Modeling failure time of atmospheric tanks with safety barriers under multiple pool fires

Abstract

Chemical parks are often characterized by the layout of numerous large atmospheric storage tanks, which may trigger domino effect when they encounter pool fire accidents, eventually leading to major damage that cannot be prevented. Safety barriers are necessary to effectively mitigate and prevent the possibility of incidents. Previous studies have not focused on the expansion of domino accidents caused with pool fires under safety barriers. To address this shortcoming, this study investigates failure scenarios with the coupling influence of multiple pool fires in safety barriers. Three atmospheric storage tanks were selected and analyzed as domino accident scenarios and were laid out as isosceles triangles. which conforms to the national standard GB50341-2014. Numerical simulation study of atmospheric storage tanks with multiple pool fires under safety barriers. The atmospheric tanks with volumes of 1000 m³, 2000 m³, 3000 m³ and 5000 m³ were selected. Flame temperature derived from Pyrosim was inputted into the finite element model. The fireproof coating and water sprinklers are selected as typical safety barriers, and this design criterion meets the domestic requirements. ABAQUS was used to conduct intricate numerical simulations of temperature and stress fields within the targeted tanks. The results showed that the target tank with safety barriers had a longer failure time than the target tank without safety barriers under multiple pool fire conditions. The comparison of stress and yield strength was used to determine whether the target tank failed or not. The failure time of tanks under safety barriers and multiple pool fires was modeled. Through the verification, the model was validated to have a deviation of 4.02%, which is superior to the 15.76% deviation of Cozzani's model. This study provides valuable insights for improving the safety and risk management of chemical parks, offering a foundation for the design of more resilient storage tank systems in industrial settings.