I. CHEM. E. SYMPOSIUM SERIES NO.

85

THE ENGINEERING OF RELIEF DISPOSAL

M. Kneale*

The emissions from relief valves and bursting

discs need to be considered as part of the total
relief system. They have to be dealt with by
dispersion, destruction or containment. Methods
for this are reviewed.

1. INTRODUCTION

The Problem
The need for a relief device, be it a safety valve or a rupture
disc may be clear and obvious; indeed, it is often legally deter-
mined. However, defining the relief criteria, calculating and
specifying the relief valve and then providing and erecting it are
not the only problems. It is also necessary to ensure that the
process of discharge, which is often of a violent nature, can cause
no harm to people and adjacent equipment and that the materials
discharged are dispersed, destroyed or collected and disposed of
safely.
In the past the Process Engineer has specified the relief device
and marked the exhaust to a safe place. This is often interpreted
as meaning outside the building, or onto the floor or onto the roof
or to some other place where people are not normally expected to be.
However, further analysis will often indicate that this is not
acceptable. Depending on the nature of the materials exhausted,
direct atmospheric discharge may, or may not, be a safe procedure.
The purpose of this paper is to review the methods and systems
described in the recent literature regarding the engineering of the
total relief disposal system.
*
John Brown Engineers & Constructors B.V., The Hague, Netherlands.

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The Legal Requirement

In the United Kingdom it is indeed a legal requirement to relieve
to a safe place. The Health and Safety Executive so gave its view
here in 1979.(1)

Atmospheric Discharge
This can be the best means of disposal and can also provide a high
degree of safety (2). It is the simplest method and reduces the
problems of calculating system load, pipe sizing and back pressure
associated with a closed relief system. However, the discharge of
anything to atmosphere must not be undertaken without a great deal
of careful consideration. Discharging flammable or hazardous
vapours should only be accepted after it is proven that no new
hazards arise. The formation of flammable mixtures at ground level,
the exposure of personnel inside or outside the factory to
unacceptable levels of toxic or corrosive chemicals, and the
pollution of the environment by dangerous substances must be avoided.
Pollution must here be taken to include excessive noise, heat and
possibly even light.

Incidents
That these aspects have not always been dealt with adequately can
be seen from a large number of incidents reports in the literature.
A number of relevant examples have been selected and are given in
Appendix 1. In a review of 32 batch reactor incidents for the
period 1972-1976 HMFI reported: Where relief was purposely
provided it had usually only been designed to cope with the
evolution of gas or vapour; foam or liquid discharge had not been
envisaged. It was not unusual to find that the vessel had been
thrust into the floor and the lid through the roof of the building.
The majority of the (12) injuries were caused by persons being
affected by expelled vessel contents.

2. ENGINEERING OF THE RELIEF SYSTEM

Considering the Design Process as a whole the following steps are
necessary:
1. Defining the Requirement
2. Sizing the Relief Device(s)
3. Designing the total hardware system
4. Treating the Products of Relief.
These steps obviously affect one another and may well lead to a
reiterative process. Unfortunately some of them are not always
given sufficient attention.

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Defining the Requirement

It is usually known what equipment needs over-pressure protection.
It may be less clear under what abnormal conditions protection is
expected to become operative. The relief device will usually be
provided for many situations of which the following is by no means
an exhaustive list.
Hydraulic overfilling by liquid
dead head of pumps

Pressure over pressure by gas

and
Temperature cooling failure (internal: coils, jackets, utilities)
cooling failure (external: condenser, heat exhanger)
exotherm
fire: internal or external
explosion
All the anticipated overpressure conditions must be listed and the
system designed for the worst case that can be realistically
expected. This definition step requires a high degree of judge-
ment and is crucial in determining the complexity of what follows.
If the whole relief system becomes too difficult, or expensive
it will be worthwhile to re-examine the specification of the
requirement. This is further discussed in para.11 below.

Specifying the Relief Device

The detail design work of specifying and sizing the relief device
is not within the scope of this paper. The methods are well
established and were further covered in Session 2 of this Symposium.
Good general references are available (3). Polymerisation reactor
relief requires special consideration (4,5,6,7).

