Sun ZH, Sun JH, Fan WC (2003) 'Thermal hazard evaluation of ammonium nitrate using c80 II calorimeter.' (Science Press Beijing: Beijing) 373-379

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Keywords:

heat release; ammonium nitrate; SADT; thermal explosion; accelerating decomposition temperature;

Abstract: As a kind of chemical fertilizer, ammonium nitrate is usually recognized as a steady substance. However, several explosions occurred in Japan, France, USA, etc. in recent years were cause by ammonium nitrate storage or production. In this article, in order to assess the thermal hazard of ammonium nitrate, C80 II calorimeter was used to study the heat release behavior of the substance under several conditions. Analyzing the data obtained from the experiments, SADTs of ammonium nitrate and mixture of ammonium nitrate and sulfuric acid were calculated based on Semenov model. The result shows that SADT of mixture of ammonium nitrate and sulfuric acid is much lower than pure ammonium nitrate, which may be one of the reasons of the explosion.