Eric Parker, Hydrogen & Fuel Cell Technologies Office:
Hello, everyone, and welcome to another H2IQ hour, our monthly educational webinar series that highlights research and development activities funded by the US Department of Energy's Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technologies Office – or HFTO – within the office of energy efficiency and renewable energy. If any of you are active on social media, we encourage you to share anything interesting, surprising, or informative that you get from this H2IQ hour using the H2IQ hashtag in your post and, as always, we'll be announcing new topics continually. As a reminder, this WebEx call is being recorded and will be posted on the DOE's website and used internally, along with the full slide deck. All attendees will be on mute throughout the webinar so, please, submit any questions you have during the webinar via the Q&A chat box you should see in the bottom right of your WebEx – that's the Q&A panel. We will cover those questions during the Q&A portion during the final 15 minutes of our hour.
And with that, I'm going to turn it over to our DOE host and safety codes and standards' lead, Laura Hill, to introduce today's topic and speaker. Thanks, Laura.
Laura Hill, Hydrogen & Fuel Cell Technologies Office:
Hi, Eric. Thank you and thank you to everybody for joining us today. I'm excited to introduce to you all, again, Nick Barilo, who'll be presenting to us on recent activity for the Center for Hydrogen Safety. Nick is the director of the Center for Hydrogen Safety at the American Institute of Chemical Engineers and is the Hydrogen Safety program manager at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. In addition to the work that Nick's going to be presenting to us today, he's also a licensed fire protection engineer with over 30 years of experience, dedicating his career to reducing risks to personnel and property.
He's served on the NFPA2 Hydrogen Technologies Code Committee and was instrumental in organizing the documents' fundamental chapters. His work at PNNL has provided essential hydrogen safety support for the US Department of Energy's Hydrogen Fuel Cell Technologies Office and in this capacity, he directs activities for the US Hydrogen Safety Panel and leads safety knowledge dissemination and first responder training efforts. Nick has also authored papers and journal articles and presented both nationally and internationally on these subjects. Nick, thank you for joining us today. I'll turn it over to you.
Nick Barilo, Director of the Center for Hydrogen Safety:
Thanks, Laura, and thanks to the Department of Energy Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technologies Office for giving me this opportunity to share. And I also want to wish everyone a good day.
So, I'm gonna be – as Laura mentioned, I'll be providing you an update with what's been happening with the center. It's been an exciting year from the center's perspective and quite a bit has been going on. I'm also gonna give you a little bit of background on how we got here and some of the resources and then, the changes that have been made to those resources over the last year and the improvements in the center's activities.
So, I think, to start out, just to get us on the same starting point here, I really wanted to focus on addressing safety to enable widespread success. I think probably many of you on the call could agree that safety issues are very important and must be addressed for the technology acceptance and deployment. If not addressed properly, those safety issues can be a deal breaker and be a real obstacle to the technology moving forward. The stakeholders may not be able to identify and effectively address all the safety issues – especially with new technologies. We see this as becoming very important to understand and to work to remove the barriers. And then, an independent safety resource can play a significant role in helping to enable the technology to move forward.
So, a little bit of background on how we got here, where we're starting from. So, the US Department of Energy, back in 2003, identified the need to make safety a significant part of the activities and considerations in order to remove the obstacles for the technology to move forward. There were three primary resources that were stood up at PNNL under the support and funding of the Department of Energy. This includes the safety knowledge resources, some first responder training tools and resources, and the Hydrogen Safety Panel. These were DOE support and these resources are really fundamental for understanding how we ended up with getting to a center for hydrogen safety and the needed foundational pieces that were in place to bring about success.
So, a bit of a timeline in understanding how we got here. DOE, again, established the Hydrogen Safety Panel and the need for some additional training materials back in 2003. You can see, over the years, some of the different activities that have been done – things like first responder training, online training resources, databases, best safety practices – those sort of things – as well as a very large extent of the Hydrogen Safety Panel and the work they've been doing and its integral part into the rest of these activities as well. Moving on out to the right you see the Safety Panel being involved in activities in California, supporting the role of the infrastructure, and that continues through today, and then, you'll notice there in 2019, a marker for the Center for Hydrogen Safety.
So, through all the years of supporting through the Department of Energy and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, we've learned an awful lot about hydrogen safety. We've learned about technical issues. We've learned about obstacles and barriers. And one of the more important ones that we've really been a part of in the process is this sharing information. So, you see a number of terms in the figure on the right and some of those are bolded.
It's really about informing, advising, revealing, disseminating, et cetera – sharing information with those that need it to ensure that things are done safely and that lessons learned, and best practices are transferred. More importantly, though, it's really about connecting. And so, the two bullets on the left really highlighting the part that we see coming out of all this – communication of hydrogen specific safely guidance – it's critical to the success and the energy transition – and establishing and communicating best practices from a trusted, independent, safety resource is a valuable part of the safety ecosystem. So, really, this is about connecting. It's about connecting those that are coming new and don't have the experience with the knowledge that's currently available.
It's also connecting those that have a great experience and have been involved in the industry for a long time – connecting what they've learned and their best practices with others that are new coming into the industry as well. So, it's connecting the community with the safety knowledge to enable the safe and timely transition to these technologies.
