Author Topic: Alcohol/distillation  (Read 8427 times)

Offline TFEM

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Alcohol/distillation
« on: October 21, 2010, 09:18:20 AM »
I have received an enquiry about fire extinguishers for alcohol fires. The customer is distilling and producing up to 300 litres of pure alcohol per day which is then immediately diluted to a maximum 60% proof....all of which takes place within a sealed/vented process.
My question is, should extinguishers be provided for the full "risk" ie 300 litres or should we be looking at "the likelyhood" aspect of spillages.
Thanks all in advance.
John

Offline nearlythere

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Re: Alcohol/distillation
« Reply #1 on: October 21, 2010, 09:38:27 AM »
I have received an enquiry about fire extinguishers for alcohol fires. The customer is distilling and producing up to 300 litres of pure alcohol per day which is then immediately diluted to a maximum 60% proof....all of which takes place within a sealed/vented process.
My question is, should extinguishers be provided for the full "risk" ie 300 litres or should we be looking at "the likelyhood" aspect of spillages.
Thanks all in advance.
John
John
Portable fire extinguishing equipment is essentially for First Strike level fire fighting so that a small fire can be prevented from developing into something more significent and damaging.
Consider other bulk storage situations of flammable liquids such as petroleum, kerosene and the like. There is generally no requirement for extinguishing equipment to deal with these when large quantity are on fire unless your client wants a suppression system installed for business and building protection.
What you should be looking at is general fire prevention measures which would include spillage control.
« Last Edit: October 21, 2010, 09:40:03 AM by nearlythere »
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Offline AnthonyB

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Re: Alcohol/distillation
« Reply #2 on: October 21, 2010, 05:47:50 PM »
Unless you are going for an on site fire team, you should only be looking at covering small spills, small bunded fires, etc as with a polar solvent you are looking at at least trolley extinguishers if not hose & foam branch.

Although Alcohol Resistant Aspirating Foam Branchpipe extinguishers, usually FFFP-AR these days rather than AFFF-AR, are available commercially the impressive fire ratings on them of 183B or 233B are on standard Avgas test fires and their capacity on polar solvents is much less.

The last (in fact only) manufacturer to do proper test fires on polar solvents with extinguishers was Angus in the 70's & 80's when they made their own extinguishers (before switching to buying in Britannia Fire extinguishers in the early 90's).

A 9 litre Aspirating branch extinguisher with Angus Alcoseal FFFP-AR attained a rating of 233B on a normal Class B fire, but on Polar Solvents only managed a 34B rating - even with 'AR' compounds a far greater application rate and volume is required to maintain a stable foam blanket, limiting the efficacy of portable equipment.

Even at 60% Polar there will be an adverse effect on foam blankets, and the exact type of alcohol matters as foam destruction rates differ widely based on exactly what is involved.

Proper training in the use of these extinguishers is needed as well - a video or a extinguisher training gas rig will not be enough to develop the skills for proper foam use on in depth Class B risks - anything more than a shallow non running spill requires technique, particularly if using Foam Branchpipe extinguishers.

You can of course fill the standard non aspirating spray extinguishers with 'AR' compounds, but this is a waste of time as the required application rates for this type of foam application method are even higher and the fire rating plummets even more to the size of fire where you might as well save some money and use an off the shelf powder or CO2 extinguisher.
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Offline firstforensic

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Re: Alcohol/distillation
« Reply #3 on: October 26, 2010, 08:19:04 PM »
Sorry to nit pick, but you cant have 60% proof; there is no such unit. You can have 60% abv (alcohol by volume) which is the modern accepted method or 60 proof (60%abv contains more alcohol than 60 proof so choose your drinks carefully!)

Offline Phoenix

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Re: Alcohol/distillation
« Reply #4 on: October 29, 2010, 11:26:40 PM »
Absolutely Firstforensic, I seem to recall, off the top of my head (and this illustrates the sort of nonsense that floats around inside the typical fire safety head), that a spirit is at 100 proof or 100o proof when the amount of ethyl alcohol contained therein, made up to the volume of the spirit with distilled water, weighs 11/13th of an equal volume of distilled water.  Or something like that - correct me if I'm wrong.  I think 100o proof is about 57% abv.

Different in the US of course.

Stu