Operational risk assessment of marine boiler plant for on-board systems safety

A marine boiler plant is an essential auxiliary onboard machinery that provides pressurized steam to several ship systems such as pipeline steam tracing, fuel tank heating, main engine jacket water heating, separation, cleaning, cargo pump operation, electric generation, etc. Despite the crucial role of this equipment in ship operations, its components, including fuel, air, water, exhaust, and steam, present severe operating hazards with the potential for catastrophic consequences. Furthermore, the topic of shipboard boiler plant risk assessment has not been extensively studied in the field of maritime. To fill these gaps, this study provides a systematic risk assessment for marine boiler plant utilizing the Analytic Network Process (ANP) method to reveal the complex relationship structure between boiler clusters and their sub-factors. According to the analysis results, the three most risky boiler clusters have been determined as Steam (0.295), Water (0.236), and Fuel (0.211). Besides, the most significant sub-factors in the prioritization have been, S-1: Steam temperature/pressure fluctuation (0.1666), S-2: Safety valve failure (0.1004), F-3: Fuel temperature/pressure fluctuation (0.0890), A-2: Improper air-fuel ratio (0.0646), W-2: High or low boiler water level (0.0558) respectively. The findings of this study will aid the maritime industry by analyzing the risks of boiler systems and presenting them to safety experts, ship crew, shipping corporations, port authorities, and inspection officers with the aim of proactively mitigating future accidents.