Jonathan Hall

Technical Team Lead

Jonathan is the Technical Team Lead for the Explosive Atmosphere Team, Major Hazards Capability Group, which specialises in commercial research and incident investigation involving explosible/flammable dusts, gases or mists.

Jonathan has worked on wide variety of explosive atmospheres topics such as; hydrogen-based research involving; cryogenic liquid spills, high- and low-pressure gaseous releases, accumulation in confined spaces, novel gas detection and fundamental property analysis. In addition he has worked on vapour cloud explosions, large scale and standard dust explosion testing involving ignition energy testing, equipment certification and vented and enclosed explosions. He has also worked on flashback arrestors design/testing, acetylene explosions, LNG spill research and runs training courses on DSEAR for dusts, process safety hazards and hydrogen safety.

Research Interests

• Hydrogen Safety Sphere
• Conversion of the UK gas distribution network to low carbon alternatives
• The decarbonisation of the transport sector through the use of liquid or high pressure gaseous hydrogen

Previous Projects

• H21 - NGN - Understanding and demonstrating the feasibility of conversion of the UK natural gas distribution system to 100% hydrogen
• PresLHy - EU/HSE - Pre-normative Research, Liquid Hydrogen, experimental work demonstrating and understand the phenomena relating to spills of LH2 from road tankers
• HyDeploy2 - HSE - The regulatory assessment of a safety case to use Winlaton for a trial of a blend of 20% H2 in NG in the natural gas distribution system
• Acetylene cylinder fires incident -HSE - Investigating the causes of two fires on acetylene cylinders and potential future mitigation
• Gas chromatograph incident - HSE- Investigating the cause of an explosion within a gas chromatograph
• H100 - SGN - Excess flow valve testing for novel devices on predominantly hydrogen distribution system

Notable Achievements

• IMechE Chartership
• Member of the BSI committee EXL/023: Fire and explosion prevention and protection in plant and machinery