- Author
-
Houlding, R. C.
|
Rew, P. J.
- Title
- Assessment of Benefits of Fire Compartmentation in Chemical Warehouses.
- Coporate
- WS Atkins Consultants Ltd., Surrey, England
- Report
-
Research Report 152
2003
57 p.
- Keywords
-
warehouses
|
compartments
|
legislation
|
building codes
|
walls
|
failure
|
probability
|
fire protection
|
fire prevention
|
costs
|
scenarios
|
sensitivity
|
impact
|
storage
|
fire hazards
|
risks
|
risk assessment
|
hazardous materials
|
toxicity
|
fire fighting
|
fire suppression
|
fire departments
- Identifiers
- Australia; New Zealand; review of current legislation and guidance; model framework; probability data for fire protection measures; costs associated with fire prevention measures; model testing; impact of sudden failure of container on compartment wall
- Abstract
- This study concerns the fire protection measures that can be applied to chemical warehouse storage. As discussed by Tyldesley, fire hazards from pesticide warehouses have been the topic of much research, because they are subject to major hazard legislation in Europe. However, while experience has shown that fires in non-pesticide chemical warehouses are also a concern, specific advice for the design of such warehouses is lacking, particularly with regard to the minimisation of off-site hazards, such as the effects of dispersion of smoke. This report discusses the benefit of various compartment wall options in mitigating fire hazards. It then describes the development of a model for comparing the risk reduction resulting from the installation of different fire protection measures within a chemical warehouse site. The review of current legislation and guidance covers building regulations and guidance in the UK (England and Wales and Scotland), and four other countries drawn from Europe/North America/Australia/New Zealand. The types of hazardous incidents considered in the risk assessment model include a fire starting inside a warehouse and a fire starting in open air chemical storage close to the warehouse. Buildings considered have a large range of sizes and cover typical heights, with racked or free standing storage. The model considers five representative chemicals: heptane; acetic acid; aniline, lead oxide and nitric acid.