Handbook of Fire and Explosion Protection Engineering Principles for Oil, Gas, Chemical, and Related Facilities

Dr. Dennis P. Nolan has had a long career devoted to risk engineering, fire protection engineering, loss prevention engineering and systems safety engineering. He holds a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Business Administration from Berne University, Master of Science degree in Systems Management from Florida Institute of Technology and a Bachelor of Science Degree in Fire Protection Engineering from the University of Maryland. He is a U.S. registered professional engineer in fire protection engineering in the state of California.He is currently on the Executive Management staff of Saudi Aramco, located in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, as a Loss Prevention Consultant/Chief Fire Prevention Engineer. He covers some of the largest oil and gas facilities in the world. As part of his career, he has examined oil production, refining, and marketing facilities under severe conditions and in various unique worldwide locations, including Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East, Russia, and North and South America. His activity in the aerospace field has included engineering support for the NASA Space Shuttle launch facilities at Kennedy Space Center (and for those undertaken at Vandenburg Air Force Base, California) and “classified” national defense systems. Dr. Nolan has received numerous safety awards and is a member of the American Society of Safety Engineers, He is the author of many technical papers and professional articles in various international fire safety publications. He has written at least four books, several published by Elsevier.

1. Historical Background, Legal Influences, Management Responsibility, and Safety Culture2. Overview of Oil, Gas, and Petrochemical Facilities3. Philosophy of Protection Principles4. Physical Properties of Hydrocarbons and Petrochemicals5. Characteristics of Hazardous Material Releases, Fires, and Explosions6. Historical Survey of Major Fires and Explosions in the Process Industries7. Risk Analysis8. Segregation, Separation, and Arrangement9. Grading, Containment, and Drainage Systems10. Process Controls11. Emergency Shutdown12. Depressurization, Blowdown, and Venting13. Overpressure and Thermal Relief14. Control of Ignition Sources15. Elimination of Process Releases16. Fire and Explosion Resistant Systems17. Fire and Gas Detection and Alarm Systems18. Evacuation Alerting and Arrangements19. Methods of Fire Suppression20. Special Locations, Facilities, and Equipment21. Human Factors and Ergonomic Considerations22. Evaluating Concerns

AppendixA. Testing Firewater SystemsB. Reference Data