QRA Presentation

Agenda
Introduction to Risk Assessment
Introduction to PHAST: Inputs-Scenario, Weather, Material, Map
Discharge Modelling
Flammable & Toxic Gas Dispersion
Parts Count and Failure Frequency
Input to PHAST Risk (Population, Ignition Sources, Inserting Map)
Risk Estimation (Individual and Societal Risk, Risk Criteria)

Common Definitions
Hazard: A state or condition having the potential to cause a deviation
from uniform or intended behaviour which, in turn, may result in damage
to property, people or environment

Incident: Actual Realization of Hazard i.e. an event or chain of events,

which has caused or could have caused personal injury, damage to
property or environment

What is QRA?

Means of making a systematic analysis of the risks from hazardous

activities, and forming a rational evaluation of their significance, in
order to provide input to a decision-making process.

Objective of QRA

To identify and quantify the major process hazards associated with in the
facility.

Assess the acceptability of the risks to people against internationally

recognised criteria.

Identify the main risk contributors in order to establish potential risk reduction
measures.

Why Risk Assessment required?

Legal requirement ?

To understand risks and manage them effectively

Insurance requirement

Improve the morale of operating staff

Why Risk Assessment required?

Risk Management Workflow

Hazard Identification
A qualitative review of Possible incidents that may occur, based on previous
accident, experience or engineering judgement, creating synthetic situations
where necessary.

Failure cases are usually derived by breaking the process system down into subsystems when required

Hazard Identification Needs

Types of materials handled, stored and used

Hazard potential based on material properties and conditions
Types of Hazard Events e.g. Vessel Leak, Line rupture, equipment failure, overpressurisation and high temperature
Plant and process information/ Operating conditions
Safety systems provided
Learning from Previous incidents / accidents
Previous Risk analysis if done

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Isolatable sections
The limit of Isolatable sections boundaries are defined by location of the following:

Shutdown Valve
Blowdown Valve
Pressure Safety Valve
Normally closed valve with positive isolation

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Inventory Analysis
Inventory that could potentially be released from each isolatable sections.
Total released inventory = Static Inventory + Dynamic Inventory
Static inventory was the amount of material within the isolatable section's vessels
and piping, prior to a leak
Dynamic Inventory was calculated based on the pumped-in flow rate and the isolation
time by:
I (T ) = I ( S ) + MIN (rL, rP) t
I (T ) =
I(S)=
rL =
rP =
t=

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Total potential inventory released (kg)

Static inventory (kg)
Leak rate (kg/s)
Process flow rate (kg/s)
Release duration (s)

Meteorological Conditions
Maximum Ambient Temperature

39.4C

Average Barometric Pressure

1.010 bar

Relative Humidity

61%

Solar Radiation

1 kW/m2

Surface Roughness Coefficient

0.1m

Stability Class

Definition

Very Unstable

Unstable

Slightly Unstable

Neutral

Slightly Stable

Stable

The Pasquill Atmospheric Stability Classes

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Population Data
Onsite Population
Worker Category
A shift
B shift
General shift

No. of person
45
45
15

Offsite population around 200

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Hour per day (A)

8
8
9

Day per Week (B)

7
7
5

Week Per year

(C) (Note 1)
52
52
52

No. of Hours Spent

per year
( A x B x C)
2,912
2,912
2,340

RELEASE SECTIONS
The key factors in the selection of these representative sections are:

Material / phase released (pressurized gas/atmospheric liquid etc.)

Release condition (whether the driver for the release is the inventory of a vessel
upstream, pressure, etc.)
Process conditions (temperature and pressure)
Release location (the area in which the release occurs, including the height)
Isolation

RELEASE (HOLE) SIZES

For each of the sections containing process equipment / piping / pipeline, three
representative release sizes are considered:

Large leaks(50-150)

100 mm diameter hole

Medium leaks(10-50)

25 mm diameter hole

Small leaks (3-10)

5 mm diameter hole

Failure Frequency Analysis

Once the potential hazards have been identified, failure frequency estimates how
likely it is for the accidents to occur, based on the type and number of equipment
components included in the defined failure cases
Parts count of equipment, flanges, valves, etc.
The component failure frequencies to be used are usually derived from an analysis
of historical accident experience (Failure databases)
UK HSE Failure Frequencies Database
OGP (Oil and Gas procedure) for frequencies of failure

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Consequence Analysis
In parallel with the frequency analysis, consequence modelling evaluates the
resulting effects if the accidents occur, and their impact on man, machinery and
environment.
Estimation of the consequences of each possible scenario by latest software
modelling.
Consequence analysis requires the modelling of a number of distinctive phases,
i.e. Discharge rate, evaporation, dispersion of flammable and toxic gases , fires
and explosions etc.

