United States Department of Transportation
i
Reducing Flammability for Bakken Crude Oil for Train Transport – Phase IV
-
2022-02-28
[PDF-1.99 MB]
Details:
-
Alternative Title:Reducing Flammability for Bakken Crude Oil for Train Transport Final Report for 2021 – Phase IV [Project Title from Cover]
-
Creators:
-
Corporate Creators:
-
Corporate Contributors:University of Nebraska. Mid-America Transportation Center ; United States. Department of Transportation. University Transportation Centers (UTC) Program ; United States. Department of Transportation. Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology ; United States. Department of Transportation. Federal Highway Administration
-
Subject/TRT Terms:
-
Publication/ Report Number:
-
Resource Type:
-
Geographical Coverage:
-
Edition:Final report (Jan 2021-Dec 2021)
-
Corporate Publisher:
-
Abstract:Crude oil shipping by rail is a critical component of our energy security and has grown steadily with the Bakken oil boom. However, existing rail infrastructure is in a state of disrepair which is evidenced by several recent, high-profile derailments of trains carrying crude oil resulting in large oil spills. This is an especially dangerous situation in the case of Bakken crude, which is of a light variety and contains significant amounts of easy to evaporate, easy to ignite, light ends, and usually the result is an intense fireball. Previous research done by Professor Albert Ratner’s research group under MATC-DOT sponsorship has concluded that polymeric additives improve fire safety in diesel fuels and its blends by delaying ignition, promoting flame extinction, and suppressing splashing. There is a strong indication that the same will be true for crude oil as well. As of December 31, 2021, research efforts continued the work that would help accomplish the goals of a larger, five year project to improve fire safety during transportation by adding long-chain polymers and carbon-based nanoadditives to crude oil before shipping. Surrogates for the Bakken crude were identified and tested for their ability to suspend polymers and nanoparticles that will serve as the fire limiting agents. Combustion characteristics were established for surrogate fuels with nanoadditives which is expanded with Bakken and Pennsylvania crudes containing various polymeric additives at various concentrations. Also, the stability/settling characteristics were investigated with different surrogate fuels. This work has resulted in several published manuscripts, and they are expected to help in the modeling of the combustion characteristics of crude oil and how to make crude oil transport safer.
-
Format:
-
Funding:
-
Collection(s):
-
Main Document Checksum:
-
Download URL:
-
File Type:
