Onlookers near Oxford have filmed a fireball, after reports of a large explosion heard in the area.

  • tal@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    Severn Trent Green Power published a statement on their Facebook page saying they could "confirm that at around 19:20 this evening, a digester tank at its Cassington AD facility near Yarnton, Oxfordshire, was struck by lightning resulting in the biogas within that tank igniting.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightning_rod

    A lightning rod or lightning conductor (British English) is a metal rod mounted on a structure and intended to protect the structure from a lightning strike. If lightning hits the structure, it will preferentially strike the rod and be conducted to ground through a wire, instead of passing through the structure, where it could start a fire or cause electrocution.

    The principle of the lightning rod was first detailed by Benjamin Franklin in Pennsylvania in 1755,[2] who in subsequent years developed his invention for household application (published in 1757) and made further improvements towards a reliable system around 1760.

    This seems like the sort of thing that one could reasonably equip a facility with large tanks of explosive gas with in 2023.

    EDIT:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaerobic_digestion

    Image: Biogas holder with lightning protection rods and backup gas flare

    That seems to have pointy pole things extending above their tanks.

    This is a picture of the facility that just had the explosion:

    https://www.stgreenpower.co.uk/assets/images/banners/Severn-Trent-Green-Power-cassington-AD-page-banner.jpg

    I do not seem, at a cursory glance, to see any pointy pole things extending above the tanks at the facility that just had the explosion.

    • Nighed@sffa.community
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      1 year ago

      Yeh, seems like an oversight. Maybe they thought that as the tanks were metal they wouldn’t need it?