Designing the Total Hardware System

As the relieving process may be violent all aspects of the hard-
ware, connected even remotely, to the relief valve have to be
designed for the hydraulic and mechanical forces released. This
will include elements directly involved, such as nozzles, flanges,
inlet and outlet lines but also line supports, reactor supports,
vessel feet, foundation bolts, piles and building structures.
If hardware is required for treating the relieved products, it
will be specialised and determined by the nature of the fluids.
The literature on this and on the calculation of the reactive
forces will be reviewed.

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3. TOXIC EMISSIONS AND AIR POLLUTION

Whether or not there is a specific code requirement, emissions of

toxic materials have to be controlled. A good general introduction
is given by O'Connell in a paper entitled "How to attack air
pollution control problems"(8). An orderly approach to emission
control is recommended. This has five steps:
(1) Setting up emission limits
(2) Identifying all emission sources
(3) Investigating possible process modifications
(4) Defining the control problem
(5) Selecting a control system
It is pointed out that relief valve operation is frequently over-
looked as an important contributor to process emissions.
As long ago as 1972 Teller (15) predicted that within 5 years
emission limits in the USA would be expected to include that:
(1) Gaseous emissions should be limited to 1 part per million
(except where high toxicity will require even lower values)
(2) Concentration of gaseous components at plant boundaries
should be of the order of 1 to 2 part per billion.
(3) Particulate loadings should be less than 0.02 grains per scf.
(4) Liquid wastes will be prohibited.

Although such standards were not all legislatively enforced

subsequently, they had already been achieved in some communities.
Technology is certainly available capable of achieving these limits.
It is very doubtful whether relief valve exhausts are generally
being considered in this light and it might be argued that emission
control for relief can be less stringent.
Data on "permitted" emission levels is extensive and confusing.
Levels set up by EPA, data on cancer suspect agents, hazardous
metal compounds and LC50 & LD50 for some 1300 substances are
quoted (9,10,11,12,14).
A useful list of organic materials purported to be toxic is
contained in a recent consent agreement between the EPA and
environmental action groups (13). Data on flammable materials is
given in (52).
Some of the more prominent among 65 materials included are given
in Table 1.

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TABLE 1
SOME OF THE 65 ORGANICS INCLUDED IN THE CONSENT AGREEMENT WITH E.P.A.
(Ref: Environmental Reporter Decision 8ERC, 26 June 1976, p.2120)

Benzene & ethyl benzenes Nitro-phenols

Chloro-benzenes Nitrosamines
Chioro-ethanes Phenol
Chioro-phenols Phenolate-esters
Chloro-alkylethers PCBs
Halo-ethers Polynuclear aromatics
Halo-methanes Tetra-Chloro ethylene
Hexachloro butadiene Toluene
Hexachloro cyclohexane Trichloro ethylene
Hexachloro pentadiene Vinyl compounds.

The Data needed for designing the relief system will in any case
have been needed for sizing the relief device. This is summarized
in Table 2.

TABLE 2 : DATA REQUIRED FOR DESIGN

Physical form : gas, liquid, solid

Flowrate
Particle size distribution
Variation of flow and concentration
Physical properties e.g. solubility, density, resistivity
Chemical properties - corrosivity, toxicity
Temperature and Pressure.

Three circumstances commonly lead to major problems in the design

of control systems. These are:
(1) Failure to recognise the presence of another phase
(2) Presence of fine particles
(3) Variation in emission characteristics

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As it is necessary to match the toxic control system to the relief

device it is worthwhile to review both in the light of this
experience.
The major types of control system for polluted fluid streams include
filtration, electrostatic precipitators, packed towers (absorption
and particulate collectors), adsorption and incineration. These
are described by O'Connel (8).

