Explosion potential assessment of heat exchanger network at the preliminary design stage

The failure of Shell and Tube Heat Exchangers (STHE) is being extensively observed in the chemical process industries. This failure can cause enormous production loss and have a potential of dangerous consequences such as an explosion, fire and toxic release scenarios. There is an urgent need for assessing the explosion potential of shell and tube heat exchanger at the preliminary design stage. In current work, inherent safety index based approach is used to resolve the highlighted issue. Inherent Safety Index for Shell and Tube Heat Exchanger (ISISTHE) is a newly developed index for assessing the inherent safety level of a STHE at the preliminary design stage. This index is composed of preliminary design variables and integrated with the process design simulator (Aspen HYSYS). Process information can easily be transferred from process design simulator to MS Excel spreadsheet owing to this integration. This index could potentially facilitate the design engineer to analyse the worst heat exchanger in the heat exchanger network. Typical heat exchanger network of the steam reforming process is presented as a case study and the worst heat exchanger of this network has been identified. It is inferred from this analysis that shell and tube heat exchangers possess high operating pressure, corrected mean temperature difference (CMTD) and flammability and reactive potential needs to be critically analysed at the preliminary design stage.