Batista-Abreu, Jean C.

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    Comportamiento de tanques de almacenamiento de petróleo en presencia de fuego
    (2011) Batista-Abreu, Jean C.; Godoy, Luis A.; College of Engineering; López Rodríguez, Ricardo; Saffar, Ali; Department of Civil Engineering; Sundaram, Paul A.
    This thesis presents the analysis of the structural behavior of steel oil storage tanks exposed to fire. This study focuses on determining the deformed configurations and the critical buckling temperatures of storage tanks in relation with their failure scenarios, attending to external actions that influence the structural response. Furthermore, it presents the investigation of the causes of explosions occurred in oil plants located in Buncefield, UK, in Bayamon, Puerto Rico, and in Anacortes, Washington, in 2005, 2009 and 2010, respectively. Structural analysis have been performed using the Riks method applied to finite element models, using the commercial software ABAQUS. Geometric and material nonlinearities due to thermal action of fire in terms of mean temperature and thermal gradient in the cross section on the structure have been considered. The heating process is simulated until the occurrence of buckling failure in the wall of cylindrical tanks with and without external fixed roof. The geometries modeled correspond to tanks affected by the fire incident occurred in Caribbean Petroleum Corporation (CAPECO) in Bayamon, Puerto Rico, in 2009. The results indicate that thermal buckling occurs in the tank walls because temperature variations along the structure generate irregular levels of displacement in the shell, which, in its attempt to expand, suddenly changes its geometrical configuration to stay in equilibrium, while restricted by the boundary conditions and by shell areas under lower temperature levels. The analyzed structures show relatively low critical temperatures compared to the temperatures developed during fires at oil plants, which means that buckling in the storage tanks could arise in early stages of the fire event. In addition, it is observed that the volume of fuel in the tank has significant influence on the critical temperature, since the fluid pressure stabilizes the cylinder walls delaying the occurrence of buckling. Also, it is noticed that the development of thermal gradients in the cross section of the shell causes structural buckling at a mean temperature lower than the temperature at which the tank without external roof will fail under a uniform thermal distribution.