4. TREATING THE EMISSION PRODUCTS

Relief streams may contain liquids, solids or gases or any

combination of all three. Whereas it is quite usual to consider
the relief stream as if it were pure gas such a simplification is
dangerous as two phase flow often obtains.
Duxbury (7) gives a comprehensive discussion of the sizing of the
relief system for 2 phase flow and also reviews the work reported
by Huff (16) and Gartner (17). Two phase flow following bursting
disc operation was observed by Kneale and Binns (69).
Two phase flow directly affects not only the relief valve design
and sizing but also has major impact on the methods required for
dealing with the products.
A general taxonomy of relief systems is given in Figure 1. From
this the strategies derived for dealing with the relief products
can be categorized.
In general, any stream containing liquid or solid or both, should
not be relieved directly to atmosphere. Mixtures containing two
or even three phases must first be separated. The liquid and/or
solid is collected and must be contained for later treatment.
Separation methods range from the simplest, such as knockout pots
and cyclones, to the most sophisticated, such as filters, bag
houses and electrostatic precipitators.
The gas stream, whether originally pure, or first separated, can
only be discharged directly to atmosphere if it can be safely
dispersed. If it contains toxic or flammable pollutants it must be
treated or flared.

5. DISPERSION

If flammable gases are to be relieved to atmosphere, it is necessary

to check that the relief stream either cannot reach a source of
ignition, or that if ignited it will burn harmlessly. Gas
released from a relief valve or bursting disc enters the atmosphere
as a high velocity jet. Interaction of- jets with stagnant
atmosphere was studied by Ricou and Spalding (18). Sonic velocity

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releases give very rapid dilution so that jet action usually

ensures more than 100 fold dilution within 200 nozzle diameters,
guaranteeing dilution to below the lower flammable limit.
Unfortunately, release from a relief system is not a steady state
phenomenon and flow velocity will fall off from sonic to a low
velocity so that the initial turbulent upward jet will change to
a dense gas diffusion cloud, a phenomenon which has been referred
to as slumping. Calculation methods for such regimes have been
proposed by Ooms et al (19) and by Hoehne and Luce (20). It is
obvious, but nevertheless worth stressing, that a bursting disc
cannot re-close after firing so that release from a disc system is
certain to proceed through the slumping phase.
Marshall (21,22) thoroughly analysed the size of flammable clouds
arising from continuous releases to atmosphere.
In still air and where the density differences between the gas and
air are relatively small the formulas given by Hess et al may be
used (56).
Dense gas releases continue to receive considerable attention
including some large scale field trials to test the physical models.
Excellent recent reviews are available by Pikaar and others (23,24,
25).
Liquid releases are not the subject of this paper. It has already
been emphasised that liquids should not be released to atmosphere:
they should be separated and contained. Flashing liquid release
is a special case which has produced many accidents. An abnormal
but highly dangerous situation arises if liquefied gas vessels are
overfilled to relief valve level. For consideration of liquefied
gas release the reader is referred to a recent paper by Van der
Akker et al (26).
The dispersion of toxic releases, if gaseous, can be calculated by
the same methods as for flammable gases given by Marshall (21,22).
The deposition of particulates has been thoroughly described by
Clancey (27).
The Safety and Reliability Directorate of the UK Atomic Energy
Authority have recently published a large number of reports of work
undertaken for HSE. These include descriptions of CRUNCH a computer
model to describe continuous release to atmosphere of denser than
air vapours (28), the transition from pressure energy to gravity
slumping during dense gas release (29) and DENZ a computer program
for the calculation of the Dispersion of Dense or Explosive Gases
in the atmosphere (30). Extensive references are included. These
programs are still under active development.

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6 FLARING

In large installations such as oil refineries, petro-chemical plants,

storage and shipping facilities flare relief systems are provided
as the method of disposal for liquid and gaseous effluents from
normal and abnormal plant operations. A good general paper by
Boeije describes the design of Flare Relief Systems (31).

The efficiencies of flares as destructors of combustible gases

have been extensively studies using propylene/nitrogen mixtures
with steam and air assisted flares. This study (32) funded by the
Environmental Protection Agency and the Chemical Manufacturers
Association showed combustion efficiencies well above 99%. Smoke
causative factors are also explored. The same study is reported by
Keller and Noble of John Zink (33) who claim that flares have
destructive efficiencies equal or greater than those of reasonably
available control technology.