So, in a snapshot here, really, we're looking at bringing together a global membership to expand the body of safety knowledge – and that's not just expanding it in what we know but, to those that are involved in getting the information. It's the community at large – whether they be new to the community or maybe even outside the community – the public and other stakeholders that are not familiar with hydrogen and hydrogen safety. So, the vision is a global non-profit dedicated to promoting applied hydrogen safety and best practices worldwide and our mission is to support and promote the safe handling and use of hydrogen across applications in the energy transition and then, providing a common communication platform and a global scope to ensure that the safety information and guidance, expertise, et cetera, is available to all the stakeholders. You can see some of the activities there on the right that are so critical and at a center of what we're doing, and I'll talk a little bit more about these, but it really is building a community and it's enabling that community to then be more productive in a more efficient manner, in a more impactful manner, and ultimately, to remove the barriers to get to where we need to be.
A little bit of the timeline over the past year of the Center for Hydrogen Safety. April 2019 is the launch – that was done in New Orleans – in conjunction with the AIChE, their spring meeting, and Center for Chemical Process Safety Conference. Was a great kickoff. At the time, we had 13 founding members that were a part of the safety panel. In June of 2019, as a result of some incidents that occurred in the industry, the center held its first member meeting to discuss those incidents and what we really needed to do to be impactful. One of the things that you're gonna see as I move through this overview is that it's really critical to us that the members are a part of what we do and understanding what the issues are and what resources and activities are necessary to really help us be impactful and productive.
So, you're gonna see – constantly, you're gonna see a lot of things in here in which the members were providing feedback and making this activity successful. Because it's really all about all of us working together. So, in 2019, we redeployed the Hydrogen Safety for First Responders course under the AIChE Academy and held our first conference. That conference was very exciting because in 75 attendees, about half of those were folks that were fairly new to the industry or faces that we may not have been all that familiar with and it's really good to see the excitement and the energy growing outside of what has been a relatively steady and well-known community group. It's good to see new faces, new interests, and a lot of new activities.
We put out our first newsletter and deployed some technical bulletins in multiple languages in December of 2019. Had our first international MoU for doing work – was signed with Gangwon Technopark from South Korea, and then, in February, we initiate some plannings for some virtual conferences – and I'll talk a little bit more about those coming up. In April 2020, we had our first members meeting. We have monthly members meetings and I'll talk a little bit more about that. And then, we had another incident occur and a member meeting was convened immediately to discuss that.
In May, we have a revised first responder course and our first working group and we'll talk about that. We're in the final stages of approving bylaws and we also had our first international government member come on board as well. We have some micro-learning courses for first responders that were put out in June and we also have – we've now hit 40 members.
So, a little bit of an overview of the benefits before I start talking about what's changed in the last year. I'm gonna start at the center. Networking is really the center of everything we do. It's connecting people together. We do that through conferences, collaborative teaming, meetings, work groups, lots of discussions and activities, taking feedback, et cetera.
We have training and education materials – you hear quite a bit more on that. We have some incident management resources – and I'll talk about that – and we also utilize the Hydrogen Safety Panel for providing expert reviews and support of projects, and you'll hear more about that. And then, we are steadily trying to reach out and become more beneficial in the outreach side as well.
So, let me talk about training and education and what has happened in the last year and the things that are going on. Well, really, right now, you'll hear a lot about the first responder courses and those are the ones that are moving over first. We're also working on researchers and academia courses. That'll be coming soon as well as some other courses for workforce development. We have focused webinars and custom training.
This is everything from project safety and safety planning, researchers, code officials, and others based on customer needs. We've had many discussions with some customers about doing on-site training as well as webinar training. And then, we've put out some information certainly to first responders and to the public and we have safety bulletins that we're doing. We're going to be moving towards translating many of these resources and the educational products into many languages so, that – and we're going to utilize, hopefully, our membership to do that. One of the things about translation support is that it's not about word for word translation but about getting the content and the meaning behind that transferred over.
So, again, having this community that has – that's a global community and has capabilities in those areas will greatly help the products be impactful in those areas.
The goal of first responder training – and for those of you that are not familiar – it's really to support successful implementation of hydrogen and fuel cell technologies by providing technically accurate hydrogen safety and emergency response information to first responder. This group is really critical because not only are they on the front line responding to incidents; they are also seen as a major safety influence in the community and their support and their understanding and perspectives on the issues are important and taken as important and the community really values that. We've seen, through our first responder training, that we've done, in conjunction with our partner, the California Fuel Cell Partnership – we continually see where when this group of individuals is first responders is involved in training, many time they'll walk into training a bit skeptical or just lacking some knowledge on the technology and its benefit and the safety issues. More than not, we see a great majority walk out the door with not only a great understanding of the issues, but also, lots of support for the issue, lots of excitement for the technology moving forward, and generally, just overall ease that this can be handled and is not something that they need to be overly concerned about.
