating liquid fire and explosion hazards, which are based on our scientific and yet practical approach using test data to determine the real hazard and risk.
With our extensive expertise and experience in gas explosion hazard control in various industries, liquid fire and explosion incident investigations, litigation consulting, laboratory testing, training and code and standard compliance review, we will address the issues you are facing adequately and effectively, and develop effective and practical solutions for prevention and mitigation. We will help you navigate efficiently through complex problems and prioritize recommendations based on sound hazard and risk assessment.
To learn more about our expertise in liquid fire and explosion prevention & mitigation, please call us at 609 240 7545 or email us at info@PrincetonSafetySolutions.com today.