June 5, 2011

A piece of cloth causes chlorine release!

An interesting incident is mentioned by Stephen P. Andrew, T. Kim Parnell, Robert Caligiuri, Lawrence Eiselstein of Parnell Engineering and consulting:
"A process upset at a chlorine production facility resulted in a release that forced the partial evacuation of a nearby town. Investigations revealed that the events commenced with the failure of a shell and tube heat exchanger used to condense chlorine gas. Post-incident inspections revealed a cloth at the liquefier coolant inlet that accelerated the flow in that region, causing certain tubes to be breached. As a result, the water-based brine liquefier coolant was entrained in the chlorine process stream, forming a highly acidic oxidizing mixture. This corrosive mixture then flowed to the chlorine storage tanks destroying an elbow in the tank inlet piping and rendering the tank shut-off tank valve ineffective, thus allowing chlorine to vent into the atmosphere".
Read the detailed report in this link. 

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