So, talking about what we've done in the last year for first responder training. So, on 10/8, National Hydrogen Day in the US, we redeployed the – previously, the PNNL training under the AIChE Academy. This is the first time this course is now being offered with CEUs and PDH credits. That's really important, as many of those first responders need those credits in their annual job description and things that they do. In May of 2020, we have included updates with video clips and information relative to what the National Transportation Safety Board deemed as necessary based on a 2018 Diamond Bar incident.
So, there was some information that came out of that incident that suggested that the first responders need to be trained more thoroughly on transportation issues and we've included that in the Awareness Level Training. You're gonna see we've also included that in the micro-learning courses as well as the slide deck for trainers – and I'll talk more about that. So, what's new is we have these first responder micro-training learning plan. It's video-based content – 4 courses that are set up with approximately 10 to 15 minutes of video and then, there are test questions afterward. The work that was done to produce these videos is very high quality.
Very exciting to see what's come out of this. We have a lot of new information. We have a lot of new ways of describing that information and sharing it and you'll see that it's really done well. So, the two courses – the training plan on the bottom right has four courses in it and the Awareness Level Training – you see the link there on the right. I'm going to take just a couple of minutes and I'm just show you a few pieces out of this training to get a feel for the quality of it and sort of how it's being presented as well as some of the ways that we attempted to bridge the gap in the new areas.
So, hopefully, this will come across to your computers very well. If not, we can certainly provide you a link to this information later on.
[Start of video]
[Musical intro]
Male 1:
As with any alternative fuel vehicles, fires involving fuel cell vehicles present unique hazards not found in conventional cars and trucks. Most notable are the high-pressure storage of hydrogen in these composite cylinders and the high voltage electrical system. Understanding the on-board safety systems and how fire impacts the hydrogen storage component is important when determining the best way to extinguish the fire. Additionally, fire damage to the high-voltage battery can have an impact on fire-fighting operations and post-fire storage consideration.
[Music]
Male 2:
As identified in the introduction to this video series, the composite cylinders on fuel cell vehicles are equipped with thermally activated pressure release devices – TPRDs – to protect against catastrophic failure due to intense heat. In the event that these cylinders are exposed to fire, the TPRDs will activate. Each cylinder is equipped with its own TPRD. In passenger vehicles, TPRD vents are generally located at the rear of the vehicle, angled toward the ground. In heavy-duty vehicles, hydrogen can be vented towards the ground or vertically.
Once activated, the TPRD vents the entire contents of the cylinder. This generally takes two minutes or less for passenger vehicles. Trucks and buses can take longer to vent due to the greater storage capacity. The venting is accompanied by a loud, high-pitched noise. When the venting sound stops, it doesn't necessarily mean that all the cylinders on the vehicle have emptied.
[Music]
When arriving on the scene of a vehicle fire, every attempt should be made to identify the vehicle type in order to properly –
[End of Video]
Nick Barilo:
All right. So, we're really – that was just to give you a short sample of some of the information and the quality of the videos. We're really excited about these videos because we actually took the – there were five courses; two were combined into a single course for the micro-learning plant, but out of these courses, we took shorter video clips. Much of the information can be used in other webinars and other training courses as well as some of the fundamental information in these courses can be used more broadly than just first responders. So, we're really excited about what's come out of it and it's a resource that will be used for many products, many activities, and can be a benefit in many areas. So, really excited about that.
The other thing I want to point out now on the first responder is the Hydrogen Safety Resource for trainers. We're sort of kind of re-branding this a little bit, not only on the slide deck, but also on the title. It's previously discussed as the National Training Template. It's – with CHS being a global organization, we've had requests for this information to be used in other countries. We're actually getting away from that word "national" and really just calling it, "Hydrogen Fuel Cell Emergency Response Training".
So, it's a templated slide deck. It's intended to serve as a resource and a guide for the delivery – variety of training to variety of audiences. The material's adaptable so, the slide deck comes with not only information, but speaker notes. You could use as many or as few slides as you deem appropriate for the audience that you're dealing with. Some of the recent updates include putting in video – links to video clips.
So, we have about 15 video clips that we've made available and some of those are in the slide deck now to help broaden not only the appeal of the slides in the presentation material but to help those that are in the training to get a better understanding of the content. Additional information provided on transportation considerations – again, that's as a result of the 2018 incident. And we've moved to this universal 16x9 format – thank you. We finally entered the 2000-teens.
We also provide some custom training. This could be done virtually or on-site. You see just some things on the right there – just some of the slides that can be used in some of the training that we do – along with some of the video content you see down there on the bottom right – a liquid hydrogen tank with an exposure fire on it. It's available for a wide variety of audiences. Could be code officials, fire prevention officers, inspectors, academia, OEMs, equipment providers, military organizations.
Topics really could be tailored to specific needs. And, as I mention, we now have the – not only the slides, but the videos and the animations. And this kind of training can be led by members of the Hydrogen Safety Panel.
Excited to bring this topic up to you. So, in December of 2019, one of the Center for Hydrogen Safety members submitted a comment that our hydrogen fuel's best safety practices could be made into courses. And we really pondered that idea and thought that was a really great idea. And so, right now, we have work ongoing with the topics that you see there listed in the bullets on the left. Quite a few variety of topics.