Brzustowski (34, 35) has researched and published extensively

particularly in connection with radiation from elevated flares.
Emergency flares must be able to handle difficult fuels over an
enormous turn-down ratio with minimum pollution and noise. They
must have reliable pilot burners and flame holders and give a long
service life in rugged environments (36).

New technology has been developed particularly in relation to off-

shore applications (37). The Coanda effect has been utilized by
B.P. to produce new burners and has been widely reported by Kaldair
(51). The prediction of thermal radiation from flares continues to
receive much attention (38, 39).

Fumarola et al (49) recently proposed new flame models with

radiation developed along the axis of the flame rather than
considering the flame as a point source and McMurray (50) reported
field tests which support the use of an integrated mixed source
model.

Much of the above discussion is particularly relevant only to off-

shore and the largest land based applications. For more modest
installations it is nevertheless necessary to check what would
happen if the relief exhaust ignited, as many reported incidents
show can happen. For personnel exposed to radiation a figure of
400 BTU h1ft2 has been the recommended maximum continuous
exposure and 5000 BTU h1ft2 for unattended but exposed steel
plant (37).

Finally Gerardu (55) concluded that it is often simpler and safer

to have a safety valve vent directly than to connect it to a flare
system. However, it is then necessary to design for secondary
effects, such as cloud ignition.

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Flame Arresters
Sometimes, but not always, flame arresters are specified on relief
valve lines. There is no definitive code as to the requirements
and use of flame arresters in the UK, or to the authors knowledge
elsewhere. They are usually applied to the vents of vessels
containing explosive atmospheres to prevent ignition on the
atmospheric side flashing back and causing tank explosions. A
good guide to their use was given by HSE (40) and a fuller
discussion by Rogowski of Fire Research (41). It should be noted
that to comply with flash back resistance requirements, the
arrester element must be capable of holding a pre-mixed flame of
an appropriate gas mixture for 2 hours. Arresters in pipelines
containing flowing gases must be protected by temperature sensing
devices which alarm, and provision for extinguishing the flame.
As the tail pipe of a relief valve is usually in a "safe location",
it is also remote, difficult to maintain and inaccessible.
Flame arresters in such locations may not get the maintenance
attention they need, and block, freeze-up, or corrode. For this
reason, they are often deliberately omitted (31).

7. SCRUBBING

There is a large choice of versatile equipment available for the

absorption of soluble gases or particulates from gas streams. Wet
scrubbers are organised into generic groups in The Scrubber Hand-
book (42) and are further well described by Calvert (43).
For gas absorption the most usual equipment is a packed tower or a
plate column using sieve or bubble caps. Gas atomised spray units,
Venturi scrubbers and centrifugal spray units are also described.
The situation differs markedly depending on whether there is a
steady state normal exhaust load for the scrubber. This may be
size determining with a modest extra capacity for the occasional
relatively small relief stream. Alternatively, the relief stream
may be the major, and hence size determining load. In that case
the utmost simplicity and robustness are important. This usually
means simple packed columns, spray towers or Venturi units. The
scrubbing liquid depends on the nature of the pollutant to be
removed. Water, alkali, acids and solvents are the usual choices.
Design methods are well established (44) but absorption equilibrium
data for even fairly common pollutants may be difficult to find.
It should be noted that if a continuously operating scrubber is
provided against the possibility of a relief stream expected to
occur only rarely the chemical cost of make-up can be very high.

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For example, if a plant is continuously extracted with a negative

pressure exhaust system and this stream is alkali scrubbed to
remove possible acid relief streams, the alkali will absorb
carbon dioxide from the air. It is not usual to rely on
instrumentation to commission such equipment only at the time of
relief. Such solutions can be possible given sufficient design
attention but will need expensive duplicated equipment for
reliability.
All wet scrubbers have potential pollution problems at the gas
outlet. Great attention has to be paid to the prevention of spray,
mists and carry-over. If the gas stream is hot the heat balance
will need careful study to prevent boiling in the scrubber. Water
injection may be a solution in this case.

