VIII.10  Hydrogen Safety Panel

The Hydrogen Safety Panel was tasked with conducting work under the project “Hydrogen Safety Panel Review of Department of Energy’s Fuel Cell Projects,” through memorandum purchase order DCO-0-40618-01 with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory using American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funding.  Panel members reviewed project safety plans, conducted safety review site visits for selected projects, and prepared safety evaluation reports for the sites visited that included safety recommendations for the project teams.

Quenching limits of hydrogen diffusion flames on small burners were observed. Four burner types,with diameters as small as 8 m, were considered: pinhole burners, curved-wall pinhole burners, tubeburners, and leaky fittings. In terms of mass flow rate, hydrogen had a lower quenching limit and a higherblowoff limit than either methane or propane. Hydrogen flames at their quenching limits were the weakest