We're vetting. We're going through the information. We're trying to put it into a format, an arrangement, that'll make it most beneficial. This will result, likely, in 10 plus new course being on the AIChE Academy. This will be a part of getting PDHs and CEUs as well and also, this material can then be redeployed if an organization, a company, needed to have training program customized for their specific needs.
We have the foundational information that can do that and can be manipulated quite easily. So, thanks again to the CHS membership – its great ideas and the impact that that's making.
Translating resources. We're gonna be focusing on addressing educational materials and safety information bulletins first. Hoping to utilize the CHS membership to do that. Again, I mention, the translation is more than just word for word, really, to get to the content and the meaning. It takes going much deeper than that.
We have a bulletin that was produced and issued in Japanese in December of 2019. We also have some information that's being – currently gonna be worked for translation into Dutch or potentially Russian and then Spanish as well. You see some of that here on the left.
Another activity that I'm excited to really share with you today is the potential for credentialing and certification. So, again, this is a discussion that was had during a member meeting and there was resounding support for the idea of coming up with potentially a Hydrogen Safety Certificate or other means of credentialing someone. So, I put this slide right after the previous because you can see how the two start to tie together. We have this best safety practices and information that's being put into a multiple level training program and package and then now, we're going to be able to look at potentially doing some credentialing. AIChE has a credentials activity that's part of the Institute for Learning and Innovations so, we're not – we're moving within an area of strength that the AIChE already has.
And I probably failed to mention this early on so, let me stop here and just pause. The Center for Hydrogen Safety is a technical community under the American Institute for Chemical Engineers. It is a brother organization to the Center for Chemical Process Safety. So, when you hear me say "AIChE", that's why. We're tying into all those resources to really make the center more impactful and more successful in all that we do.
And there's a rich legacy under AIChE of being greatly impactful in the chemical industry as well as chemical processing industry and other areas as well. So, we're in the early stages of working with industry members for developing the credential program. Again, the membership gets to speak to what we're doing and how we do it, where the priorities will be, and how we make this impactful. It's anticipated that the CHS members and the safety panel will help direct the process and review the content so, this is really exciting. I'm hoping that we can start to show you some of this later this year and into early next year.
Incident response activities. So, that meeting that I mentioned in June of 2019, we had quite a discussion about how the center can be impactful with responding to incidents and so, this really kind of gives you a little bit of a flow. When an incident occurs, we'll reach out through established channels to gather all the relevant information that we can. We'll then hold a meeting – a member meeting – to discuss the incident and share whatever information we have – both what we have as well as what other members may have in that meeting. We will, to the greatest extent possible, participate in fact-finding, make those resources available, and hopefully, that those involved in the incident will see the value and get us involved.
Develop incident records – so, we will maintain a maturing incident record that will gather what we have, references – what we may have on the incident itself as well as the learnings. Update that fairly frequently, as much as we can, as the information is made available. And then, at that some point in the end, after that has matured substantially, we'll then translate that information into a lessons learned that is available on H2 tools. So, the key about this incident record is to understand it's a member only record maintained for our members and our members are asked to keep that within the membership as well to ensure that we're able to get the most impactful information we have and to bring the greatest value to them.
Other resources for responding to an incident – so, once an incident occurs, that could impact a lot of things. One of the things it does is really help us to reassess our educational materials. So, we can have new courses, revise course content, et cetera. You saw that in the February 2018 incident, coming back to impact what we did and how we expanded the training. Technical bulletins – we can – we did this last year.
There were two bulletins put out. One was intended to be for more of a public bulletin; another is for members only to consider information that they may want to share within their own outreach activities and sharing of information. It can impact with working groups. So, to address important safety issues, we may put together a working group that we'll need to consider what we've learned out of the incident and then, what we may need to do going forward. We share incident information and learnings and conferences and workshops and then, we're also working to put together an incident management guide helping those organizations that may not have the experience or expertise to better understand how to maneuver through an incident and what resources are available to them.
So, for example, on the Diamond Bar incident, this is the incident record you can see there on the right. We also have, on the left of that record, you can see that we have the online training now that addresses specifically transport of hydrogen fuel. That was all in response to the incident that occurred. And then – and an incident record will be input into the H2 Tools Lessons Learned database in the near future. So, you can see that when something happens, we're trying to utilize the CHS to be reactive and responsive in a way that can benefit not only the membership, but the industry and the public as well.
So, here's some of the incidents that we're tracking. This is not all of them but this is some that are currently on the website. And I want to go back and talk about this a little bit because as you look at the incidents here, you start to see a common thread – and I'll walk through these real quick. The personnel did not fully understand the interrelation of an electrolyzer membrane with the membrane gas permeability, degradation, and dynamic operating range. That was really one of the foundational issues.
And another – an assembly error; and another – incorrect pressure relief device; and another – incompatible pressure relief device installed; and then, we have an unauthorized repair and failure to follow the procedures. So, you see a common thread here among the incidents. This is not unique to hydrogen. Many industries can really identify incidents in which there was human error occurring and certainly, engineering controls are worked first as a primary means of defense but I think it's important to see the trend and see where we need to focus our efforts. You know, there are incidents in every industry and I think the important thing to realize here and take away from this is that hydrogen is – can be used as safely as other fuels.
