Fully charged vessels with LPG and risks

[wd1980]

Folks

We have in our Plant two storage vessel of LPG.
one is filled and the other is a back up

from safety perspective is there any recommendation to avoid to have the second one is filled to avoid potential leaks,etc or is it safe to have both of them filled.

these two vessels are above ground and the exterior temperature are sometimes around 47 to 52 deg C in summer and 5-10 deg C in winter

thx

 

[MJCronin]

First, you would be better served if you post in the "Boilers and Pressure Vessel Engineering forum" or, perhaps the "Loss Prevention Engineering forum"

Second, you state NO information about the age, size, coatings, conditions or original vessel certification or periodic inspection of these vessels. Are you storing LPG in tanks that you found along the side of the road ?

Third, where are you located ...????

Lastly, more up-front information will always equal better answers

Any design data sheets or tank drawings available ???

Tell us more

MJCronin
Sr. Process Engineer

 

[LittleInch]

wd1980.

Indeed you offer us little to go on, but clearly anything which has no volatile hydrocarbons in it is lower risk than something which does.

I can only assume these are pressurised LPG vessels or cryogenic ones?

There is NO SUCH THING AS SAFE, only lower or negligible risk. The only "safe" thing to do is to do nothing at all and have nothing.

Then there are operational risks associated with having one vessel empty and de-pressurised / vented being put back into service, perhaps in a hurry / panic. How is that vessel maintained and tested? The risk being that it corrodes and you don't now about it until you fill it full of LPG again.

So long as the vessels are designed for it there is no issue with the temps you mention, however note that if in use, the vessels could become wet with condensation leading to issues with external corrosion if not properly inspected on a regular basis.

All these things are what your technical safety engineer or dept thinks about all day and possibly all night if the plant isn't well inspected or maintained

So we have absolutely no idea if the risk from filling two vessels with LPG is sufficiently low for you to accept that risk or not. Generally government authorities also have a finger in the pie...

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.

 

[don1980]

As inferred by LittleInch, to be objectively safe you'll need to remove all the hazardous materials, and close the plant. That is, find another way to make money. But, you'll then find that other hazards exist in almost every industry. The point here is that we're in the business of managing risks, not eliminating them. We use the word "safe" to mean that we're managing risks with sufficient layers of protection such that the risks are acceptably low, and they meet our risk tolerance.

Are these LPG tanks being managed sufficiently, such that the risk exposure is tolerable for the stakeholders? Obviously we have no way to judge whether that's true.

Assess all the potential scenarios for failure and the potential consequences of those failures. Then assess what layers of protection you have for each scenario. Each failure scenario has it's own risk and consequences, and that will determine the number of protective measures needed for that scenario. There are a number of process safety tools (e.g. LOPA) that are used in these types of analyses.

 

[georgeverghese]

Strange why you have a backup LPG storage bullet (which is now empty and not used?). Most companies dont have a backup storage bullet.