Security and tolerable risk for hydrogen service stations

The use of hydrogen as a clean fuel in the automotive sector has come under increasing scrutiny. One source is decentralized production of hydrogen from natural gas by using the existing natural gas infrastructure. Hydrogen service stations with on-site reforming require a sufficiently high level of safety to engender public confidence. In this paper, we argue that public acceptance can be achieved if the service station is designed to be as safe as any petrol service station. Tolerable risk is defined as risk that is accepted in a given context based on the current values of society. This paper considers a tolerable level of risk for hydrogen service stations with on-site reforming based on incident data for petrol stations in Norway and the United States. Based on the IEC 61508 standard, a safety system can be built that will create the defined tolerable risk level, which means that hydrogen service stations will be as safe as any petrol service station in Norway or the US.