Hydrogen (CAS 1333-74-0): storage and disposal

Look at the chain or bracket first: a hydrogen cylinder should stand upright and be held so it cannot fall, including a small one tucked at the back of a prep room. Then read the shoulder label and find out who owns it, since that decides its route later. Keep it away from heat and ignition sources, and separate from oxygen and other oxidisers, which can make a fire far more intense. Acids and corrosive stock stay elsewhere too, because their fumes attack valves and seals. Ventilation should reach ceiling height, as the gas is much lighter than air and a leak gathers at the highest point of a room. Never puncture the cylinder or vent it to empty it.

Rust, dents, a bent valve or a missing valve guard tell you more than anything else, along with a shoulder label faded beyond reading. Hydrogen itself does not go off in the cylinder, so age shows in the steel and the markings rather than in the gas. Look too for periodic test stamps that are long out of date and a supplier name nobody recognises. A leak is harder to judge, because the gas has no colour or smell, and a leak that catches fire may show no visible flame at all. Any hissing, a damaged valve or a cylinder found close to a heat source needs reporting straight away to whoever looks after gases on site. Do not try to tighten or open anything.

This does not go through our standard collection route. It is arranged by manual enquiry, and never goes down the drain or into general waste.

Lab packs are how most bottled chemicals are grouped for collection, but a hydrogen cylinder cannot join one, because pressure containers do not go in a lab pack. Its usual exit is back to the gas supplier, so the first job is finding the supplier's name on the cylinder or in a hire record. Where the owner has gone or the markings are lost, send a manual enquiry describing the size, the markings and where it stands. We do not quote for hydrogen cylinders online, and a store assessment is recommended. Until advice comes, leave it upright and secured where it is. It must never go in a skip or a general waste bin, and nobody should try to vent or puncture it first.

Usually held as: cylinder.

Tell us the container size and how many you hold. An estimate is enough to start with, and some items cannot be priced until someone has looked at them.