Daft but curious..

Soldato
Joined
6 Dec 2006
Posts
5,914
Location
West Yorkshire
Grangemouth oil refinary just caught my attention on the news, now here comes some probably daft questions but im curious to know.

Now, in the background there was the refinary.. But, there was a towers with a flame coming out the top:

1) What is that for?
2) How dosnt it explode?

Slightly weird.
 
Associate
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
690
Location
Wiltshire
Hi,

I think its a by product of the 'cracking process' (turning crude oil into useable stuff). I live not too far from Milford Haven and some of the flames from that are massive :o

Regards,

Dave.
 
Don
Joined
7 Aug 2003
Posts
44,275
Location
Aberdeenshire
Depending on the facility, they can have a permantantly lit flare tower, so that in an emergency they can "blowdown" the gas inventory to atmosphere without ending up with tons of toxic and explosive gas floating about the place.
 
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