Experimental study on the correlation between diesel oil's flash point and elevation

The long distance petroleum or oil pipeline covers a wide range of altitude in practice. The changes of altitude lead to corresponding changes of atmosphere pressure, which influence the flash point of oil greatly. In this paper, the experimental method was adopted to investigate the correlation between the closed flash point of-10# diesel oil and altitude. In the experiments, the MINIFLASH, which is a continuous flash point tester, was used to test the oil samples. In order to simulate the different altitudes, a box called as vacuum glove truck is used to change the experiment environment air pressure. In the serial experiments, the closed cup flash points were measured in the altitude range of 0 to 5100 m. The data analysis indicates that there is a negative linear correlation between sample oil's flash point and altitude. The flash point will decreased with the growth of altitude, and this will increase the fire hazard in pipeline transportation. The experiment results will benefit the fire protection in oil pipeline management.