Gas Leak

It is a practise in our facility that whenever there is a gas leak from a flange,a steam hose is applied to the point of leak. The reason provided is to dilute the gas.

The gas is ethylene at 100 to 300 barg.

Any comments on this? Do any of you use any other method to mitigate online HC leaks in the plant.


AFD

Basically, what you describe is some simple, mobile form of a "steam curtain". Other methods used are fixed steam curtains and mobile or fixed water curtains. Water curtains can be provided using either spray nozzles or water monitors.

Purpose of all these systems is to generate some air flow in order to move and dilute the flammable gas. Preferably they are located as close as possible to the potential leak sources (flanges), but sometimes they are also employed in front of potential ignition sources (e.g. fired heaters).

An example of a steam curtain used in an ethylene plant to prevent ignition of a flammable gas cloud by the cracking heaters is given in the following link (see picture 3): http://www.basf.de/e...3LQ1w7s9Qbsf3kt

Gvdlans,

I was thinking on the static charge that can build,as steam and ethylene are static charge generators.Is nitrogen not a better tool to dilute and disperse the HC.

AFD

You can and have to prevent static charges by proper grounding and bonding.

Nitrogen will not always be present in sufficient quantities and has its own safety issues (asphyxiation).