SAFETY ASPECTS OF HYDROGEN COMBUSTION IN HYDROGEN ENERGY-SYSTEMS

Considerable progress has been made in the last few years concerning the understanding of the complex phenomena involved in combustion processes of gaseous mixtures. This holds in particular for flame acceleration and maximum turbulent flame speeds in unconfined and confined geometries. Fast turbulent deflagrations often transit spontaneously to detonations if flame speeds are high enough, depending on the combustible and boundary conditions. This paper discusses the potential hazards of hydrogen in the energy market as compared with other and already familiar energy carriers like natural gas and propane.