• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.35 no.6
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• pp.25-31
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• 2020

Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion(BLEVE) can cause not only economic damage to the plant but also serious casualties. LPG accidents account for 89.6 percent of all accidents caused by gas leaks in Korea over the past nine years, while casualties from accidents also account for 73 percent of all accidents, according to statistics from the Korea Gas Safety Corporation. In addition, a potential explosion and a fire accident from one LPG storage tank may affect the nearby storage tanks, causing secondary and tertiary damage (domino effect). The safety distance standards for LPG used by LPG workplaces, charging stations, and homes in Korea have become stricter following the explosion of LPG charging stations in Bucheon. The safety distance regulation is divided into regulations based on the distance damage and the risk including frequency. This study suggests two approaches to optimizing the safety distance based on the just consequence and risk including frequencies. Using the Phast 7.2 Risk Assessment software by DNV GL, the explosion overpressure and heat radiation were derived according to the distance caused by BLEVE in the worst-case scenario, and accident and damage probability were derived by considering the probit function and domino effect. In addition, the safety distance between LPG tanks or LPG charging stations was derived to minimize damage effects by utilizing these measures.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.47-60
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• 2021

Hydrogen is a next-generation energy source, and according to the roadmap for activating the hydrogen economy, it is expected that industries to stably produce, store, and transport of hydrogen as well as the supply of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles will be made rapidly. Accordingly, safety measures for accidents of hydrogen vehicles in confined spaces such as tunnels are required. In this study, as part of a study to ensure the safety of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in road tunnels, a basic investigation and research on the risk of fire and explosion due to gas leakage and hydrogen tank rupture among various hazards caused by hydrogen fuel cell vehicle accidents in tunnels was conducted. The following results were obtained. In the event of hydrogen fuel cell vehicle accidents, the gas release rate depends on the orifice diameter of TPRD, and when the gas is ignited, the maximum heat release rate reaches 3.22~51.36 MW (orifice diameter: 1~4 mm) depending on the orifice diameter but the duration times are short. Therefore, it was analyzed that there was little increase in risk due to fire. As the overpressure of the gas explosion was calculated by the equivalent TNT method, in the case of yield of VCE of 0.2 is applied, the safety threshold distance is analyzed to be about 35 m, and number of the equivalent fatalities are conservatively predicted to reach tens of people.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.205-216
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• 2024

Recently, seismic Probabilistic Safety Assessment (PSA) methods have been developed for process plants, such as gas plants, oil refineries, and chemical plants. The framework originated from the PSA of nuclear power plants, which aims to assess the risk of reactor core damage. The original PSA method was modified to adopt the characteristics of a process plant whose purpose is continuous operation without shutdown. Therefore, a fault tree, whose top event is shut down, was constructed and transformed into a Bayesian Network (BN), a probabilistic graph model, for efficient risk-informed decision-making. In this research, the fault tree-based BN from the previous research is further developed to consider the multi-hazard of earthquake-induced fire and explosion (EQ-induced F&E). For this purpose, an event tree describing the occurrence of fire and explosion from a release is first constructed and transformed into a BN. And then, this BN is connected to the previous BN model developed for seismic PSA. A virtual plot plan of a gas plant is introduced as a basis for the construction of the specific EQ-induced F&E BN to test the proposed BN framework. The paper demonstrates the method through two examples of risk-informed decision-making. In particular, the second example verifies how the proposed method can establish a repair and retrofit strategy when a shutdown occurs in a process plant.

• Fire Science and Engineering
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.19-24
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• 2017

Flammable substances are used in laboratories and industrial process. The flash point (FP) is one of the most important physical properties used to determine the potential for characterizing the fire and explosion hazard of liquids. The FP data at 101.3 kPa were measured for the binary systems {toluene+ethylbenzene}, {methlycyclohenxane+ethylbenzene} and {n-heptane+ ethylbenzene}. The experiments were performed according to the standard test method (ASTM D 3278) using a SETA closed cup flash point tester. The measured FPs were compared with the values predicted using the following activity coefficient models: Wilson, Non-Random Two Liquid (NRTL), and UNIversal QUAsiChemical (UNIQUAC). The average absolute deviation between the predicted and measured lower FP was less than 1.74 K.