8. CONTAINMENT
The effluent from the relief may be too toxic or the instantaneous
rate of relief too high to be treated economically. In such cases
it has been found possible to collect and totally contain the
exhaust stream in another vessel where it can be held for subsequent
treatment. Such systems range from the simplest relatively small
drums used for abnormal overfill situations to the most sophisti-
cated, such as described by Speechly et al (48) for the containment
of very toxic compounds.
Exhaust total containment systems have the obvious advantage that
nothing gets out during the originating event so that the results
of the incident can be dealt with later.
There are, however, several problems:

The capital cost is high

The reaction forces have to be dealt with carefully in the
whole system.
Unless good and reliable instrumentation is provided a leak
across the relief system may not be detected and the overfill
capacity be quickly used up.
The testing of the systems needs careful planning and design.
Ultimate method of containment is to make the original vessel
strong enough to withstand any foreseen temperature and pressure
(see para.11 below) rise.

9. REACTION FORCES
Woods and Thornton (57) gave an extensive introduction to this
subject and showed how the transient forces could be calculated
on the reactor, the building, the reactor supports and the ducts.

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Operational experience with total containment will be discussed by

Welding (71).
The reactive forces during violent venting following sudden relief
have to be predicted in order to avoid secondary damage to plant
or structure. Hattwig (58) observed that the situation can be
particularly dangerous with large cylindrically shaped vertical
vessels with a lateral vent, a solution often used for the
explosion relief position. Research is reported with vents up to
0.5 m2 area in vessels of up to 5 m3. It is concluded that the
maximum recoils force can be calculated by the formula:
K = Area (1.27 Pred-1)
where Pred is the reduced explosion pressure obtained in the
interior of the vented vessel.
Porter (59) analysed the initial thrust on the supports of a
totally enclosed system within which two vessels, the reactor and
the container are connected by a bursting disc. He concluded
that the thrust when the disc first ruptures is significantly lower
than for free jet flow and the maximum thrust is given by:
K = Area (Pvessel Patmosphere)
Jones and Beveridge (70) are reporting on scale model experiments
with interactive effects of bursting discs in a relief manifold.

10. NOISE

Pressure control and relief valves are among the principal sources
of noise on a chemical plant and the noise aspect of relief has to
be considered to safeguard operatives and neighbouring residents.
Once the pressure ratio across the valve approaches the critical
value of about 1.85 the valve becomes a very efficient noise
generator. The situation is not helped by the tall vertical stack
often used for dispersion reasons which tends to broadcast noise.
In an excellent general paper Shearer (45) shows that the noise
level in decibels measured 200 ft. from a vent, regardless of
initial temperature and pressure can be approximated by 25 log10V,
where V is the volumetric discharge in scfh.
This was experimentally confirmed over a range from 3000 to 1
million scfh.
Useful advice on relief valve noise attenuation methods is given
and the insertion losses of screens is discussed.
Halter and Hollingworter (46) describe the development of a new
vent noise silencer and give a comprehensive list of references.
A very useful general paper by Davis and Monk (47) outlines the
various on-plant and environmental noise criteria appropriate to

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chemical plant and discusses methods of noise control for general

venting considerations. It points out that whereas silencers
giving noise reductions of 50-60 dB are available they are liable
to blockage and may not be acceptable in reactor vents. These
may have to be dealt with by remote location and forbidding access
particularly if noise levels can exceed 125 dB.

11. REDUCING THE PROBLEM

It has by now perhaps been shown that dealing with the relieving
process is not as simple as at first appears. A thorough hazard
and operability analysis of the conditions under which the relief
valve may lift in all exceptional circumstances will often lead
to the discovery of new and as yet unforeseen possibilities.
Overpressure may arise from any one or more of conditions such as:

Loss of cooling water

Loss of electricity
Failure of mechanical drives to pumps or fans
Failure of heat exchanger tube
Failure of heat source control
Excess chemical reaction due to
improper feed rate
contamination
poor temperature control
Failure of control systems
Operator error
Fire

It has been shown that for at least some of these conditions

merely specifying venting to a safe place is not sufficient.
Most probably there will be two-phase flow. This will need some
form of separation equipment. If the gas is flammable it may need
a flare; or in the absence of a flare, dispersion calculations are
needed. Even if the dispersion is acceptable under sonic discharge
conditions it may not be when the plume slumps. Toxicity of the
vented products has also to be considered and treatment may call
for expensive equipment. The whole process may need alarms and
further automatic actions for detecting, arresting and snuffing
flames. The possible inventory of control equipment that may be
required to be added to an emergency vent seems endless.

