International Conference on Hydrogen Safety
Hydrogen is explosive—a fact every child learns in school. How can the handling of the gas be made safe? This issue is being pursued by research facilities across the world. Every two years they meet and exchange knowledge and experience during the International Conference on Hydrogen Safety. This year it took place from September 12th to 14th in San Francisco, USA.
More than 120 participants presented their research results during the fourth conference of this kind. For instance, it was examined how and under what conditions (pressure, temperature, mixing ratios) hydrogen self-ignites. Also, how and in what way hydrogen-filled garages may explode or how hydrogen fuel stations in Brazil can be licensed. All in all, 118 lectures were held in three simultaneous sessions.
In general, there are two main aspects that motivate scientists in their research: On the one hand, the results of their experiments should enable standardisations that will create an internationally equal basis for the implementation of hydrogen technologies. On the other hand, scientists work hard to alleviate the public’s fear of hydrogen, for example among future drivers of hydrogen fuelled cars. There are misgivings in the scientific community that hydrogen is viewed as an unsafe technology. Reason enough to discuss these alleged reservations of the public with the security experts.
Dr. René Zimmer and Joerg Welke from the department for Resource Protection & Landscape Ecology were able to present remarkable results of the HyTrust Project in San Francisco. UfU’s project HyTrust aims at gaining an insight into the public opinion about hydrogen and fuel cell technologies, using different methods and approaches. The general tenor: The people are not especially afraid of hydrogen technology. However, they expect the future technologies, for example hydrogen cars, to be just as safe as conventional vehicles. These results the security experts found hard to believe, as the assumed scepticism of the public was the motive for their research. “Many an expert will have to come up with a new line of argumentation in his research application to justify the social significance of his scientific research” was the opinion of one participant in the subsequent discussion.