I think the important thing to understand is that it can be less forgiving when something does occur. It's a very small molecule and very energetic so, those are some things to keep in mind why we have to really keep applying ourselves to safety and learning from what's happened.
I'm gonna talk now a little bit about the Hydrogen Safety Panel. So, the Safety Panel promotes the safe operation, handling, and use of hydrogen. It was established in 2003 at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratories – so, 17 years. Been involved in almost 370 projects, 535 reviews. 16 current members and we're adding a 17th later this year.
The safety reviews really cover the entire portfolio of fuel cell projects and also, some non-fuel cell projects as well. There are white papers, reports, and guides developed by the Safety Panel and really support the application of hydrogen codes and standards so, we will, at times, provide some feedback on those code and standards. We also have provided some input to the codes and standards committees for consideration to future updates. And then, sharing the safety knowledge through H2 Tools.
So, this is sort of the process the Safety Panel uses. The Safety Panel was stood up at PNNL under the direction and the funding of the US Department of Energy and so, you see that a safety planning guidance is the first thing that was put together and then, the Safety Panel is involved in design and safety plan reviews, its site visits. We participate in incident fact-finding. Through all that, we identify gaps and learnings and then, the goal was to share those learnings – both broadly and with other projects. So, really, the value here you see is that when we are involved in a project, we bring the learnings with us to that project.
We then learn from that project and then bring that back to the next set of projects. And so, it's a constant snowballing effect of that safety knowledge being increased and shared. The Safety Panel is non-regulatory, objective, and neutral. These are really – all of these words are really important. We're not a regulatory body and so, really, the information can be shared in a manner that can be received by those requesting the information without needing to understand if it's a regulatory basis and is free to do with that information as they see fit, which is then a much better role to work with folks and to be a part of the activities.
We're objective and we're neutral as well. So, we really get to see the big picture – and you saw from the figure on the right how that can come about. Helping to reduce costs – so, we do see, especially with a lack of experience and understanding in the industry, that at times, there are unnecessary features that are added, perhaps over-engineering. Not only can these increase the costs, but they can really be impactful on setting up precedents in the industry and, at times, some of those may be more detrimental to safety than actually helping. Delayed approvals can occur and we're helping to reduce those and then, certainly, missed safety considerations or features.
This collaborative group with diverse experience really is good for responding with the balanced solution to questions, problems, and issues. We see that fairly constantly. Avoiding repeating costly mistakes and different projects and certainly helping to not have industry impact the incidents. Perhaps the last bullet is among the most important – helping establish stakeholder and public confidence. We've seen this in our projects many times in which our involvement was a key to helping the stakeholders and regulatory officials be more accepting of those project activities.
So, the Safety Panel – I've given you background on it. So, one of the goals – back in 2016 and 2017 – was to identify a way in which that safety panel could be more accessible by others. We had put together with some work with the state of California. The goal was then to expand it out so it could be impactful and beneficial. We saw a lot of comments to that effect in the annual merit review with DOE.
There was a constant need to say, "How do we make this unique entity more impactful and more available?" So, understanding the National Laboratories, it's sometimes difficult with some of the bureaucracy to move through that in a timely manner and so, by bringing access to the Hydrogen Safety Panel under the Center for Hydrogen Safety – again, the Safety Panel right now still resides under PNNL, but getting access to the panel through CHS, we reduced the contracting requirements in a way that makes it much more easy to facilitate reviews. So, we've gone from three to six months down to one to two weeks. It's a little bit more transparent to the end user and we're starting to see – we've had multiple projects engage the panel through CHS already and we're seeing more interest in doing that as well.
Some of the activities – this is a very busy slide, but this is everything – even the gray in the figure – are different activities that can be done by the Safety Panel and the program. But I highlight the ones in the darker blue to show what could really be accessed through the center very quickly and in a very beneficial manner – things like – certainly like webinars – safety planning webinars, consultations, and then, obviously, I've talked a lot about reviews – participating in or reviewing risk analyses. Evaluating safety features, on-site evaluations – all those are areas that are very prime for someone accessing the Safety Panel through the Center.
Networking – we do a number of activities and this last year, we've really grown in how we do this. So, I've talked a little bit about incident response meetings. I'll talk some more about conferences. The member meetings – really, it's a forum to update the members and get collective feedback. It's meant to be an interactive time and it's really – we really try to keep the agenda of things down to a minimum. It's also a good opportunity for members to understand who else is a member to find ways to connect.
Working groups – we have working groups now going. Our first working group is on introducing hydrogen into the natural gas pipelines and understanding the safety issues around those and that working group is off and running. And then, we have webinars to engage members on relevant and important topics, as well as we do some of these for outreach.
We get member feedback. This is something that we do. We have a formal onboarding process with every member and during that onboarding, we not only share about what benefits and resources are available, but we get their input on what they may need, where they could see improvements could be done. We're current tracking almost 30 items that we're provided during the onboarding meetings. We take that feedback; we develop what we think is a response and then status that.