In the circumstances it seems wise and expedient to stand back

and re-examine the needs and objectives.

It is often feasible to avoid at least some of the relief needs by

more care at the design stage. It is not possible to generalise
here but some examples are:

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1. Vacuum collapse. Where collapse of vessels or tanks could

result in dangerous releases the vessel should, if at all
possible, be designed for full vacuum, rather than to rely
on fallible relief devices and instrumentation. Otherwise
expensive redundant systems will be required.
2. Distillation Columns. If distillation columns can be designed
for the maximum process temperature and pressure corresponding
to maximum heat source temperature, with simultaneous condenser
failure then the relief possibility can be reduced or avoided.
Walker (54) showed how difficult it is to establish values for
emergency reliefs on large distillation towers. Combination of
maximum steam to reboiler with condenser failure gives very
high relief rates. The addition of redundant controls is
recommended to avoid such a possibility.
It is usually possible to predict the ultimate temperature and
pressure that a system can reach in the event of control failure,
human error or chemical excursions. Very often the mechanical
design can be made to cope with these conditions at perhaps
acceptable additional cost. This can be done in 2 ways:
1. If the event can be predicted by hazard analysis, to occur
only very rarely, say 1 in 1000 years to 1 in 10000 years,
the vessel can be designed for overstress beyond the yield
point but within the bursting strength.
2. If the event is likely at frequencies of the order of 1:10 to
1:100 years, it may still be possible to design the vessel to
contain the explosion pressure. Of course, small thermal
and overfill relief will still have to be provided.

QUESTIONS AND CONCLUSION

As with all safety systems, additional protection against very low

probability events can be obtained by the expenditure of more
design effort, equipment and money. A great deal of judgement and
experience is needed to decide when enough has been done. Many
awkward questions such as the following need consideration and
some of these are of general interest.
1. Overfill
Can reactor or pressure vessel overfill occur? If it does,
will the relief device function? If so, will the relief go to
a safe place? Can it ignite? Will radiation from the flame
be acceptable?
2. Fire
Is relief valve expected to operate during fire? Will exhaust
ignite? Is this situation tolerable? Can flame travel back
into the vessel and cause explosion?

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3. Flare
If the relief is provided only for the fire case, should it
still have to be exhausted to a safe place e.g. a flare, or
can it be its won flare?
4. Fire Brigade
Are the fire brigade expected to be subjected to greater risk
than the plant operators from emission or radiation?
5. Toxicity
What are the acceptable levels of toxicity at the relief
exhaust to atmosphere? If the level is to be, say 1 ppm,
where should this be measured?
Should the relief from the top of a distillation column be
allowed to exhaust corrosive chemicals (e.g. phenol) when the
bottom is on fire?
6. Leakage
Does it matter if the relief valve leaks slightly? Will it be
known if it does? Are detectors necessary?
7. Ancillary equipment
Are alarms, detectors, flame arresters, sniffers and snuffers
needed and provided? Can they be tested in situ?
8. Double Jeopardy
It is often argued that design need not address double or
triple jeopardy. If for example, reactor over-pressure due
to operator error combined with alarm failure causes relief
valve operation followed by vent ignition, is this double or
triple jeopardy? Does containment also have to be provided?
9. Size of Inflammable Release
Is there a minimum cloud size which, even if ignited, can
be considered safe? For example if by the time sonic jet
discharge ceases, there is only 100 kg. left, can this be
ignored?

