Goodarzi, Mohammad Ali

An Experimental Study on Reduction of Seismic Sloshing in Floating Roof Tanks By Using a Suspended Annular Baffle (Sab)

Abstract eng:
Floating roof tanks, with capacity as large as one million barrel, because of their advantages are among very common tanks in oil industry, and only in Kharg Island of Iran there are more than 45 ones of these tanks. However, these tanks have shown their vulnerability against large earthquake happened in recent decades, such as Kobe, Izmit and Tokachi-oki earthquakes. The main cause of damage has been reported to be the sloshing of liquid, resulting in sinking of the floating roof and also escaping of flammable gases leading into fire. In this research the possibility of reduction of seismic sloshing in floating roof cylindrical tanks by using a suspended annular baffle (SAB) has been investigated experimentally. The tests were conducted by using the shake table of the Structural Laboratory of the International Institute of Earthquake Engineering and Seismology (IIEES), Tehran, Iran, and included a set of harmonic excitations and also a set of simulated earthquake motions. The annular baffle was hanging from the roof by some ropes, connecting to the roof near its perimeter, so that the baffle was located inside the impulsive section of the liquid in the tank. During the dynamic excitation, which causes sloshing of the liquid as well as tilting of the floating roof, the SAB resists against the upward motion of the floating roof, and can reduce its fluctuations remarkably. To do the test, small model of the real tanks with 100 cm diameter and 120 cm height, made of transparent condensed plastic (Plexiglas), was used. Transparency of the tank wall gives the possibility of observing the motion of the liquid, the floating roof as well as the SAB. Two SABs were used, one with 7 cm width and the other with 11 cm. Three values of 70, 50, and 20 cm were considered for the depth of the impounded liquid in the tank. Tests were done once without the SAB and once again with it to find out how the SAB can reduce the seismic response. Results show that using the SAB reduces the maximum fluctuation amplitude of the liquid around 80% and 40% in average respectively, for harmonic and seismic excitations.

Contributors:

Soroor, Amirhossein

Conference Title:

Proceedings of the 16th World Conference on Earthquake Engineering

Conference Title:

16th World Conference on Earthquake Engineering

Conference Venue:

Santiago (CL)

Conference Dates:

2017-01-09 / 2017-01-13

Rights:

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