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High-pressure methanol synthesis case study: safety and environmental impact assessment using consequence analysis

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Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the estimated people’s fatalities percentage due to methanol reactor incident from a newly proposed plant in Perak, Malaysia. This work investigated the possibility of (1) various events occurring in term of toxicity, thermal radiation, and overpressure, and (2) the fatalities percentage when these events occurred due to the release of chemical mixtures from the reference plant, which has 42 m3 reactor volume and operates at 76.4 bar; and three reactor scenarios in which the reactor volume is reduced to 7.6 m3, while operating pressures are 76.4, 150, and 300 bars. HYSYS software was employed to simulate the process and obtain the mass density of the mixture, mass fraction, and volume fraction, while ALOHA and MARPLOT software was used to calculate the amount of toxicity, thermal radiation, overpressure and area affected. The methanol reactor contains a mixture of hydrogen, carbon dioxide, methanol, carbon monoxide, and water, where only water is not considered hazardous. Release of chemical mixture via three-hole size scenarios, 10 mm, 25 mm, and 160 mm was proposed, and the simulation was carried out. Results showed that reference plant and plant 300 bar exhibit the highest fatalities percentage for overall and reduced reactor volume (15.7% and 11.2%), both caused from the release of carbon dioxide at night through a 160 mm hole leakage. This study can be used to suggest the best location for the methanol plant to be built to avoid any deaths to people living surrounding area.

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Acknowledgements

The authors 1 and 2 would like to acknowledge Faculty of Chemical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) and the Ministry of Education (MOE) for the 600-RMI/FRGS/5/3 (0094/2016) grant, for all the funding and support given in establishing this project. Mohanad El-Harbawi would like also to thank the Deanship of Scientific Research at King Saud University for supporting him through research group no. RGP-303.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center of Industrial Process Reliability Engineering and Sustainability (INPRES), School of Chemical Engineering, College Of Engineering, Universiti Teknologi MARA, 40450, Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia

    M. A. Ahmad & Z. A. Rashid

  2. Department of Chemical Engineering, King Saud University, Riyadh, 11421, Saudi Arabia

    M. El-Harbawi & A. S. Al-Awadi

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  1. M. A. Ahmad
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  2. Z. A. Rashid
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  3. M. El-Harbawi
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  4. A. S. Al-Awadi
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Correspondence to M. El-Harbawi.

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The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

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Editorial responsibility: Binbin Huang.

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Ahmad, M.A., A. Rashid, Z., El-Harbawi, M. et al. High-pressure methanol synthesis case study: safety and environmental impact assessment using consequence analysis. Int. J. Environ. Sci. Technol. 19, 8555–8572 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13762-021-03724-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13762-021-03724-1

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