This paper presents different aspects of pressure vessel safety in the scope
of industrial safety, focused to the chemical industry. Quality assurance,
including application of PED97/23 has been analysed first, followed shortly
by the risk assessment and in details by the structural integrity approach,
which has been illustrated with three case studies. One important conclusion,
following such an approach, is that so-called water proof testing can
actually jeopardize integrity of a pressure vessel instead of proving it.
[Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. TR 174004 i br. TR 33044]
Welded joints are analysed as critical regions in a pressure vessel in respect to structural failure due to the elastic-plastic fracture/crack growth. To assess structural integrity of pressure vessels used in chemical industry the risk based procedure has been introduced and applied in the case of a large spherical pressure vessel used as a vinyl-chloride monomer (VCM) storage tank in HIP Azotara Pancevo. The risk matrix has been used, taking into account the basic definition of risk, being the product of the probability and consequence, and applied to different regions of welded joints, having different mechanical properties, i.e. crack resistance. To estimate probability, the failure assessment diagram (FAD) has been used, as an engineering tool, defined according to the position of the operating point for different regions of the welded joint, relative to the critical point on the limit curve. Generally speaking, consequence is estimated based on pressure vessel parameters, or by detailed analysis of health, safety, business and security issues, but in the analysed case, the worst case scenario is assumed, with the highest consequence due to potential disaster for environment and fatalities. [Project of the Serbian Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, Grant no. TR 33044 and Grant no. 35017]
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