Overpressure Effects

Explosions produce pressure waves which expand in the atmosphere. When impacting industrial equipment, domino effects may be caused if the equipment content is flammable or toxic. A detailed analysis of these scenarios requires complex computational tecniques based on finite element analysis. Simplified methodologies have been developed in the past years for land use planning and quantitative risk assessment. These approaches are based on the definition of probability functions and threshold values for the occurrence of loss of containment from damaged systems and rely on the prediction of peak overpressure with respect to distance from the explosion source and on the structural category of the target equipment.