Mobile Phones at Petrol Stations

alanp23

Does anybody know why these are still banned from use on the forecourt?

I understand why there was an issues ten years ago, etc etc, but these days, the fact it is in my pocket transmitting and receiving data as I fill up, makes the ban pretty redundant, doesnt it?

Sussed out

I guess it's like the phones on planes thing, it's not an issue anymore but they are cautious about testing it out in real life.

beverick

From the UK Petrol Industries Association:

"The use of mobile phones on UKPIA members’ forecourts is actively discouraged for several reasons:

Distraction - Using mobile phones can create a serious distraction for people dispensing fuel or crossing the forecourt due to the number of vehicles moving. Traffic movements will always present a risk for customers. However the distraction caused to pedestrians by mobile phones increases the risk of accidents.

Risk of incendive sparking - Mobile phones are not designed and certified for use in explosive atmospheres which exist temporarily around the pump and nozzle during refuelling as well as around the fill and vent pipes during petrol deliveries. Such use is expressly forbidden by law under the conditions of the petroleum licence and associated guidance. Whilst the risk of incendive sparking from mobile phones is low, they are not intrinsically safe devices and should not be used in those hazardous areas that exist on a forecourt. Generally,there is no need to restrict the use of mobile telephones in other areas of the forecourt, such as in the shop, in motor vehicles parked on the forecourt or in other non-hazardous areas."

I did find it amusing that the UKPIA lead with "....is actively discouraged" and only later change it to "....is expressly forbidden by law" - which really is the key part.

ben@31

Naive people fear what they don't understand.

alanp23

Hmm... I get the bit about the petrol fumes around the nozzle.

But that implies that I really shouldnt have my phone switched on in my pocket as I dispense fuel. For a whole variety of reasons, that is probably the worse place for it to be.

My point, I think is that I think my smart phone is as much "on" just sitting switched on as it is when I am talking into it.

capt_slog

ben@31 wrote:

Naive people fear what they don't understand.

Because the phones are not hermetically sealed, the internal electronics can come into contact with petrol fumes. If any electrical contacts are made/broken, there is always the chance of a spark, and so the risk of explosion. So, this is the use of any of the keys.
More of an issue though, is the little motor which spins if the phone is set to vibrate on ring, that's likely to be the biggest problem in terms of sparks.

There used to be an idea which came from some early incidents, that microwave radiation from the phone could maybe ignite petrol, but I think this has been dis-proven.

Simmotino

alanp23 wrote:

My point, I think is that I think my smart phone is as much "on" just sitting switched on as it is when I am talking into it.

Which is why you are supposed to turn it off* whilst in the petrol station.

*No, I don't do it either

tiredofwhiners

If water can get into a phone, then petrol vapour can also get in....... potential fire hazard which is relatively easy to limit by saying 'do not use your phone'.

Refilling the fuel tanks while on the phone http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=1ac_1320055088

Filling your own car while on the phone http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gct1BmKNvU0

Most people obey the instructions, and we don't have many fires as a result. The problem as with all things is the people think the warnings of the past don't apply to them, when physics doesn't alter just because you have a 'better' phone.

GiantMike

Does the massive sparking starter motor ever cause forecourt fires?

I thought the reason was to stop people being distracted rather than an ignition risk.

alanp23

Ta! All good stuff!

ben@31

Capt Slog wrote:

Because the phones are not hermetically sealed, the internal electronics can come into contact with petrol fumes. If any electrical contacts are made/broken, there is always the chance of a spark, and so the risk of explosion. So, this is the use of any of the keys.
More of an issue though, is the little motor which spins if the phone is set to vibrate on ring, that's likely to be the biggest problem in terms of sparks.

There used to be an idea which came from some early incidents, that microwave radiation from the phone could maybe ignite petrol, but I think this has been dis-proven.

Rubbish. I doubt any of the electrics in the petrol station and your car are hemetically sealed. If petrol vapour goes past a ciruit board it wont catch fire. The odds of my phone sparking must be lower than the petrol station being hit by a meteorite.

Even hot exhaust pipes don't cause Tescos to catch fire (you'd physically have to pump petrol on to the hot exhaust pipe).

laurentian

I would have thought the risk of the electrics within any given car engine, shorting, sparking, arcing and so forth would be far far greater than that from a mobile . . .

tiredofwhiners

GiantMike wrote:

Does the massive sparking starter motor ever cause forecourt fires?

You mean that electrical thing that is heavily sealed to prevent water ingress to such an extent that you can immerse it in water and it'll still work ? Most of the electrics of a car are very heavily protected against the weather and water ingress and so are very much less likely to come into contact with fuel vapour - it wouldn't be much of a vehicle if fuel vapour leaked out all over the place and met an electric spark would it ?

