Aircraft fuel inerting system for an airport
First Claim
1. A system for reducing accidental explosion hazard of an aircraft fuel tank having a head space, comprising (a) fuel scrubbing means for removing oxygen dissolved in a liquid aircraft fuel, in which the fuel scrubbing means is adapted to remove an amount of the oxygen from the fuel effective to produce a low concentration of dissolved oxygen of the fuel at which oxygen liberated from the fuel during flight produces an oxygen concentration of vapor in the head space not exceeding a preselected limit, (b) head space inerting means for purging the head space with a substantially oxygen-free gas to provide an oxygen concentration of vapor in the head space of less than the preselected limit, and (c) volatile organic compound removing means for separating substantially all volatile organic compound components present in a vapor produced by the fuel scrubbing means and the head space inerting means prior to emitting the vapor to ambient atmosphere, in which all of the fuel scrubbing means, head space inerting means and volatile organic compound removing means are positioned on ground at an airport.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A multicomponent, ground based system for reducing the hazard of explosion of aircraft fuel in the on board tanks of aircraft. The system is adapted to provide a supply of scrubbed fuel having a low concentration of dissolved oxygen. The scrubbed fuel can be supplied from bulk storage tanks to dispensing stations nearby the aircraft loading and boarding positions at an airport. The system also includes equipment adapted to wash the ullage of the aircraft fuel tanks to remove excess oxygen above the fuel in the tanks. The system further includes a gas cleaning unit to strip excessive amounts of volatile organic compounds from gas exhausted during operation of the system thereby producing environmentally benign atmospheric emissions. The system also includes redundant sources of inert gas so that the system can continue to operate in the contingency that one of the inert gas sources temporarily ceases to operate.
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Citations
12 Claims
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1. A system for reducing accidental explosion hazard of an aircraft fuel tank having a head space, comprising
(a) fuel scrubbing means for removing oxygen dissolved in a liquid aircraft fuel, in which the fuel scrubbing means is adapted to remove an amount of the oxygen from the fuel effective to produce a low concentration of dissolved oxygen of the fuel at which oxygen liberated from the fuel during flight produces an oxygen concentration of vapor in the head space not exceeding a preselected limit, (b) head space inerting means for purging the head space with a substantially oxygen-free gas to provide an oxygen concentration of vapor in the head space of less than the preselected limit, and (c) volatile organic compound removing means for separating substantially all volatile organic compound components present in a vapor produced by the fuel scrubbing means and the head space inerting means prior to emitting the vapor to ambient atmosphere, in which all of the fuel scrubbing means, head space inerting means and volatile organic compound removing means are positioned on ground at an airport.
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4. A system for reducing a hazard of accidental explosion of aircraft fuel tanks comprising at least one of
(A) a first supply of ultra high purity nitrogen gas comprising a means for removing water, carbon dioxide and airborne impurities from air thereby producing filtered air, a heat exchanger adapted to cool the filtered air and cryogenic distillation means for separating oxygen from the filtered air, B) a second supply of ultra high purity nitrogen comprising a tank containing pressurized, liquid nitrogen and a vaporizer means for vaporizing a stream of liquid nitrogen, (C) an aircraft fuel bulk storage tank fuel scrubbing subsystem comprising, an aircraft fuel bulk storage tank, a gas-liquid mixing means for intimately mixing a liquid aircraft fuel in turbulent flow with nitrogen gas from at least one of the first supply and the second supply of ultra high purity nitrogen, and a fuel circulation pump adapted to circulate the aircraft fuel in a flow loop through the bulk storage tank and the gas-liquid mixing means, (D) a gas cleaning means for removing a volatile organic compound from a gas mixture generated by the aircraft fuel bulk storage tank fuel scrubbing subsystem, the gas mixture comprising nitrogen gas and the volatile organic compound, (E) an aircraft fuel tank head spacing inerting subsystem comprising a membrane separation unit adapted to produce highly nitrogen enriched air from ambient air and a highly nitrogen enriched air distribution header operative to deliver the highly nitrogen enriched air to aircraft loading/boarding positions of a concourse of an airport, and (F) an aircraft fuel tank head space venting system comprising a vapor transfer line from the concourse of the airport to the gas cleaning means, and means for removably connecting the vapor transfer line to the aircraft fuel tank head space of aircraft at the aircraft loading/boarding positions.
Specification