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With a global push for decarbonization, significant projects are both planned and ongoing to retrofit existing hydrocarbon equipment for the biofuel economy. One such conversion is transitioning hydrotreating equipment to treat plant derived oils, which can result in a fuel having a higher-octane rating than traditional diesel product. However, due to the unsaturated nature of the plant derived oils, the hydrotreating process needs to operate at higher pressures and use more hydrogen feedstock to produce the diesel. As a result, the consequences and associated risk will change for the new operation.
While operational hazards for biodiesel hydrotreating are similar to hydrocarbon refining, the introduction of process changes does necessitate revisiting facility siting per U.S. 29CFR1910.1191 (Process Safety Management of Highly Hazardous Chemicals) to evaluate potential impacts from explosions, fires, and toxic events on facility employees.
In previous articles in this series, BakerRisk discussed the hydrogen economy and high-level hazards. Additionally, best practices and general guidance for performing a PHA on hydrogen processing facilities to accurately assess all the risks and consequences associated with hydrogen were also covered. This article will focus on the materials and potential damage mechanisms and hazards associated with the operation of equipment exposed to hydrogen, including pressure vessels, pipelines, piping, and other equipment handling hydrogen.
Hydrogen has been used in petroleum refining, fertilizer production, chemical synthesis and many more applications for centuries. Throughout hydrogen’s use, releases have resulted in numerous explosion and fire incidents. Hydrogen is becoming more prevalent as a low carbon energy solution since it can be used both as an energy carrier as well as a replacement for raw materials. As hydrogen is adopted across more industries and applications, continued emphasis on preventing release and escalation is essential.
Test programs, such as those discussed above, have provided significant validation of the current methodologies used to analyze hydrogen hazards. Despite the enormous amount of work done by BakerRisk, the ERC, and others to understand the hazards associated with hydrogen, there is still more work to be done.
As the biofuels industry continues to expand in support of global decarbonization mandates and objectives, facility owners and developers are being challenged to balance production efficiency, operational reliability, and personnel safety.
The promise of hydrogen as the simplest of molecules and perhaps the most challenging and perplexing of energy carriers has the clean energy world diving into hydrogen applications across all major energy categories.
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