A Numerical Study of Dust Explosion Properties of Hydrogen Storage Alloy Materials

Hydride materials, used in hydrogen storage technologies, in powder form can be an explosion hazard and testing these materials using standard techniques is difficult. Research reported in this paper is an attempt to develop numerical methods to obtain explosion properties of such materials. In this work a one-dimensional transport-type model is presented to simulate the dust explosion process in a closed 20-L spherical vessel. Transport equations for energy, species and particle volume fraction are solved with the finite difference method, whilst velocity distribution and pressure are updated with numerical integration of the continuity equation. The model is first validated with experimental data and then applied to simulate the explosion process of an AB2- type alloy powder used for hydrogen storage.