With more and more plants moving towards biofuel, dust explosion prevention and protection in the biomass industry is more important than ever before. It’s vital that manufactures switching to biofuel are fully able to face the challenges that are unique to the biomass industry.
In this multi-part series we will be examining the state of dust explosion prevention in the biomass industry and what plant owners can do to meet their legal obligations, prevent damage to their premises and most importantly, protect the lives of their workers and anyone in the nearby area.
Wood chips in a storage hopper. Image via Wikimedia Commons. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
With the Kyoto Protocol and the EU’s continuing objective to reduce its member states’ carbon footprints, more and more countries are making the push towards biofuel. However, in the production of biomass wood pellets, wood chip and similar renewable resources, the materials are continually broken down in the process, which can result in high levels of combustible dust. Proper dust explosion prevention measures demand that dust levels must be monitored carefully and frequently.
As all engineers and plant owners will know, oxygen, fuel and finally a source of ignition is required for a fire to break out. However, for an actual dust explosion to occur, the combustible dust must be subject to over-pressurisation due to how it is stored and confined – and secondly, the dust concentration must be dispersed and mix with the air at the right level.
The dry, flammable dust in mills found in the biomass is exposed to constant friction and abrasion – chippers, grinders, even conveyor belts can be the source of ignition.
More importantly, the source does not require high levels of ignition energy for the ultimate ignition. This is one of the major factors in biomass dust explosion prevention – the dust can be highly prone to self-ignition.
For more information on how a dust explosion can occur in the Biomass industry, download our whitepaper here.
For an overview of key explosion prevention equipment used in the Biomass industry, find out more here.
Accordingly, storage and waste management is vital to running mills in the biomass industry. Without correct maintenance and supervision, hazardous dust quickly gathers and the risk of a dust explosion can be huge. This has become a major consideration as countries seek to meet their EU obligations.
The countries that are the most involved in the use of industrial wood pellets within the EU are Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, & Denmark. Sweden and Denmark are moving towards 100% biomass-fueled plants obligations and have strict regulations for dust explosion prevention in their plants.
The UK has seen a recent shift, keeping subsidies for co-firing equal to that of full biomass firing.
In the UK:
- RWE Tilbury Power Plant 2.5 million tonnes of wood pellets due to close 2015
- Drax Group uses about 1 million tonnes of wood Pellets in co-firing in Drax and has plans to increase this up to 900MW or 3 million tonnes
- EON converted a 500 MW unit at its Coal fired power plant in Ironbridge, due to close 2015
- Eggerborough IP and Lynemouth Alcan power are the next likely developments for biomass conversion.
Most of the utilities active in the aforementioned countries are Electrabel, RWE, Drax, EON, Vattenfall and DONG Energy. There are further plans for large scale full biomass power plants driven by their respective CO2 intensity of assets and increasing indirect costs for the coal that can be substituted by Biomass.
Up to 2013, 22 fires and explosions have been recorded in biomass plants, encompassing 45 wood pellet plants and 20 wood products mills, with fires of varying degrees of destruction. Fires at biomass facilities typically start from spontaneous combustion of woodchip or sawdust piles or wood dust explosions according to the Institute of fire Engineers.
Explosion Hazards has been reporting on dust explosions for many years now. A large percentage of these tragic accidents could have been prevented with correct dust explosion prevention measures in place.
Continual maintenance and supervision is vital dust explosion prevention, but just as important is having the correct equipment in place. If you’re making the move to biomass or simply need advice on what equipment your factory requires, contact Explosion Hazards today.
We can provide you with top of the line solutions tailored for your specific needs and give you the guidance you need to implement the right dust explosion prevention equipment into your existing infrastructure.
Protect your staff and everyone in the nearby area with Explosion Hazards today.