That's available on our member-only website to look at and it's really been beneficial. We have some new educational resources – obviously, we talked about that. We have more focused member meetings. The working group I mentioned – that working group was a direct result of folks identifying the need for it. We're standing up additional membership benefits.
We have download materials, et cetera, that are now available as a result of the input of our members. And then, our members are getting more and more involved in the development of these safety resources, which is great to see.
Conferences we have – we had the conference in October of 2019. The next two conferences are going to be virtual conferences so, you see sort of a virtual background there to a lobby area. And then, we also had a conference that was set up for June in which Covid impacted and we're not able to do so, we may talk more later on about doing that conference virtually as well.
So, now that we're talking about virtual conferences, I really want to highlight, just for a moment – I think it's really clear that we lose a bit of the organic feel and the interaction by not having it in person. Be that as it may, we're in an era that, at least for the temporary near future, we're going to have to come up with other ways of connecting and sharing information. So, what I want to highlight here is some of the benefits of virtual events – and I'm pleasantly surprised to see these and excited to see how it goes. Certainly, on the cost, it's pretty obvious. You have a much lower cost – not only for registration, but for travel and hotel.
Access really tended to be more regionally located. This really opens it up globally. AIChE's use experience so far has shown, even in different time zones where it may not be convenient, people are attending some of those activities because they want to be a part of what is happening. So, that's interesting to see as well. Networking – a lot of the presentations can be prerecorded so, what you end up with is you end up with an opportunity in which the presenter can be online and taking chat questions while their presentation is ongoing.
It really facilitates some different ways of interacting with the audiences. And then, proceedings will be available – including the video content that's been recorded – so, that's really interesting as well. And we can support many more participants. I think that's the other exciting part – is I think we're going to probably see more attendees to the conferences when they're virtual. Price will be lower. People won't have to travel.
It's just going to make for a greater opportunity for people to get access to the information and consider it part of their ongoing professional development.
So, for those of you that are not aware, we are a membership organization and so, that's how we do all the things that we're doing. So, this is the different levels of membership that we have currently. More information on the membership levels and the benefits can be found at the Center for Hydrogen Safety website or you can contact me if you'd like to talk more.
So, I want to really highlight a little bit of the impact of membership because we're at a phase where – we're in that, what I consider, a little bit of that grace umbrella where there have been some incidents that occurred. It's gotten a little bit of attention but not globally, I think, if you recall maybe some of the transportation – the electrification for transportation – some of the electric cars. Early on, some incidents occurred and it was really – really went under the radar. Now, when you see an incident, you tend to see quite a bit of coverage internationally on the incident. So, I think, long-term, we're going to have demonstrate that safety's a fundamental principle if we're deploying the technology.
So, it's not – we're going to have to stand up – especially with the public being unfamiliar with this hydrogen's uses of fuel and having some paradigms. We're really going to have to make safety a big part of our story. We're going to have to have the resources available and sustained now, prior to when things happen, and certainly, as the industry's getting to move forward, and as we're seeing many, many new participants in the industry and those without substantial experience. And then, it's really going to ensure that safety's not a significant impediment to acceptance of the technology. Ultimately, we're facilitating that safe and timely transition and contributing to stakeholder and public acceptance and certainly, helping the safe operation of the facilities.
This is our current membership. The exciting news is we've grown from the original 13. You can see many more members now, many more strategic partners. IPCH – we're thankful they're a strategic partner, along with the Hydrogen Council. Certainly, very much appreciate the support of the US Department of Energy. You can see those on the board and some of the other members as well.
Some recent feedback – you can see this on the right. We're constantly getting some good feedback from our industry members and it's good to see that they're finding their membership valuable. Really, would encourage you to – if you're not already a member, become a member. Utilize the resources and then, get involved in some of the activities that we're doing 'cause it not only benefits you and your activities and the work that you're doing with your stakeholders and the public, but it benefits the community as a whole. And what others are doing will benefit you.
Concluding thoughts – we're gonna see an increased use in hydrogen. I think that's really clear to everyone on the phone. Because it's a relatively new technology, I think a lot of the folks involved don't have the experience or expertise and may not really understand well how to use it safely and transport it safely, et cetera. So, safe practices will be essential and then, the Center for Hydrogen Safety and its resources are available to really help in this matter and deploying the information.
So, I want to say, "Thank you" for you being involved and watching today but also, a shout out, again, to the Department of Energy, the Fuel Cell Technologies Office, and the Safety Codes and Standards Program. They've been a really big help for us getting to where we're at and have been critical to making this a success. Certainly, up for questions now and if you need to contact me, I'll have my information available on one of the screens. So, I'm gonna stop at this point and we're going to take questions and answers – and I'll get you some answers, hopefully.
Laura Hill:
All right. Thanks, Nick. That was a great presentation and, just a quick reminder to everybody on the phone, feel free to submit questions to the Q&A box. You can see the picture here. It's down to the bottom right of your window.
We've had a few questions come in already, Nick. First, I think this one might be a quick answer for you. If somebody wants more info on a specific incident, where could they start to find that information?
