Evaluation of Hydrogen-Oxygen Recombiner Catalysts Under Various Conditions for Nuclear and Non-Nuclear Hydrogen Safety

• Published in: STEM Fellowship Journal Vol. 2; no. 1; pp. 12 - 16
• Main Author: Qin, Helen
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 01.07.2016
• ISSN: 2369-0399; 2369-0399
• DOI: 10.17975/sfj-2016-003

Hydrogen plays an important role in nuclear and non-nuclear safety, as the unsafe manipulation of hydrogen can lead to dangerous accidents. This concern has led the Hydrogen Isotopes Technology Branch at the Canadian Nuclear Laboratories to develop catalysts in order to aid in the recombination of hydrogen and oxygen. This research project evaluates catalysts with different compositions under various conditions (i.e. dry, humid) in a spinning basket reactor (SBR). Results suggest that catalysts with lower wetproof coating loading have higher activity levels after being exposed to water vapour or immersed in liquid water compared to catalysts with higher amounts of wetproof coating. The specific activity levels were 1.91 cm 3 H 2 /s·gCAT and 1.57 cm 3 H 2 /s·gCAT, normalized to the benchmark catalyst’s activity in humid conditions, for catalysts with low and high amounts of wetproof coating, respectively. Normalization was performed so that the activity levels of the benchmark catalyst in humid conditions was equal to one, thus assigning the other activity level values based on their relation to the benchmark catalyst’s activity levels in humid conditions. For the benchmark catalyst, activity levels in water vapour and immersion conditions were about the same, whereas activity levels for the newly developed catalysts (with low and high wetproofing agent loadings) varied depending on the water exposure levels of the test. Thus, despite the wetproofing, the amount of water exposure had an effect on catalyst activity levels. This trend demonstrates that the benchmark catalyst was well wetproofed and suggests that further improvement is needed in the wetproofing method used for the new catalyst.