A fuel stop has to accept the very limited risk of a car setting off a fire as the car has to be there to fill up and they do ask you to turn the engine off. Its completely unnecessary for a mobile phone to be used during refuelling process so the simplest and safest risk minimisation approach is to not use them.

The whole argument against sounds to me like a new generation who think the lessons of the past don't apply to them and their right to talk on the phone incessantly will somehow stop accidents from happening.

ben@31

tiredofwhiners wrote:

You mean that electrical thing that is heavily sealed to prevent water ingress to such an extent that you can immerse it in water and it'll still work ? Most of the electrics of a car are very heavily protected against the weather and water ingress and so are very much less likely to come into contact with fuel vapour - it wouldn't be much of a vehicle if fuel vapour leaked out all over the place and met an electric spark would it ?

Or maybe the fuel vapour that's all over the place does not ignite.

Car electrics won't work underwater. Lots of terminals, especially earth/ground terminals are not hemtically sealed . Look at your car battery terminals, if you are lucky you may have a loose fitting rubber cup on the positive terminal (only to stop you from touching both the positive and negative terminal at the same time).

team47b

over here we have cafes at all petrol stations (that interestingly sell alcohol) and no smoking rules for cafes apply to petrol stations so you have to sit outside at a table on the forecourt to smoke

tim_wand

I would Imagine most Petrol Pumps talk back to the Cashier point by RF frequency and there may be a minimal risk of this signal being intefered with by a mobile phone.

ben@31

At airports, some aircraft are refuelled with the engines still running and radios transmitting. Not a problem.

LangerDan

The ingress protection of electrical components (how you stop water, dust or inquisitive fingers from entering the device) and the hazard protection (how you stop it from igniting petrol fumes and burning your eyebrows off) are not the same thing.

Why the starter motor doesn't cause explosions is because it is too far from the vapour source. The area in the immediate vicinity of the filler cap is "baby bear's porridge" in terms of flammability - a continuous flow of displaced petroleum vapour from the filler neck, relatively sheltered by the car and your body to avoid immediate dispersion and mixing with just the right amount of air. By the time the vapour reaches the engine bay, it is far too lean to ignite.

pinno

tim wand wrote:

I would Imagine most Petrol Pumps talk back to the Cashier point by RF frequency and there may be a minimal risk of this signal being intefered with by a mobile phone.

In that case, can we set up an experiment where you fill up whilst soeone else talks on the mobile right next to a fuel pump and see if we can't diddle the bill ?

crescent

I work on an offshore oil/gas platform where the control of electrical equipment in hazardous areas is taken very seriously indeed. There are basically four zones : 0,1,2,safe. It is down to the likeliehood of flammable vapours being present and for what duration. Although it does not translate exactly into an onshore scenario, essentially the area round the filler nozzle whilst decanting fuel would be zone 0/zone 1 (high likeliehood) the area around the engine would most likely be zone 2 (less likely). The shop would be classified as a safe area as a rough comparison.
I would not use any battery operated equipment when refuelling, nor have it in my pocket. Electrical equipment does exist with the correct rating and ingress protection but it is not generally found in a non-industrial environment.

Jeez, I've bored myself with that reply. :oops:

verylonglegs

It is indeed nothing to do with the RF signals but about the chance of a small spark from any switch mechanism which wouldn't apply to smart phones with touchscreens. I started out working with mobiles and a Nokia engineer said he knew of a case where someone used a flip phone on a gas platform and the reed switch in it that triggered when the flip was opened to answer the call triggered an explosion.

tiredofwhiners

ben@31 wrote:

At airports, some aircraft are refuelled with the engines still running and radios transmitting. Not a problem.

Jet fuel, not petrol. Irrelevant example.

You might want to look up the difference as you can extinguish a match in diesel fuel.

Jez mon

They never bothered stopping the engines when re fueling in F1

tiredofwhiners

Jez mon wrote:

They never bothered stopping the engines when re fueling in F1

Still irrelevant when you see all the safety interlocks on the refuelling nozzle to make sure the fuel is injected straight into the tank and the vapours doesn't see the light of day at any stage.

And no, people don't sit there on the phone while refuelling, and the car is also surrounded by guys with fire extinguishers as well.

fosst

Nobody remember the episode of Brainiac?
Mobiles in a petrol soaked caravan did nothing but the static from a crappy shell-suit blew it apart...

MattC59

It's all bollox!

Firstly, not just any spark will ignite a flammable vapour/gas, the spark has to have sufficient energy to ignite the fuel. Very few mobile phones have components capable of sparking at sufficient energy, even if you just pull the battery. In fact, the difference between a lot of phones, and those suitable for use in a potentially flammable atmosphere is the accompanying ATEX / UL / CSA etc cert.

