1 CFD Modeling of Hydrogen Releases and Dispersion in Hydrogen Energy Station

This paper presents the results of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling of hydrogen releases and dispersion in simple geometries and a real industrial environment. The PHOENICS CFD software package was used to solve the continuity, momentum and concentration equations with the appropriate boundary conditions, buoyancy model and turbulence models. Numerical results for simple geometries were compared with the published data on hydrogen dispersion. The similarity study of helium and hydrogen releases has been conducted. Numerical results on hydrogen concentration predictions were obtained in the real industrial environment, which is a hydrogen energy station (HES) produced by Stuart Energy Systems Corporation. The CFD modeling was then applied to the risk assessment under hypothetical failure hydrogen leak scenarios in the HES. CFD modeling has proven to be a reliable, effective and relatively inexpensive tool to evaluate the effects of hydrogen leaks in the HES