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Control of Self-heating / Spontaneous Combustion Hazards

The Intrigues of Self-heating/Spontaneous Combustion and the Challenges in Controlling this Hazard

Fires arising from self-heating or spontaneous combustion have been reported from a wide range of industrial facilities, in manufacturing plants, storage and transportation, and other diversified facilities, including food, dairy, feed, agricultural, wood, coal, biomass, metal, metal powders, waste treatment, storage tanks and silos, dryers, dust collectors, oil mist eliminators, and laundromats to name a few.

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Self-heating spontaneous combustion can result in an ignition of the material and even dust and gas explosions, which have caused severe property damages and personal injuries.

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As implied by its name, self-heating events are self-propelling, i.e. once commenced, a self-heating process is sustained and accelerated by the heat released from the self-heating itself.

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Self-heating of a material can start at a temperature significantly lower than the "flaming" ignition temperature of the material, however, eventually raise the temperature of the material to the ignition temperature of the material resulting in self-ignition. Self-ignition causes a fire of the material and in certain cases leads to dust, liquid and/or gas explosions. 

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The driving force can be any heat-releasing processes in the body of the material, such as oxidation, decomposition or other exothermic reactions.

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Because it is difficult to estimate the conditions for self-heating, many fires arising from self-heating occur in surprise and extensive property damages and personal injuries can happen to to the unpreparedness toward self-heating hazards. 

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Self-heating temperature is not a constant material property, but rather a function of many variables such as materials' chemical and physical properties, size/geometry of material piles, availability of oxygen or other oxidizing agents, and flow conditions. 

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To predict self-heating/spontaneous combustion hazard, and protect properties and personnel against this hazard, a proven approach is a combination of experiments and theories to solve this complex problem. Based on the results of such analyses, effective safety measures (safeguards) and actions can be developed to prevent and to mitigate the effects of potential self-heating/spontaneous combustion hazards.

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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:

 

  • Identify the self-heating hazards in your processes and operations;

  • Determine the temperature at which self-heating can occur in your processes;

  • Assess the risk of self-heating hazards in your processes by analyzing the influences of various factors that determine the occurrence of self-heating/spontaneous;

  • Recommend effective and practical safety measures to prevent self-heating and mitigate the fire and explosion consequences of self-heating/spontaneous combustion;

  • Provide the supporting services to assist you in developing solutions to prevent and mitigate self-heating hazards.

 

Our self-heating hazard control services are supported by our extensive expertise and experiences on self-heating/spontaneous combustion, including investigations of self-heating incidents in various industries, laboratory testing of self-heating hazards, and expert witness in litigations about fires and explosions caused by self-heating/spontaneous combustion.

Our Approach

Our help begins with a hazard review/assessment of self-heating/spontaneous combustion hazards.  Apparently, self-heating/spontaneous combustion hazard assessment is only one element of the overall fire and explosion assessment like a PHA or DHA. In some cases, self-heating/spontaneous combustion can be the major and most likely potential ignition source in a process and should be dealt with significant effort. 

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Our review/assessment will determine whether self-heating/spontaneous combustion is a likely hazard in your processes based on:

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  • Reviewing or obtaining the chemical and physical properties and fire & explosion hazard characteristics of the materials involved;

  • Evaluating materials' hazards under the process conditions; and

  • Our experiences and knowledge on self-heating/spontaneous combustion;

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The next step is to determine the conditions at which self-heating can occur. The temperature at which self-heating starts is much lower than the ignition temperature of the material. Therefore, the self-heating hazard in a process cannot be effectively prevented without the knowledge of the initiation temperature of self-heating in a process for a given material.

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However, the bad news is that the initiation temperature of self-heating is not a constant material property, but rather a function of many factors, including materials' chemical and physical properties, size/geometry of material piles, availability of oxygen or other oxidizing agents, and flow conditions.

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Our experts will help you to tackle the self-heating/spontaneous combustion hazards with a combination of testing and thermal ignition/explosion analyses. Our objective is to determine the conditions that will lead to self-heating and to provide effective and practical solutions to prevent it from happening and to mitigate the consequences of fires and explosions.

 
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 self-heating/spontaneous combustion. 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 Self-heating/Self-heating/Spontaneous Combustion?

Princeton Safety Solutions possesses over 35 years' experiences on dust, liquid and gas fires and explosions throughout the process industries globally. Our process industry experiences include hundreds of process safety projects. Our experts possess extensive expertise on self-heating/spontaneous combustion hazards and control that have been obtained from:

 

  • Extensive experiences on hazards assessments of fires & explosions, including self-heating/spontaneous combustion;

  • Numerous investigations of fire and explosion incidents, including those ignited by self-heating/spontaneous combustion;

  • Our hazard assessments and incident investigations of self-heating/spontaneous combustion are based on laboratory testing and thermal ignition/explosion analyses;

  • Successful expert consulting services to OSHA Citation and litigation related fire and explosion incidents the were ignited by self-heating/spontaneous combustion;

  • 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 dust, liquid and gas 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, 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.

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