Petrol has an LEL of 1.3% v/v and a UEL of 7.1% v/v (Lower and Upper Explosive Limits). Below the LEL, there is insufficient fuel to ignite, above the UEL there is too much. At the point where the fuel vapour exits the fuel tank when you're filling it is zone 1 (>10<1000hrs/annum) but the vapour levels are generally above the UEL. The vapour needs to dilute in the air in order to fall into the flammable range. This happens as the vapour falls. You'll notice the 'haze' from the vapour dropping, this is because petrol vapour is considerably heavier than air. Unfortunately, the vapour stays in the flammable range until a very low level, so the hazard can spread out when it hits the ground. Petrol vapour does not rise, so unless you've got your head on the ground whilst talking on the phone, it's unlikely that you would put your phone in a position where it could ignite the fuel. Obviously air currents can effect this.

I've also witnessed testing of whether a phone can ignite petrol vapour. Numerous phones were placed in a vapour rich environment and called; nothing. They were set to vibrate; nothing. They were set to auto answer; nothing. They were thrown into the environment so that the batteries came off; nothing.

The myth that phones can cause petrol stations to explode comes from a piece of CCTV footage from the states. A woman started filling her car and latched the pump. She then sat in her car, on the phone. When the filling was done, she got back out and..... BOOM ! It was assumed that it was caused by the phone. It was actually due to a build up of static, which sparked when she touched the pump, not the phone.

You are in more danger of igniting petrol vapour if you're a Chav (and wearing a nasty Nylon shell suit) then you are from using a phone at the pump.

This is not a bad image of the hazardous area zoning at a filling station, but doesn't necessarily show the mapping of the fuel vapour dispersion:



(I work in the gas detection industry, can you tell ? :oops: )

Escadrille Ecosse

fosst wrote:

Nobody remember the episode of Brainiac?
Mobiles in a petrol soaked caravan did nothing but the static from a crappy shell-suit blew it apart...

Short answer absolutely right.

Longer answer. The problem is not the phone, it's the battery. Different fuels have different ignition energies, which is the amount of energy in the form of a spark or in some cases mechanical impact that is required to actually ignite the substance. So petrol has a lower ignition energy than diesel but it is still quite high compared with something like propane and like the proverbial brick sh*thouse compared to some explosive compounds like nitroglycerine or fulminate of mercury. Even in normal use the energy from a battery would be incapable of igniting petrol, however in the event of the battery short circuiting then there is possibly just about enough energy to ignite petrol vapour if the circumstances are right, ie close enough to the vapour cloud which has just the right air/fuel ratio, highly unlikely but conceivable. Something smaller though like the battery in your watch or car key has insufficient energy ever when short circuited. But there is enough to energy in a carkey battery to ignite nitroglycerine, although this isn't the biggest risk for ignition here.

Mobile phones are now widely used in the petrochemical industry in refineries and gas plants and the like, the ONLY difference (aside from cost!) between these phones and the ones you get out of the Orange shop is that the case is designed to prevent the battery being removed without tools and is a lot more robust so it won't break open if dropped. That's it, they even have vibrate mode, etc, everything except a camera flash function, due to the energy stored in the capacitor for the flash. I know this because I have one. I have yet to see one with a touch screen though.

Aside from the distraction thing, the biggest issue is static spark from people's clothing which is one of the reasons why the lock function on the petrol dispenser trigger is removed from petrol pumps in the UK. In the US they still fit them, and aside from the driveaway accidents where the numpty drives off with the petrol hose still in the filler, the biggest cause of fires is going back into the car to phone whilst its filling to make a phone call then getting back out and touching the petrol trigger without earthing themselves on anything else first. Then big fat spark and boom. So would I worry about a mobile phone and petrol...no. Would I worry about a mobile phone and a car...yes, that's a far more dangerous combination.

Boring techie bit over.

MattC59

Escadrille Ecosse wrote:

fosst wrote:

Nobody remember the episode of Brainiac?
Mobiles in a petrol soaked caravan did nothing but the static from a crappy shell-suit blew it apart...

Short answer absolutely right.

Longer answer. The problem is not the phone, it's the battery. Different fuels have different ignition energies, which is the amount of energy in the form of a spark or in some cases mechanical impact that is required to actually ignite the substance. So petrol has a lower ignition energy than diesel but it is still quite high compared with something like propane and like the proverbial brick sh*thouse compared to some explosive compounds like nitroglycerine or fulminate of mercury. Even in normal use the energy from a battery would be incapable of igniting petrol, however in the event of the battery short circuiting then there is possibly just about enough energy to ignite petrol vapour if the circumstances are right, ie close enough to the vapour cloud which has just the right air/fuel ratio, highly unlikely but conceivable. Something smaller though like the battery in your watch or car key has insufficient energy ever when short circuited. But there is enough to energy in a carkey battery to ignite nitroglycerine, although this isn't the biggest risk for ignition here.