Nick Barilo:
So, the lesson – the Best Practices/Lessons Learned site is the public site and that's the latest that we have. Not all the incidents – recent incidents – are on that site. So, we do have incident information for our members that is available but, due to restrictions, we can't share that information broadly with the public 'cause it's not a public record yet. So, I would encourage you – become a member and be a part of the meetings when we have incidents and discussion on those and get access to the information.
Laura Hill:
I'll add to what Nick just said – that the Best Practices and Lessons Learned Site are on H2Tools.org. In case you have interest in that, we encourage you to check out the resources there. Could some of this first responder training and safety info be applied to other industries – for example, refineries?
Nick Barilo:
Yeah. So, there's a lot of fundamental information in that training that is actually very much could be used in other industries and other activities involving hydrogen. So, we've already seen that. Actually, in some of our courses, we have some folks from other government agencies that have been using it – some of the folks doing the weather balloons – the hydrogen weather balloons and those sort of things have been using the safety training. But now, especially with the video content, it's gotten even more broadly impactful and there's a lot of fundamental information in this that can be really – can be beneficial.
So, the videos – especially the fundamental video – I would encourage you to go to out on AIChE and take that course. It's free. So, the hydrogen micro-learning plan is – all those courses are free and available through the AIChE Academy.
Laura Hill:
All right. Great. We have a couple of different questions about membership. If somebody wants to have the CHS engage with them on a project or a recent event, do they have to be a member of the CHS to work with you guys?
Nick Barilo:
Great question. Thanks for asking. Sorry I didn't say it before. No, you don't. No, you don't.
The panel is available through CHS to anyone. Members, at various levels, get a variety of discounts to accessing that panel. So, if you are gonna be involved in multiple projects, it might be in your best interest to join us. But nope, to answer the question, you don't have to be a member to access that resource.
Laura Hill:
We also had a question from somebody – if they are a part of a company that is an industry member, does that mean they should be able to have access to all the training materials and videos that you've already discussed?
Nick Barilo:
Yeah. So, if you're at a company that is already a member, you have access to all this. Currently, the first responder training material – DOE helps sponsor a lot of that material and so, it is gonna remain free for a number of years. Some of the course that you saw that we're putting together – that will likely not be free as we go forward but a member will still have access to that. We haven't come up with a cost.
Certainly, it would be – at the very least, it would be a discounted program, if not free, but many of the materials that we have right now are – for members – are free. So, the incident records, some of the safety bulletins, the other information – as well as providing some technical support where if a question comes in, we're able to get you some feedback on that question fairly quickly – and that's all covered without a cost to members.
Laura Hill:
Great. Let's see here. Do you have a newsletter than non-members can access or is that for member's only?
Nick Barilo:
So, we have a newsletter that we put out and I don't think there's a – I don't think there would be a restriction. Michelle, I don't know if we made that available. Michelle Bryner, from AIChE is on as well. I don't know if we've made that available but certainly, that's a – I'll take that and if we haven't made that available, we can do that. We also have some other information online that can be made more broadly available. So, let me get your name – if you can share that with the folks –
Laura Hill:
I can follow up on with you on that one, Nick.
Nick Barilo:
– and we'll get that back to you. If nothing else, we'll send you a copy, but we'll take also the suggestion to broadly deploy those newsletters. I think we have the ability to do that. We just need you to be – let us know you're interested and we'll find a way to get it to you.
Laura Hill:
If somebody has a specific question about the membership fees and what level of membership their entity would be, who should they contact? You?
Nick Barilo:
Yeah. Just contact me. We can work through it.
Laura Hill:
All right. If you want to jump back to your contact information real quick, you can do that. I think you already addressed this, Nick, but if somebody wants in-person training or custom training for a specific purpose, can you guys provide that?
Nick Barilo:
Absolutely. And we've actually had discussions with member organizations. The way we do this is we have a phone call to talk to you about what is it – what are your needs – what are your desires and needs – webinar, in person? What are the topics? And then, we sort of put together a concept of what that might look like and then, determine how best to deploy that, in what manner.
And we've also had some recommendation, as folks are looking at doing this, if you're thinking you'd like to have an in-person training – once we get over the travel restrictions – that's a great idea. If you're a smaller organization, it might be something that could be opened up to a larger – sort of a larger area – geographical area – and so, you wouldn't have to cover the entire cost of doing that. So, I mean, there's ways we can do this and certainly, it can be customized where we have those that are doing the work, those that are designing, those that are involved in some activities. We can really, totally customize this to whatever your needs are.
Laura Hill:
You talked a little bit about working with folks to get project acceptance in different areas. Do you have an example of where over-engineering led to approval delays and also had a negative impact on safety?
Nick Barilo:
So, yeah, I can actually. There was one project in which it was a hydrotreater activity in which – essentially taking biofuels and making those fuels into gasoline, diesel, and _____. So, this was done in a small room within a facility and in that room, you had a multitude of hazards here. You had flammable liquid hazards associated with the production of those fuels. You also had hydrogen coming in that was being injected into the biofuels.
