Control of Electrostatic Hazards
The Challenges to Control Electrostatic Hazards
Occurrence of electrostatic sparks is ubiquitous in industrial processes and everyday life. While such a spark is sometimes merely a nuisance like a zap on your hands when you touch a door knob, it can ignite a gas, vapor or dust cloud, causing catastrophic explosions and/or flashfires.
Static sparks strike almost silently and unexpectedly with surprises, as in the following example instances when static sparks triggered severe flashfires or explosions in our clients facilities, and our experts performed investigations of static electricity and helped our clients to investigate incidents, and provided solutions for prevention and control:
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Hydrogen gas in a wet scrubber system mysteriously exploded;
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An operator was hit by a flame of hydrogen gas as a by-product of powder surface treatment when taking a powder sample from a powder blender fitted with nitrogen-inerting system;
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Flame flashed out of hands of an operator during parts cleaning operation;
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Flame erupted suddenly from the top of flammable liquid-based product cans in a packing line;
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A container in a liquid product filling line suddenly become bulged;
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Dust flashfire in a PVC plant;
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Two operators who were pouring a metal powder into a process vessel all of sudden were engulfed in a fireball of the metal powder, which spiraled upwards from the bottom of the vessel;
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Two operators who were feeding a powdered reagent into a reactor from a supersack (FIBC) struck with pressure and dust flame coming out of the enclosed powder feeding hopper fitted with nitrogen inerting system;
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A dust explosion took place in a feeding hopper when a chemical powder is being fed into a reactor;
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A dust explosion took place in a fluid bed granulator of stainless steel construction in a pharmaceutical plant;
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Reactors in a newly commissioned plant got a lot of pin holes in the lining of the reactors and pipes;
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Bubbles were formed between the product coat and the polymeric substrate resulting in product defects;
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A consumer was hit with flame coming from an aerosol can when he was applying the product;
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An operator is knocked out (unconscious) when he was vacuuming floors of train/truck unloading terminal in an aluminum refinery.
Because static charges can be generated on a wide range of materials, a static hazard control program has to consider, evaluate and control all plant operating elements, including raw materials, products, process equipment, containers, pipes, process condition, operations, people involved, PPEs, tools/implements, flooring and ventilation/air-conditioning systems.
Therefore, static hazard control can be intrigued by all these factors inherent to the processes and operations and materials' physical properties and interactions between materials and various elements of plant operations.
Often, many fires and explosions are attributed to lack of recognition of static hazards and/or adequate/effective safety measures. In some cases, people rely on some common experience to control static electricity, however, this can be risky because under certain conditions, these practice may not be working if a change of material, equipment, process condition is made.
Sometimes, static electricity is blamed as the culprit of a fire or explosion incident without convincing proof from adequate evaluations. This can also be dangerous because the real ignition sources/hazards will be overlooked if one blames the wrong source of ignition. Under such a circumstance, a recurrence of the same or similar fire or explosion will very likely to happen in the future.
You may rest assured that our experts will bring the extensive and comprehensive expertise and experience to your facilities to identify, assess, and quantify the electrostatic hazards in your facilities, and recommend effective and practical solutions to prevent and control these hazards, as explained in the following paragraphs.
What Do We to Help
We bring effective solutions to electrostatic hazard control to your facilities through:
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Identify all potential electrostatic ignition sources through an Electrostatic Hazard Assessment/Analysis;
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Provide laboratory measurements of electrostatic hazards;
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Perform full-scale/onsite measurements of electrostatic hazards;
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Identify the scenarios where static spark can cause ignitions of explosions and flashfires;
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Assess the ignition likelihoods and consequences of ignitions by electrostatic sparks;
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Recommend effective and practical hazard and risk control measures to prevent electrostatic hazards;
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Provide the supporting services assist you in implementing changes and safety measures to prevent static hazards as an ignition source of explosions and flashfires.
Our static hazard control services are supported by our extensive expertise on static hazard testing, and extensive hand-on experiences on static hazard/risk assessments, incident investigations, litigation support/expert witness, and compliance reviews.
Our Approach
Our experience with clients across a wide range of industries is that an effective static hazard control program should be started from a systematic assessment of the electrostatic hazards in a facility. Our static hazard assessment/analysis will:
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Identify all potential electrostatic charging and discharging (sparking) hazards associated with specific processes/plants/operations;
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Identify the scenarios ignitions of flammable/combustible dusts, liquid vapors or gases by electrostatic sparks;
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Review and evaluate the efficacy of existing static hazard control measures and determine the missing measures (if there is any) in your facilities;
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Recommend any further, alternative or different safety measures for controlling static hazards in your facilities.
Our experts will evaluate all factors of plant operations that can give rise to electrostatic charging.
Our services will go beyond hazard identification by quantifying the electrostatic charging and discharge hazards. This will be achieved by laboratory measurements of electrostatic hazard properties, and in some cases, onsite measurements of electrostatic hazards under the actual process conditions. The outcome of this is the accurate assessment of the risk of electrostatic discharges.
Knowing the actual static hazards and risks, we can determine the real culprits of fires and explosions or potential ignition sources in your facilities, whether electrostatic sparks or something else. Based on the results of reliable risk analysis, you can allocate resources effectively for eliminating or minimizing the electrostatic hazards and risks of fires and explosion as a result of electrostatic discharges.
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 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 electrostatic hazards and control that have been obtained from:
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Extensive experiences on hazards assessments of fires & explosions, including those that are caused by electrostatic discharges (sparks);
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Numerous investigations of fire and explosion incidents, including those ignited by electrostatic discharges (sparks);
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Our hazard assessments and incident investigations of electrostatic discharges (sparks) are based on both laboratory testing and onsite testing under actual process conditions;
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Successful expert consulting services to OSHA Citation and litigation related fire and explosion incidents the were ignited by electrostatic discharges (sparks);
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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 dust, liquid and gas explosions and fires, 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 electrostatic hazard control in various industries, gas 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 and prioritize recommendations based on sound hazard and risk assessment.
To learn more about our expertise in electrostatic hazard control, please call us at 609 240 7545 or email us at info@PrincetonSafetySolutions.com today.