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Clean Hydrogen Partnership

Explosion at a storage tank

Event

Event ID
695
Quality
Description
Hydrogen release and explosion due to a leak in a high pressure hydrogen storage tank, during first start-up of plant.
Event Initiating system
Classification of the physical effects
Hydrogen Release and Ignition
Nature of the consequences
Macro-region
Europe
Date
How was it involved?
Leak & Formation Of A Flammable H2-Air Mixture
Initiating cause
Unknown
Root causes
Unknown (No additional details provided)

Facility

Application
Unknown
Sub-application
stationary GH2 storage
Hydrogen supply chain stage
Hydrogen Storage (No additional details provided)
All components affected
compressed hydrogen Tank
Location type
Unknown
Operational condition
Pre-event occurrences
The accident occurred during the first start-up of plant.

Emergency & Consequences

Number of injured persons
0
Number of fatalities
0
Post-event summary
Rigas&Amyotte reoprts 15 injuries and 26 fatalities. It is however unclear if they refer to the same event, because they provide only the year.

Event Nature

Release type
gas
Involved substances (% vol)
H2 100%
Actual pressure (MPa)
>10.0
Design pressure (MPa)
>10.0
Presumed ignition source
Not reported
High pressure explosion
N

References

Reference & weblink

Event no. 4490 of the UK ICHEME database in PDF format:<br />
https://www.icheme.org/knowledge/safety-centre/resources/accident-data/… />
(accessed July 2020)

Rigas F., Amyotte P., Hydrogen safety, Green chemistry and chemical engineering, CRC Press, Taylor & Frances Group; 2012. ISBN-13: 978-1439862315

SEDGWICK LOSS CONTROL NEWSLETTER, 3RD QUARTER, 1990.

JRC assessment