And so, the initial activity was set up to be one which, due to the hazard, the choice was made to use a water mist system to put out the hydrocarbon fires, used ventilation shutdowns to deal with the hydrogen fires. Someone came back and required sprinklers to go into that facility as well – fire sprinklers – so, the water mist system is a fire system that is a limited water or a system that can better handle out flammable liquids fires whereas sprinkler systems just don't put out flammable liquids fires. They end up floating the flammable liquid. In this case, this was a room inside of a building so, by introducing that additional need for sprinklers, you've actually increased the hazard because the flow of that flammable liquid outside of that room – and it could be burning – could now promote the fire traveling to other portions of the facility. So, really, it downgraded the safety of that facility.
In another case, there's been some concern of early project AHJs that are really concerned around safety [Inaudible] hydrogen and so, looking at things like deluge systems over tanks – water deluge systems and those sort of things. And again, these – we've seen some cases where some of those that were reviewing the project suggested that you couldn't have more than a few thousand cubic feet of hydrogen at a fueling station. So, these are all early issues with the experience level and expertise just not being there and this is where having an expert group, like the Safety Panel, can come in and be impactful.
Laura Hill:
Thanks, Nick. We have a couple of questions about different states requiring safety planning. I know you've spoken a little bit about California so, I'm gonna ask you both parts of this at once. So, first of all, talk a little bit about how California has required safety plans for a station going in and then, also, talk about whether Washington State – is the other one – is going to be requiring safety plans or whether you know anything about that.
Nick Barilo:
So, California is investing a lot of public dollars into helping the infrastructure get deployed and, in doing that, they're also concerned about safety and want to make sure that not only are the dollars protected, but the activities are protected and the public and users are safe. And so, they decided very early on to integrate the Safety Panel into the process and require safety plans and safety planning and this latest round of funding opportunity will also require that the Safety Panel be involved in early reviews of the designs to provide feedback. So, that was something that the state itself did because they were investing dollars into the projects themselves. Right now, Washington State – I've heard discussion of a variety of projects and I'm in discussion with a few folks that are talking.
Right now, there is no requirement at a state level that I'm aware of, relative to the requirement for hydrogen safety planning. I would say, though, if you're doing a project, it's really important to consider safety planning. We have a guidance document on H2 Tools that's free for download that gives you some ideas of things to think about in the safety planning process. Really recommend it regardless of whether one's required or not, so, you could consider the issues. And a key part of that is really evaluating the hazards and the risks prior to getting too far into detail design.
So, I'm not aware of it in Washington State and Washington State is really in the early stages of seeing some projects come on board.
Laura Hill:
All right. Thanks, Nick. Just one or two more before we close out real quickly. If somebody wants a review by the panel or wants to work with the CHS on a specific event or a project and they're worried about company privacy, can you talk a little bit about how you guys handle anonymity and conflict of interest?
Nick Barilo:
Yeah. Great questions. So, one of the things that we can do is we can set up a non-disclosure agreement so, when we're working with you on a project, that we won't disclose the information. Our goal – let me take an incident as an example. Our goal is, number one, to help you get through that; number two – to help broadly help the industry and move forward – and, as part of that, our membership.
So, we would work with you – if it was an incident, for example, we'd work with you to understand what happened. We would also work with you to try and identify ways that we can share information. None of that would be shared without your approval, though. And so, again, all that information would be protected under and NDA. Same is true for designs and looking at designs of facility layouts.
All that can be done under and NDA and all that information could be protected. We set up some firewalls around the information internally as well. So, again, it's a formal NDA that can be written with you and so, that's the means for protecting your information and making sure that it's covered, and if there's any – we also can limit the individuals that are participating on the review from the safety panel, if there's a concern over one or two individuals because of their company associations, that there may be a conflict of interest or a concern about sharing information. So, we do all those things and it's a really great question. Thanks for asking.
Laura Hill:
So, I thought we'd end with this one before we hand it back over to Eric. Does the panel only deal with safety matters?
Nick Barilo:
So, we – that's a great question. So, we are a hydrogen safety panel. Now, that said, it's a body of expertise that is much broader than safety. Many projects that we've reviewed, we've given some feedback in non-safety areas, operational areas, equipment areas.
We can do that.
I would say, as a project activity as a whole, that probably doesn't fit us well, but in carrying out a safety review or interaction on some safety issues, we're always glad to share if you have some operational issues or questions or equipment questions. We're always happy to share on those and provide you some perspectives to think about. Another good question. Thanks. Thanks, Eric and Laura and the team.
I really appreciate you as well as all the questions. You guys came up with some great questions and thanks for listening and please, get a hold of me if you'd like to talk more.
Laura Hill:
All right. Thank you, Nick. I think there's one final slide at the end that Eric will take over so, I'll hand it back over to Eric.
Eric Parker:
Yeah. Thanks, Laura, and thank you, Nick, for the presentation today. Thank you, everyone, for your thoughtful questions. That does conclude our H2IQ Hour for the day. If we didn't get to your question, sorry about that, and please, feel free to reach out directly and we'll do our best to respond.
So, with that, I'd like to thank everyone for joining and remind you that the webinar and the slides will be posted on the Hydrogen and Fuel Cells Technologies Office website in the near future and I encourage you to sign up for our monthly newsletter that includes information and registration for upcoming webinars and other media. And with that, have a great rest of your day and goodbye.
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