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Classification of Consequence
Toxic / Flammable Gas release
Fire (Jet Fire, Flash Fire, Pool Fire) leading to injury, fatality or property damage
Vapour Cloud Explosion leading to injury, fatality or property damage

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Toxic
Dispersion of toxic material in the atmosphere is a function of source strength,
relative density of toxic cloud, weather conditions etc. The severity of harm
depends on the exposed concentration level and exposure time
For the purpose of analysis we consider fatality as the concentration of interest,
as the data for fatality can be available from the history while it is difficult to get
data for injury accurately.
NIOSH (National Institute Of Safety & Health) have defined different
Threshold concentrations levels (TWA, STEL, ERPG, IDLH etc) based on exposure
time.
time-weighted average (twa)
short term exposure limit(STEL)
Emergency Response Planning Guidelines (ERPGs)
Immediately Dangerous to Life or Health
Concentrations (IDLH)

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Fire
A release of flammable substance results in various events depending upon
direct or delayed ignition. Different types of fire are envisaged based on its
shape such as jet fire, pool fire etc. The shape of fire again depends on storage
condition, release condition, ignition etc.
Personal injury, death or damage to properties may occur either by direct flame
or the radiation which goes around the flame.

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Jet Fire
Release of a flammable material
at high pressure due to hardware
failure
(leak)
may
lead
to
formation of jet, which may cause
jet fire on immediate availability
of ignition.

The Jet Fire could damage the

neighboring vessels / tanks by
direct flame impingement. The
thermal radiations may as well
affect surrounding population.

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Flash Fire
A Flash Fire is low-intensity combustion
without explosion, whose effect zone is up
to the LFL (Lower Flammable Limit) region
of the cloud. A flash fire may occur if the
gas cloud reaches a source of ignition and
rapidly burns back to the source of release.
Due to the short duration of a flash fire,
only people within the fire path will be
affected.

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Pool Fire
A pool fire is a turbulent diffusion fire
burning above a horizontal pool of
vaporizing hydrocarbon fuel where the fuel
has zero or low initial momentum.
Fires in the open will be well ventilated
(fuel-controlled),
but
fires
within
enclosures may become under-ventilated
(ventilation-controlled).

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Vapour Cloud Explosion

Continuous release of flammable
material over a period may lead to
formation of vapour cloud due to
non-availability of ignition source.
This may lead to Vapour Cloud
Explosion (VCE), if this cloud gets
ignition before it is diluted to the
concentration below the Lower
Explosive Limit (LEL) in air. The
explosion may cause overpressure
resulting into damage to the
surrounding
buildings
and
equipment.
Vapour Cloud Explosions (VCE) are
the
most
dangerous
and
destructive explosions in the
chemical process industries.

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Damage Criteria

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Heat Radiation
KW/m2

Damage to Equipment

Damage to People

----

Causes pain if duration

is longer than 20
seconds. Blistering is
unlikely.

12.5

Minimum energy to
ignite wood with a
flame;
Melts plastic tubing.

1% Fatality in 20 sec,
30% Fatality in 30
seconds.

37.5

Severe damage to
plant

100 % Fatality

Explosion Over Pressure Impacts

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Overpressure
Bar

Damage to
Equipment

Damage to People

0.2 - 0.5
(3-8psi)

Heavy damage
to plant &
structure

Fatality probability = 1 for humans

indoor as well as outdoor
> 50% eardrum damage
> 50% serious wounds from flying
objects

0.15 - 0.2
(2-3psi)

Repairable
damage

1% death
> 1% eardrum damage
> 1% serious wounds from flying objects

0.02 - 0.15
(0.3-2psi)

Major glass
damage/10%
glass damage

Slight injury from flying glass

Risk Calculations
When the frequencies and consequences of each modelled scenario have been
estimated, they can be combined to produce Over all Risk Results for the site.
Various forms of risk presentation may be used, commonly grouped as follows:
Individual risk
Societal risk - Often expressed in terms of frequency distribution of multiple
casualty events
(FN curve.)

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Risk Assessment
Risk Assessment is the process of comparing the level of risk against a set
criteria as well as the identification of major risk contributors
Criteria is used as per UK HSE Guidelines

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Risk Assessment Guidelines

Base Data Source Used Worldwide From:
UK HSE Hydrocarbon Release Statistics, HSR 2001 002
Purple (Guideline for quantitative risk assessment)
Yellow (Methods for the calculation of physical effects)
Green (Methods for the determination of possible damage to people
and objects resulting from releases of hazardous materials)
Red Book (Methods for determining and process probabilities)

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Risk Tolerability Criteria - ALARP

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Individual Risk- IR Contour

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Consequence Contours

LPG storage bullet Over pressure - BLEVE (2F)

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Societal Risk- FN Curve

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Societal Risk- FN Curve

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Conclusions
BLEVE in storage LPG bullet; The resulting over pressure of 0.03 bar reaches the
maximum distance of 389m and 0.1 bar reaches the maximum distance of 155m ,
0.3 bar reaches the maximum distance of 84 m . Based on the results, BLEVE
potentially impacts Pump house areas.

The societal risk (F-N Curve) from facility shows that the societal risk falls in the
ALARP region as per the UKHSE Acceptance Criteria with the fatality of 11
persons.

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Recommendations
It is preferable to have fire rated doors at least for 2 hours for office building and
canteen.
Consider providing fire proof wall for office building and Cylinder storage area.
Safety valves must be tested regularly. The block valves before safety valve must
always be kept in open condition when safety valves are in position.
Vehicular traffic as well as entry of personnel inside the plant area must be
restricted.
The water sprinkler system, heat detectors and remote operated valves must be
checked regularly for their timely actuation.
The DG(Diesel Generators) sets must be periodically tested on load to ensure that
it remains always in operating condition.
Safety Audits must be regularly done as per norms and recommendations of
OISD. Risk Analysis Study in future shall be required if there is any change in the
plant facility.

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