Event
- Event ID
- 1163
- Quality
- Description
A fire occurred at a hydrogen refuelling station for buses. The incident was initially reported as an explosion due to a loud noise and vibrations felt in nearby buildings. However, subsequent investigations clarified that the fire resulted from a hydrogen venting through a safety valve of the station hydrogen storage. The fire was extinguished within approximately 50 minutes, and no casualties were reported. Some damage occurred to the roof of the storage building.
- Event Initiating system
- Classification of the physical effects
- Hydrogen Release and Ignition
- Nature of the consequences
- fire
- Macro-region
- Asia
- Country
- South Korea
- Date
- Component involved
- PRD (valve)
- Failure mode
- rupture & ignition
- Initiating cause
- unknown
- Root CAUSE analysis
The INITIATING CAUSE of the fire was a hydrogen venting through the safety valve.
The ROOT CAUSE is unknown.- Root causes
- Unknown
- Date entry in HIAD
- 01/02/2025
Facility
- Application
- Hydrogen refuelling station
- Sub-application
- CHG2 storage
- Hydrogen supply chain stage
- All components affected
safety valve
- Process temperature range [C]
- ambient temperature (-50°C to +50°C)
- Process pressure range [MPa]
- medium pressure (2 to 10 MPa)
- Location type
- Semiconfined
- Location
- populated area
- Operational condition
- Description of the facility/unit/process/substances
DESCRIPTION OF THE FACILITY
HRS compression and storage capacity of 180 kg/h with two refueling lines providing 90 kg/h each. designed for commercial vehicles like trucks and buses (https://fuelcellsworks.com/2024/10/14/fuel-cells/korea-busan-new-port-completes-first-hydrogen-refueling-station-for-cargo-trucks).
From the pictures of the YTN video, the station storage system seems to consist in hydrogen tube trailers, wit the typical vent system for each of the tube releasing hydrogen inside the building. Another type of longer tubes is visible aswell.
The building appears to be only partially covered by a roof. storage pressure is unknown (possiblyaround 40 MPa), the hydrogen inventory, the safety systems in place.
Emergency & Consequences
- Number of fatalities
- 0
- Number of injured persons
- 0
- Post-event summary
Some damage to the roof structure is visible.
- Emergency action
The fire brigade intervened extinguishing the fire within approximately 50 minutes,
In-depth data
- Release type
- gas
- Involved substances (% vol)
- H2 100%
- Release temperature [°C]
- 25
- Probable IGNITION SOURCE
References
- Sources categories
- News
- Reference & weblink