Unfortunately there are no generalised, easy or definitive answers

to these questions. They each need analysing, case by case. It
has been the purpose of this review to indicate some useful
sources of the information and the contributions made at this symposium
have widely extended this knowledge.

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APPENDIX 1
MAJOR INCIDENTS FOLLOWING RELIEF SYSTEM OPERATION

1. On the 10th June 1981 at Farmland Industries Inc. Minnesota U.S.A.

a relief valve on a 250 ton pressurized storage vessel vented
approx. 50 tons of anhydrous ammonia into the atmosphere. The
resulting ammonia drifted slowly over a nearby highway where
most of the people were injured. 30 injuries occurred.(60)

2. On the 7th February 1977 at Polmadie in Scotland a 100 ton LPG

storage bullet was enveloped in flame from an ignited leak
while being filled from a road tanker. The fixed drencher
system failed to operate and the fire brigade had to cool the
tanker by means of jets. The relief valve on the heated tank
operated and the gas stream ignited. 55 tonnes of propane was
lost. The cost was 45,000. Only the driver suffered
injuries. (61)
(This example raises the question: Should the relief valve
exhaust be near enough the tank to be enveloped in the fire?)

3. In Chicago, in October 1961 an explosion occurred in a

processing operation which killed one person and injured 250.
An uncontrolled chemical reaction occurred in a vessel
involving vinyl acetate, ethyl acetate and benzoyl peroxide.
When the reaction went out of control the relief valve vent
discharged into the building a large volume of flammable
vapours. This was followed by explosion and severe damage to
adjacent buildings where most of the injured people were
employed. (62)

4. In Ohio in April 1962 in a Petrochemical Plant pressure built-

up in a benzene stripper column causing a 6" relief valve to
discharge. The vapours were ignited in an adjacent building
at a gasfired superheater. The resultant explosion caused 1
death 3 injuries and cost $5 million. (63).

5. In a Monsanto Polystyrene Plant, at La Salle, Quebec, Canada

on 13 October 1966 an explosion of styrene vapours completely
demolished the building and killed 11 operators. (64)
The rupture disc on the reactor had relieved onto the roof but
nevertheless the building was filled with styrene which
exploded. The subsequent investigation concluded that a glass
inspection point above the rupture disc had failed allowing the
vapour into the building.

The following 3 incidents report vapour cloud explosion and are

noted in Davenports Update presented at Harrogate (53).

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6. On 24 July 1952 in Kansas City USA a LPG discharge from relief

valve on full tank of an LPG powere truck exploded and killed
2. (66)
7. On 6 August 1953 in Canpara, Argentina, the vent discharge
from a gasoline overpressure led to a cloud and ignition at an
adjacent furnace. There were 3 explosions and 2 fatalities (53)
8. On 19 December 1955 in N. Tonawanda New York 2.5 tons of
ethylene were released after a rupture disc operation. There
was widespread damage within a radius of 1.6 km.(53)
9. On 7 November 1975 at Beek in Holland more than 5 tonnes of
propylene passed out of a relief valve into a C.steel flare
header. A 2 inch pipe cracked, the cloud ignited in about
2 minutes and was ignited by a furnace 15 m. away. There were
14 fatalities and damage was 70 million dollars (65).
10. In 1978 the H & SE Report on Manufacturing Industries again
reports a number of incidents with exothermic reactions going
out of control. (67)
In one such incident caused by cooling water supply failure
excess heat led to pressure rise. Two bursting discs in the
relief line ruptured and the contents of the reactor were
ejected onto nearby houses. This is believed to be a
phenol formaldehyde incident.
11. On 12 June 1978 at Enit Oklahoma a refrigeration tripout
released ammonia vapours which were ignited by the flare on
top of the tank. 9 firefighters suffered ammonia inhalation.
After the accident the flare was moved. (68).

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45. Shearer K. "The Prediction and Control of Chemical Plant

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59. Porter W-H.L. "The Thrust on the Supports of a 2-Chamber

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APPENDIX 2 : DECISION TREE FOR RELIEF DISPOSAL

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Figure 1. The taxonomy of relief disposal

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