Hydrogen transport incidents analysis Europe and US; risk to populations highlighted
Spatial analysis of hydrogen transport incidents in Europe and in the US
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Spatial analysis of hydrogen transport incidents in Europe and in the US
The global hydrogen market amounted to 94 Mt in 2023, out of which approximately 10 Mt are produced in the US and 9 Mt in the EU. This hydrogen, mainly used as process gas in refinery and as feedstock in ammonia production and in chemical industries, is often produced and consumed at the same industrial place by the same industry without leaving the site fence. Only a small fraction of the overall hydrogen annual production, approximately two orders of magnitude lower than the total production, is commercial, leaving the fence of the production site to be delivered to external customers. Even though the amount of transported hydrogen is a relatively small part of the total hydrogen produced and consumed, there are two main reasons for studying the topic. The first reason is the increased societal risk. Hydrogen transport by road, by rail and by pipeline brings specific hazards more directly affecting the population than its production and immediate consumption in an industrial environment. These hazards are generated not only from transporting large quantities of a hazardous material on public roads, but also from its transfer to local stationary storages. The second reason is that this sector has been recently growing in relation to envisaged new applications of hydrogen for mobility and industry driven by recent decarbonisation policies. For example, hundreds of hydrogen refuelling stations have been deployed globally in the past two decades, and several of them are supplied by means of hydrogen road transport. This work presents a spatial analysis of the hydrogen transport incidents in Europe and in the US. The maps of hydrogen transport incidents in Europe and in the US are discussed in relation to the main centres of hydrogen production and demand, related routes, and risk to population. It focuses on the three incumbent hydrogen transportation technologies: compressed hydrogen tube trailers, liquid hydrogen tankers, as well as hydrogen pipelines, and is based on the most recent dataset of the Hydrogen Incidents and Accidents Database (HIAD), managed by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC).
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