Prediction of the thermal safety of nitrocellulose package in large scale

Abstract

In order to assess the risk of nitrocellulose (NC) package atuo-ignition in warehouse, the three kinetic parameters of thermal decomposition of NC were calculated based on DSC curves using commercial software AKTS-kinetic module. On this basis, effects of ambient temperature (Ta), initial temperature of the package (T0) and cylinder diameter of package on time to ignition (τ) were studied using AKTS-thermal safety module. Results showed that as Ta and/or T0 increases the τ decreases exponentially, but the τ at different package dimensions is related to the Ta. More importantly, for a certain Ta, the τ doesn’t always change monotonously with the dimension, there is a dangerous dimension which are easier to ignite. It indicates that big risks exist when trying to predict the safe status of a certain NC package by extrapolation.