The National Research Council Canada is mandating 9 Crude Oil Fire Tests by Sandia National Laboratories to characterize the thermal impact of crude oil fires on a large, thermally massive, cylindrical object fully immersed in such a fire. Three additional heptane fire tests are also required to provide comparison data from a reference fuel. Key objectives of this work are to:
collect approximately 6000 L of crude oil under pressure such that any volatile compounds present in the oil at the collection point remain in the crude oil until it enters the fuel pan and is ignited;
characterize the crude oil for composition, vapor pressure, distillation curves and other properties using closed samples taken both during collection and immediately prior to fire testing, and using sampling and testing methods that capture the effects of volatile compounds;
keep the crude oil under pressure at all times while it is transferred from the collection container to the fuel pan so that the integrity of the crude oil is maintained and all volatile compounds remain dissolved until they enter the fuel pan;
control the pre-test temperature of the crude oil (with an uncertainty no greater than ±5°C) to a set point that lies within a minimum temperature range from 5°C to 60°C;
conduct twelve 2m diameter pool fire tests (9 with crude oil and 3 with heptane), in which fuel is continuously supplied to the fuel pan containing the thermally massive cylindrical object, in a controlled environment with no wind effects and using a test facility capable of measuring heat release rate using oxygen consumption calorimetry up to 10 MW;
provide measurements of heat release rate, heat flux, fuel burning rate and temperature during fire testing at a sampling rate of 1 Hz or greater.
