Explosion Protection according to the EU Directives using the Data from CHEMSAFE Database

Abstract

For international trade and production of machinery used in potentially explosive atmospheres it is important to know about the regulations within the European Union. This paper presents an application of CHEMSAFE flammability data for fulfilling the requirements of the EU explosion protection directives. Most of the published data for flammability of substances are measured under atmospheric conditions although chemical processes operate often under non-atmospheric conditions. A couple of R&D projects were initiated in Germany to get more knowledge on explosion characteristics for non-atmospheric conditions. The explosion protection for machinery operated under non-atmospheric conditions is defined in the 2006/42/EU Directive. CHEMSAFE fulfills this requirement while it contains data of flammable compounds measured under non-atmospheric conditions and with other oxidizers than air. Furthermore it includes flammability data for gas mixtures consisting of flammable, inert, and different oxidizing components and most of the data are measured according to international standards. Safety data on flammable dusts - such as minimum ignition energy, maximum explosion pressure, ignition temperatures - represents also an important part of the database. The potentially explosive atmospheres are defined in revised Directive 2014/34/EU. For preparing risk assessment documents the following data for flammable gases and vapors, relating to the use of equipment, among others are necessary: Flammability limit, flash point, temperature class - auto-ignition temperature, maximum experimental safe gap. CHEMSAFE’2013 includes not only these data but also more than 200 triangular explosion diagrams, e.g. the newly measured methane/nitrogen/oxygen system under pressures up to 50 bars. The international standard Draft of IEC 80079-1-1 publishes data tables for flammable substances originated from CHEMSAFE which represents the international acceptance of these data.