Abstract
Unlike other countries, the Korean chemical industry does not clearly distinguish between industrial sites and residential areas. The 2012 Gumi Hydrogen Fluoride Accident revealed that chemical accidents could cause damage to nearby residents. Accordingly, the Chemicals Control Act was enacted in 2015, which requested industrial sites using chemicals to perform a risk assessment for all chemical facilities and to distribute the results to the local residents and governments. Industrial businesses had the responsibility of warning the local residents. In this study, two programs (Areal Location of Hazardous Atmospheres (ALOHA), Process Hazard Analysis Software Tool (PHAST)) were compared with Korea Off-site Risk Assessment Supporting Tool (KORA), which is the current representative risk assessment program used in Korea Chemicals Control Act. The five chemical substances (nitric acid, hydrogen chloride, ammonia, sulfuric acid, and formaldehyde) most commonly involved in chemical accidents were selected. The range of influence of ERPG-2 (Emergency Response Planning Guideline) on chemical accidents was modeled and the results compared. ALOHA was found to be the most suitable program for the determination of toxicity for nitrate acid and ammonia, KORA for hydrogen chloride and sulfuric acid, and PHAST for formaldehyde. To maximize the safety of many local residents and to prepare for chemical accidents, risk assessments should be conducted using a variety of risk assessment programs, and the worst-case damage radius should be determined.
Highlights
Since the 1960s there has been social conflict and political confusion in Korea due to rapid industrialization and urbanization
The results indicate that Korea Off-site Risk Assessment Supporting Tool (KORA) could be used for chemical accidents if the damage distance is higher than other modeling programs
Sulfuric acid was not modeled in the Areal Location of Hazardous Atmospheres (ALOHA) program because while it is dangerous to inhale, it is Sulfuric acid was not modeled in the ALOHA program because while it is dangerous to inhale, not likely to spread quickly enough in dangerous concentrations to people in large areas under normal it is not likely to spread quickly enough in dangerous concentrations to people in large areas under conditions
Summary
Since the 1960s there has been social conflict and political confusion in Korea due to rapid industrialization and urbanization. Indiscreet urban development has resulted in an unclear distinction between industrial sites and residential areas, causing continuous social conflicts between local residents and businesses [1]. Within 36 min of the chemical accident evacuations commenced for residents within a 50 m area, and after 4 h and 46 min evacuations were expanded to include all residents within a radius of 1.3 km. Five workers were killed at the scene of the accident, 18 people were killed in the neighborhood, including residents and workers, and a total of 12,243 were hospitalized. Almost all vegetation within 1 km of the accident was affected, causing significant damage to commercial crops and livestock (compensation amounting to South Korean won (KRW)
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