A Numerical Study on the Estimation of Heat Release Rate Based on the Flow Field through the Doorway

Abstract

The present study has been conducted to examine the possibility of estimation of heat release rate using opening flow in the real structure fire. As a preliminary study to quantify the heat release rate based on the flow field through the opening, a series of CFD calculation for the ISO-9705 room has been performed and compared with experiments. Prior to the full numerical simulation, the grid independence test was performed to optimize the mesh size, and then the doorway flow calculated by the CFD analysis is compared with the PIV and bi-directional probe measurement. The chemical and convective heat release rate was obtained by integration of individual cell value through the doorway and the chemical heat release rate by the CFD model was well matched with the nominal heat release rate within 8 %. The convective heat release rate through the doorway shows reasonable agreement with the nominal heat release rate having maximum discrepancy of 20 % with considering the heat loss effect. In this matter, this work improves our understanding of heat release rate measurement in real structure fire.