(54h) Hazards, Risks, and Lessons Learned from the Incidents of Fuel Ethanol Industry

With the increase is global energy demand, the demand for fuel ethanol is also increasing thus the associated hazards and risks are rising. Fuel ethanol is rarely used as a sole fuel in the United States, however, its benefits are obtained by reducing carbon dioxide emissions, and increasing the Octane number of the gasoline mixture. Currently, the United States is the major producer of ethanol and most of its production is used for blending with gasoline. The most widely used production method adopts fermentation of sugar from various sources, predominantly from corn. The process begins with milling of corn and subsequently goes through unit operations such as fermentation, distillations, pressure swing adsorptions using molecular sieves, and storage. The major hazards associated with the production of ethanol involves ethanol, ammonia, and grain dust. Ethanol being a flammable material can cause flash and pool fire; ammonia is used for pH control and as a Nitrogen source for yeast and is a toxic material, and grain dust poses dust explosion risks in the front-end milling and back-end drying operations. This presentation intends to share the major sources of risk associated with the operations of a typical fuel ethanol plant and the lessons learned from the analysis of the incidents occurred in the last 20 years.