About the project
Gexcon was awarded Subcontract 12121-6403-01 under the Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America (RPSEA), whereby the objective of the project is to improve inherently safer offshore facility designs.
One of the main goals of this research project is to provide large-scale DDT explosion data and validate the tools necessary to predict vapour cloud explosions in the early design phase. The work will also be used to develop guidance documents and recommended practices for facility owners and designers in order to minimise the potential consequence of explosion incidents.
The large-scale testing was conducted in a test rig of 51,840 ft3 (1,459 m3 ) gross volume. The tests involved the evaluation of deflagrations and DDTs involving stoichiometric, lean and rich mixtures of ethylene, propane and methane. Further phases of the testing evaluated the effectiveness of other mitigation measures (e.g., water deluge, solid inhibitor) on the explosion consequences. These experiments were to be used to validate and further develop industry-accepted CFD tools and more simplified methods in their prediction of DDTs at a large scale including events involving mitigation.
Research into DDT events and mitigation
