Golden Rules of Process Safety For:: Combustible Dusts
Golden Rules of Process Safety For:: Combustible Dusts
Golden Rules of Process Safety For:: Combustible Dusts
Combustible Dusts
Oxidant
Dispersion
Ignition Source
Confinement
Combustible Dust
The American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) and the Center for Chemical Process Safety (CCPS)
express their appreciation and gratitude to all members of the Golden Rules of Process Safety for Specific
Technologies project subcommittee for their generous efforts in the development and preparation of this
important guideline. CCPS also wishes to thank the subcommittee members’ respective companies for
supporting their involvement during the different phases in this project.
The collective industrial experience and know-how of the subcommittee members make this guideline
especially valuable to those who develop and manage process safety programs and management systems.
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acknowledges the thoughtful comments and suggestions of the peer reviewers. Their work enhanced the
accuracy and clarity of this guideline.
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this guideline and did not review the final manuscript before its release.
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site for the current release. https://www.aiche.org/ccps/tools/golden‐rules‐process‐safety
It is sincerely hoped that the information presented in this document will lead to an even more
impressive safety record for the entire industry; however, neither the American Institute of Chemical
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Copyright: American Institute of Chemical Engineers
Golden Rules for Combustible Dust
Golden Rule #1: Always recognize and understand the hazardous properties of your dust/ powder
materials.
Why:
Any particulate solid material that will burn can pose significant dust combustibility hazards.
Combustible dusts can be involved in layer fires, flash fires involving suspended dust clouds,
and explosions. All of these events can damage facilities and equipment and harm personnel.
Initial explosions can suspend additional dust clouds that can lead to large secondary
explosions (Figure 1).
Smoldering combustion within beds of material or within enclosures where insufficient oxygen
is present can lead to products of partial combustion (such as carbon monoxide) which can
ignite and cause a fire or an explosion when oxygen is later provided.
Personnel in facilities handling combustible dusts need to know the hazardous properties of
process materials so they can recognize the hazards and understand their role in guarding against
them.
Knowledge of the hazardous properties, including the toxicity of the materials and their
combustion products is a necessary input for the assessment of hazards and the design of
protections.
Incident History:
On January 29, 2003, an explosion and fire destroyed the West Pharmaceutical Services plant
in Kinston, North Carolina, causing six fatalities, dozens of injuries, and hundreds of job losses.
The facility produced rubber stoppers and other products for medical use. The fuel for the
explosion was a fine plastic powder, which accumulated above a suspended ceiling over a
manufacturing area and ignited. Although the plant had the MSDS warning about the explosive
properties of polyethylene powder, employees had not received any significant training about
combustible dust hazards. If maintenance workers been aware of the catastrophic potential of
this hazard, they could have alerted management to the presence of dangerously large
accumulations above the suspended ceiling [1].
On the evening of October 29, 2003, a series of explosions severely burned two workers
(subsequently one fatality), injured a third, and caused property damage to the Hayes Lemmerz
manufacturing plant in Huntington, Indiana. The Hayes Lemmerz plant manufactured cast
aluminum automotive wheels, and the explosions were fueled by accumulated aluminum dust,
a combustible byproduct of the wheel production process. Hayes did not perform reviews to
address the hazards of aluminum dust. The hazards of aluminum dust were neither identified
nor addressed [2].