Mobile phones are now widely used in the petrochemical industry in refineries and gas plants and the like, the ONLY difference (aside from cost!) between these phones and the ones you get out of the Orange shop is that the case is designed to prevent the battery being removed without tools and is a lot more robust so it won't break open if dropped. That's it, they even have vibrate mode, etc, everything except a camera flash function, due to the energy stored in the capacitor for the flash. I know this because I have one. I have yet to see one with a touch screen though.

Aside from the distraction thing, the biggest issue is static spark from people's clothing which is one of the reasons why the lock function on the petrol dispenser trigger is removed from petrol pumps in the UK. In the US they still fit them, and aside from the driveaway accidents where the numpty drives off with the petrol hose still in the filler, the biggest cause of fires is going back into the car to phone whilst its filling to make a phone call then getting back out and touching the petrol trigger without earthing themselves on anything else first. Then big fat spark and boom. So would I worry about a mobile phone and petrol...no. Would I worry about a mobile phone and a car...yes, that's a far more dangerous combination.

Boring techie bit over.

Another techie

tiredofwhiners

MattC59 wrote:

The myth that phones can cause petrol stations to explode comes from a piece of CCTV footage from the states.

So how come the regulation was put in place long before said video existed ? Mobile phones have been around for nearly 30 years, videos you describe much less.The regulations have been around how long ?>

Just asking .....

Escadrille Ecosse

tiredofwhiners wrote:

MattC59 wrote:

The myth that phones can cause petrol stations to explode comes from a piece of CCTV footage from the states.

So how come the regulation was put in place long before said video existed ? Mobile phones have been around for nearly 30 years, videos you describe much less.The regulations have been around how long ?>

Just asking .....

Better safe than sorry, and in the early days there was a bit of a worry about EMF radiation causing sparks, "just like in a microwave".

MattC59 wrote:

Escadrille Ecosse wrote:

fosst wrote:

Nobody remember the episode of Brainiac?
Mobiles in a petrol soaked caravan did nothing but the static from a crappy shell-suit blew it apart...

Short answer absolutely right.

Longer answer. The problem is not the phone, it's the battery. Different fuels have different ignition energies, which is the amount of energy in the form of a spark or in some cases mechanical impact that is required to actually ignite the substance. So petrol has a lower ignition energy than diesel but it is still quite high compared with something like propane and like the proverbial brick sh*thouse compared to some explosive compounds like nitroglycerine or fulminate of mercury. Even in normal use the energy from a battery would be incapable of igniting petrol, however in the event of the battery short circuiting then there is possibly just about enough energy to ignite petrol vapour if the circumstances are right, ie close enough to the vapour cloud which has just the right air/fuel ratio, highly unlikely but conceivable. Something smaller though like the battery in your watch or car key has insufficient energy ever when short circuited. But there is enough to energy in a carkey battery to ignite nitroglycerine, although this isn't the biggest risk for ignition here.

Mobile phones are now widely used in the petrochemical industry in refineries and gas plants and the like, the ONLY difference (aside from cost!) between these phones and the ones you get out of the Orange shop is that the case is designed to prevent the battery being removed without tools and is a lot more robust so it won't break open if dropped. That's it, they even have vibrate mode, etc, everything except a camera flash function, due to the energy stored in the capacitor for the flash. I know this because I have one. I have yet to see one with a touch screen though.

Aside from the distraction thing, the biggest issue is static spark from people's clothing which is one of the reasons why the lock function on the petrol dispenser trigger is removed from petrol pumps in the UK. In the US they still fit them, and aside from the driveaway accidents where the numpty drives off with the petrol hose still in the filler, the biggest cause of fires is going back into the car to phone whilst its filling to make a phone call then getting back out and touching the petrol trigger without earthing themselves on anything else first. Then big fat spark and boom. So would I worry about a mobile phone and petrol...no. Would I worry about a mobile phone and a car...yes, that's a far more dangerous combination.

Boring techie bit over.

Another techie

I know, I know...... :oops:

MattC59

tiredofwhiners wrote:

MattC59 wrote:

The myth that phones can cause petrol stations to explode comes from a piece of CCTV footage from the states.

So how come the regulation was put in place long before said video existed ? Mobile phones have been around for nearly 30 years, videos you describe much less.The regulations have been around how long ?>

Just asking .....

My mistake, I've just been through some of my paperwork (sad, I know!). The myth was propagated by said video. It started from unsubstantiated rumour from China, was then (excuse the pun) fuelled by three more unsubstantiated statements of cases, from Shell, which Shell deny making.
I believe that the legislation came in in 1992, 1996 and 2004, but (as I understand it) make it illegal for the forecourt operator to allow the use of mobiles on the forecourt, not illegal for the public to use them.