Back in January 2013 a group of experts from around the world came together at an event hosted by The Wolfson Centre for Bulk Solids Handling Technology, with the objective of trying to identify best practice of fire prevention and management for biomass storage systems. Small fires in biomass storage had been increasing in number as more biomass was used, and the big fire at Tilbury Power Station had recently happened – there was a clear concern in industry that best practice needed to be identified and shared, to bring these problems under control.
Leading researchers from around Europe attended, and industry was keen to get involved with an aim to agree a set of principles that they could recommend to users of such systems as an appropriate safety "programme" for their storage system designs.
As well as sharing knowledge and known good practice, this stimulated further research. A second, much larger, meeting followed the following year; much of the knowledge that was exchanged has subsequently been embedded in the design of industry installations at ports, terminals and power stations. Research has progressed further, and more practical experience gained, so we have decided to hold a third meeting to see how things have developed. This will take place at the University of Greenwich Medway campus, Kent on Tuesday 12 June 2018.
What is the aim of this year’s seminar?
We are asking those involved in the industry to participate by attending and networking at the seminar, sharing their views and knowledge to help shape the future. The aim is to set an agenda for putting forward a shared vision of plans for necessary research and improvement of industry practice.
We already have an exciting programme lined up, with the following presenters confirmed:
• Southdowne Solutions: Feedback from some biomass incidents
• Thorwesten Vent: Fire Fighting methods
• robecco: Preventive explosion protection in silos
• Yara: Emergency inerting systems: how to avoid dust explosions and smouldering or glowing fires in coal grinding and silo storage installations’
• Ramboll: Risk prevention: best available techniques (BAT) for the assessment and optimisation of materials handling design to prevent dust releases, increase throughput and reduce cost / Risk mitigation: some BAT examples of fire and explosion risk mitigation approaches applied to modern facilities
• The Wolfson Centre for Bulk Solids Handling Technology: Discussion towards an agreed schedule of Best Practice for biomass store fire protection.
• RISE: Recent development within biomass safety research and standardisation
• Gexcon / DnVGL : Aspects of dust explosions making research essential
o Occurrence of flame instabilities during dust explosions
o Secondary dust explosions
o Metal dust explosion at industrial scale: scaling
There will be an extensive discussion period after the presentations to share knowledge and experiences, in able to plan progress for the future.
To register:
If you would like to register to attend please follow this link: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/fire-prevention-for-biomass-storage-systems-tickets-43304752681 where further details will be updated as they become available.
Anyone from industry or academia with an interest in biomass storage systems is welcome to attend, although numbers are restricted to 80.
