Prevention and mitigation of detonations

Abstract

A number of factors mitigate against the production of a well-balanced account of the procedures available for the control of detonations. The minimal conditions required for a detonation wave are the simultaneous occurrence of a flammable mixture and an ignition source for mixtures of fuel and oxidant, or an excursion in the working pressure into the critical regime plus ignition source for an exothermically self-decomposing fuel. However, a detailed and general discussion of the avoidance of such conditions in plant is evidently outside the scope of the present text. Notwithstanding this, it is useful to draw attention to the additional potential source of ignition in two-phase systems which involves the possibility of the particles or droplets becoming charged during some stage in their processing, for example during size-reduction, with a resultant local and intense electrical discharge to an earthed portion of the plant.