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A fire broke out in a chemical warehouse that was inactive at the time. The flames had spread through the area used to store acids, bases and peroxides and included 28 storage tanks. This area is separate from the flammable products area. The site's Internal emergency Plan (IOP) was initiated. 

Six tanks containing hydrochloric acid, potash, flocculant, alkaline solutions and soda were destroyed, and the flames damaged five others. Overheating of a heating element in an empty soda tank over several hours caused the incident, as the product low-level detector had not switched off its power supply. The energy produced melted and then ignited the tank filled with HDPE (high-density polyethene). The material of which tank is made of then also fuelled the fire. The operator implemented the following preventive measures: - no heating device on product storage tanks not requiring it; - preference is given to steel or stainless steel tanks with electric or hot water heating; - the new plastic tanks are heated by hot water only; - the heating power must not allow a tank to ignite, - the reliability of the controller used to regulate the tank heating systems must be improved.

Source:Aria database