The Control of Runaway Polymerisation Reactions by Inhibition Techniques

The technique of reaction inhibition is a poorly researched topic. Other methods of runaway reaction control, namely inherent safety, process control, containment, reactor venting, crash cooling and drown-out, are well documented, established techniques that are regularly used for the protection against, or prevention of, runaway chemical reactions. Increasing environmental protection legislation will heighten the need to prevent loss of containment occurrences. This means that basis of safety such as reaction inhibition which provide total containment will become more widely used. This is particularly applicable to the polymerisation industry (the industry involved in the largest number of incidents reported in the period 1962 1984) where reactor venting is, almost exclusively, the sole basis of safety used industry-wide. Discussion is given of inhibition techniques, with particular attention paid to polymerisation reactions, and examples of successfully inhibited processes provided. It is interesting to note that even the Encyclopedia of Polymer Science and Technology suggests :