Mechanical integrity of process installations: An assessment based on bow-ties

Peter Schmitz*, Paul Swuste, Genserik Reniers, Karolien van Nunen

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

6 Citations (Scopus)
192 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Research was carried out in an ammonia plant of OCI Nitrogen, located at the Chemelot site in Geleen, The Netherlands. It focuses on the development of process safety accident processes in which loss of mechanical integrity is one of the root causes. A significant share of the mechanical integrity scenarios originate from corrosion mechanisms which develop over a relatively long time period, possibly taking months, years or even longer before turning into an event. Based on an example, a failure mechanism is worked out and visualized using a bow tie. Bow-ties have shown a good visual representation of the 'early warnings' and the barriers in place. The monitoring of the 'early warnings' and barriers can provide information about the current probability of the scenario in order to intervene prematurely.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)97-102
Number of pages6
JournalChemical Engineering Transactions
Volume77
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2019

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