Pollution
Humain
Environnement
Economique

Filtered residue presumably caught fire.

– An emergency shutdown was performed in the measuring station by the plant operator;
– The plant fire service was alerted locally as a result of the smoke formed.

A catalyst is used as an auxiliary when hydrogenating crude amine in a hydrogenation reactor. At the end of the process, the catalyst and other auxiliaries (e.g. diatomaceous earth) are filtered off in a filtration plant. This material is dried with nitrogen in a filtration plant.

The filter material is then automatically discharged at the bottom of the filter into a container beneath it. This container is regularly emptied into barrels located next to it, which are transferred to a specialist disposal company for disposal in accordance with waste legislation.

– Deployment of plant fire service
– Follow-up checks by fire brigade 

Deployment of five external fire brigades to provide additional support in fighting the fire and carrying out follow-up checks on any embers using a thermal imaging camera.

– Technological equipment
– Parts of buildings

The incident was caused by the spontaneous ignition of the catalyst.
An investigation into the cause of the fire by an expert was able to confirm the pyrophoric properties of the filtered catalyst.
The catalyst still displayed residual activity and its contact with oxygen then caused it to ignite.

The material will be rendered inert in future to avoid similar incidents. 

In addition, other, alternative technical solutions for separating the catalyst are being examined.