Lessons Learned

An explosion occurred in a Microbiological Anaerobic Chamber of approximately 2 m3 capacity that contained an explosive mixture of hydrogen and air. A fire followed the explosion, but was rapidly extinguished by staff using fire extinguishers prior to the arrival of fire service personnel. The pressure wave from the explosion blew windows out of the laboratory, with glass hitting a passerby on a path outside and glass shards landing up to 30 m away. Ceiling panels were dislodged in the laboratory and adjacent rooms, and a worker using the apparatus at the time was taken to the hospital by ambulance for burn treatment. The worker subsequently fully recovered. Another worker in the lab at the time required medical observation, but was otherwise unharmed.

Mixtures of inert gases view more

An incident involved an explosion of an oven that was heating decaborane for vaporization. In this incident, the heater controller was defective so the heating element was disconnected from the controller and plugged directly into a wall outlet. This situation allowed the oven to reach temperatures in excess of 400 °C within 20 minutes. While the temperature increased, the decaborane continued to expand, causing a significant pressure build-up within the oven. The pressure increase eventually caused the oven's viewing window to burst. A burst of burning hydrogen was emitted from the window and burned the face of a researcher who was hospitalized for approximately three weeks.

A subcontractor employee was using a band saw to cut a 1" metal pipe when a flash fire occurred on the third floor hydrogen fluoride area. Subcontractor employees were removing all piping associated with the Anhydrous Hydrofluoric Acid (AHF) system. These lines were being removed during plant decontamination and demolition (D&D). The subcontractor employee was attempting to cut a 90-degree elbow located at the highest elevation on the 1" line, but the lowest elevation of the overall piping run. Since hydrogen is lighter than air, it is speculated that a minute amount of hydrogen gas had accumulated in the elbow.

Even though Safe Shutdown personnel had previously opened the system and placed it in a safe configuration, residual hydrogen fluoride could have still view more

The hydrogen feed system for the furnaces inside a pit furnace developed a leak. The leak was on the hydrogen dryer inside a shack attached to a building. The leak vented 200 psig hydrogen into the shack. The hydrogen low-pressure alarm sounded. No furnace operators were present at the time. An estimated 10,000 standard cubic feet of hydrogen vented. T

he hydrogen release was caused by a failure of an elastomeric pressure seal on the body of a particulate filter located in the hydrogen supply circuit of the Pit Furnace. After a similar event a month earlier, the cause was identified as a simple seal failure; however an independent engineering review after the present incident showed the cause to be system overpressure, caused by regulator failure.

A brazing retort in a shop malfunctioned and resulted in an explosion that propelled the retort shell to the roof of the brazing area and then back to the floor. There were no injuries but damage was sustained by the furnace housing and the retort shell.

Administrative personnel were soon on the scene to make a preliminary assessment of the situation. An expert safety team was retained to assist in the investigation of the explosion. The safety team conducted their initial field investigation on the afternoon of the explosion and again on the following day.

Once it was determined that the explosion was the result of an ignition of a flammable mixture of hydrogen and air, the next step was to determine how air ended up in the retort, given that the retort is nominally view more

A facility manager was notified that an authorization basis requirement, associated with roofing contractor work, had not been met. The requirement was that an unused hydrogen gas cylinder adjacent to the building and not connected to a manifold be removed prior to the use of propane tanks for the hot tar portion of the work.

The project manager failed to remove the extra gas bottle as required because he did not recognize from the bottle color and lack of stencil that the bottle contained hydrogen.

An explicit checklist containing all the administrative controls and requiring careful inspection was not available at the time of the inspection. The checklist preparation also would have made obvious the fact that administrative controls had been established. The project view more

Summary

A hydrogen generation plant experienced a fire and significant damage due to a concussive combustion event that started in a high-pressure hydrogen feed pipe.

System Description

A certain hydrogen plant is designed to continuously produce hydrogen at a purity of 99.75% and at a rate of 510 m3 per day. Hydrogen is produced in two banks of cells filled with a strong solution of caustic soda. Current is passed through the cells to produce hydrogen and oxygen. The oxygen is vented directly to the atmosphere, while the hydrogen is piped to the gasholder. The gasholder is a low-pressure storage vessel capable of storing 28 m3 of gas. It is constructed in two parts. The bottom section is a large round tank. The upper section is an inverted tank or bell that is view more

Description of Circumstances
An incident occurred in late 2001, while a boiling water reactor (BWR) unit was operating at rated power. The utility was performing a periodic surveillance of the high-pressure coolant-injection (HPCI) system. Immediately after the test began, the HPCI system automatically isolated and the reactor building fire detectors actuated. The unit was then manually shut down. An examination of the residual heat removal (RHR) system revealed that a pipe elbow had ruptured near the high point in the RHR branch steam supply line leading to one of the two RHR heat exchangers (steam condensing mode line) in the reactor building. Fragments from the piping rupture caused some damage to equipment in the general area, but no significant damage to any safety-related view more

A facility experienced a major fire in its Resid Hydrotreater Unit (RHU) that caused millions of dollars in property damage. One employee sustained a minor injury during the emergency unit shutdown and there were no fatalities.

The RHU incident investigation determined that an 8-inch diameter carbon steel elbow inadvertently installed in a high-pressure, high-temperature hydrogen line ruptured after operating for only 3 months. The escaping hydrogen gas from the ruptured elbow quickly ignited.

This incident occurred after a maintenance contractor accidentally replaced an alloy steel elbow with a carbon steel elbow during a scheduled heat exchanger overhaul. The alloy steel elbow was resistant to high-temperature hydrogen attack (HTHA), but the carbon steel elbow was not. view more

Summary

A gas-phase explosion in a storage tower with semichemical pulp at a paper mill has possibly been caused by combustion of a mixture of hydrogen and air. The hydrogen was formed by microorganisms in the pulp. Ignition may be due to electric sparks in connection with an electric field in the mist above the pulp.

Accident Description

A gas-phase explosion took place in a 1,300 m3 storage tower for semichemical pulp at a paper mill. The storage tower was 21 m high and equipped with an agitator at the bottom. By a pumping arrangement, the pulp was circulated from the bottom to the top through external pipes connected with the mill (Fig. 1).

On a given day the production was stopped at a time when the storage tower was loaded with 1,000 m3 pulp at a view more