Dimensioning physical protection barricades against propagation of pressure waves following an explosion. – BARPPRO

For a few years France is confronted with accidental or intentional risks on her territory and outside operation (OPEX). The fight against these risks relies mainly on the evaluation of the threat, the idea of preventive measures (to avoid the event) and the installation of physical protection barriers limiting the bad consequences of the event, by protecting French interests, industrial sites and, property and people, against glares, thermal effects and blast waves.

In France, the regulation imposed standards concerning danger zones located behind the physical protection barriers for pyrotechnics industry. Therefore, many unknown factors exist and make impossible the easy establishment of these standards out of the pyrotechnical field. There is also a lack of protection effect dimensioning.

Moreover, much of finished or in progress projects (calls for projects ANR-CSOSG) are devoted to the detection of the threat but rather little to the quantification of the effects and even less to the fight against the consequences.

This is a real difficulty for the industrialists who must be in conformity with the Prevention Plans of the Technological Risks (PPRT). Indeed, there are no tools which would make possible the dimension of a physical protection barrier in order to protect the vulnerable Installations and their environment against intentional or accidental explosions. There is a real need to get data to reach this purpose.

The objective of program BARPPRO (Dimensioning physical protection barriers against propagation of pressure waves following an explosion), which comes with the French interests concerning of the safety of property and people, aims to define the means of dimensioning the physical protection barriers and to evaluate their effectiveness so as to reduce the effects of an explosion.Experimental, numerical and theoretical studies will be carried out on this subject.