Inherent safety assessment of the blue hydrogen value chain

Ensuring safety across the blue hydrogen value chain is essential in the short term decarbonization perspective. A novel consequence-based methodology is developed to quantitatively assess inherent safety across entire value chains since early design. The methodology has the unprecedented capability of identifying the safety-critical components and of accounting for interdependencies. The application to the blue hydrogen value chain identified hydrogen production as the most hazardous fixed asset, CO 2 pipelines as the more hazardous transport systems, and liquefied hydrogen accidents as those having the wider potential impact area, even if their likelihood is 50% lower than that of accidents involving compressed gaseous hydrogen. The approach, providing sound-consequence based hazard indexes, closes gaps in conventional inherent safety assessment often based on semi-quantitative metrics, and support the safe deployment of blue hydrogen technologies providing a clear overview of the safety critical components of the blue hydrogen value chain. • New consequence-based inherent safety method developed for complete value chains. • Blue hydrogen value chains used as a representative case study for decarbonization. • Liquid hydrogen shows impact areas near 50% larger than compressed gaseous hydrogen. • Carbon dioxide pipelines are the most hazardous transport system in the value chain. • Method complements Life Cycle Assessment for safer and sustainable decarbonization.