• Journal of ILASS-Korea
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.107-113
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• 2015

To date, the demand for Combined Cycle Power Plant (CCPP) has been continuously increased to overcome the problem of air pollution and lack of energy. In particular, the underground CCPP is exposed to substantial fire and explosion risks induced by gas leakage. The present study conducted numerical simulations to examine the fire behavior and gas leakage characteristics for a restricted region including gas turbine and other components used in a typical CCPP system. The commercial code of FLUENT V.14 was used for simulation. From the results, it was found that flammable limit distribution of leakage gas affects fire behavior. Especially, the flame is propagated in an instant in restricted region with LNG gas. In addition, consequence analysis factors such as critical temperature and radiation heat flux are introduced. These results would be useful in making the safety guidelines for the underground CCPP.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2009.07a
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• pp.1215_1216
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• 2009

Most transformer use insulating and cooling fluids derived from petroleum crude oil, but mineral oil is some possibility of environmental pollution and fire with explosion. vegetable oil fluids extracted from seed has superior biodegradation and fire-resistant properties including an exceptionally high fire point enhancing fire safety. In this study, it is aimed at the practicality of substituting natural ester dielectric fluid for mineral oil in liquid insulation system of transformers. As a rise in coil winding temperature has a direct influence on transformer life time, it is important to evaluate the temperature rise of coil winding in vegetable oil in comparison with mineral oil. Three transformers for the test are designed with 10KVA, 13.2KV, one phase unit. The temperature are directly measured in insulating oil of these transformers with the two sorts of natural ester and mineral oil dielectric fluid respectively. Temperature of vegetable oil transformers was similar to temperature of mineral oil transformer in the same design at 80% load and above.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Building Construction Conference
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• 2008.05a
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• pp.173-176
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• 2008

There are researches are in progress on ensuring the safety of the high impact concrete in cases of fire which is a current rising social problem and this research institute also developed PFB technology, the explosion preventing technology. PFB technology is to apply POSCO E&C Fire Board, a fireproof board, with an adhesive agent on the construction site, and this technology passed 3-hour fireproof test and this technology was proven from a previous research that the temperature of main root is maintained under 200 ℃. Therefore, tests on basic contents to be examined before the actual construction in this research by with a wooden prototype of a full scale to apply PFB technology to actual construction sites and tests are being done on the workability of fireproof board, the adhesive power, the resistance against imprint of wooden nail, the heat conductivity and etc. As the results of those tests, PFB technology was proven to have an excellent workability at a construction site and to be easy for processing and also this technology was proven to have a great the resisting power against imprint of wooden nail, so this research has confirmed that PFB technology has no problem to be applied on a construction site.

• Fire Science and Engineering
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.1-6
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• 2018

The flash point is one of the most important parameters used to characterize the ignition and explosion hazards of liquids. Flash points were measured for several binary systems containing toluene, including {methanol+toluene}, {ethanol+toluene}, and {1-propanol+toluene}. Experiments were performed according to the standard test method using a SETA closed cup flash point tester. The measured flash points were compared with the predicted values calculated using the following $G^E$ models: Wilson, NRTL, and UNIQUAC. The average absolute deviation between the predicted and measured lower flash point was less than 1.69 K.

• Fire Science and Engineering
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.17-22
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• 2009

Epoxy powder is being in use for insulation materials widely. Especially, in cause of coating insulation can be caused electrical fire and explosion by Joul's heat. This study has been compared and examined around breakdown, arc discharge, and V-t about insulation of Epoxy powder. Also, it has been researched about insulation which is cause of electrical fire and its basic data. According to temperature change, sample KS was stable before the Tg to be about $8{\sim}10%$ decrease in the breakdown test. In case of V-t and arc discharge, it had been kept up suitable characteristic. Also, in case of electrical characteristic, sample KS has excellent capacity.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.33-39
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• 2020

In general, in a batch reaction process in which products are made using flammable liquids, splash filling is used to clean the walls of the reactor by spraying flammable liquids, which are raw materials used for product, during cleaning of the reactor after work. During this process, mist of flammable liquid is generated, the lower limit of explosion is lowered, and fire·explosion may occur due to discharges caused by various types of complex charges, such as flow charge, collision charge, and ejection charge. Therefore, based on the recent accident case, to identify the risk when working in the form of splash filling with toluene in a batch process and perform an explosion impact analysis using the TNT equivalent method After that, we will analyze the accident results and suggest preventive measures such as constant purge system, improvement of cleaning method, and use of tantalum to prevent such accident.