Experimental Study on Combustion Characteristics of Solvent and Fire Behavior During a Solvent Fire at Nuclear Fuel Cycling Facility

A fire accident is one typical postulated accident in a nuclear fuel cycling facility. Safety-related data on a combustible fire are necessary to evaluate the safety of nuclear fuel cycling facilities under fire accident conditions quantitatively. Accurate and reliable data should be obtained by performing some demonstration tests.

This study deals with the ignition and combustion characteristics of solvent involved at a nuclear fuel cycling facility and the fire behavior during a solvent fire. Small-scale and large-scale tests were conducted at the China Institute for Radiation Protection. The minimum ignition energy of the solvent under different temperatures was obtained. The test data were used to judge the possibility that the organic solvent ignited by a spark. Parameters such as combustion rate, smoke gas, aerosol release of solvent combustion, temperature distribution, and pressure change in the solvent fire cell were also obtained. The test results can be used as conservative estimates of the amount of aerosol release during a solvent fire. The experimental data also can be used to develop preventive and mitigation measures for solvent fire accidents. This paper puts forward information based on the experimental data and the recent international study.