Characteristics of Particles Emitted from Waste Fires—A Construction Materials Case Study

This study aimed to determine the relative densities of populations of particles emitted in fire experiments of selected materials through direct measurement and parametrization of size distribution as number (NSD), volume (VSD), and mass (MSD). As objects of investigation, four typical materials used in construction and furniture were chosen: pinewood (PINE), laminated particle board (LPB), polyurethane (PUR), and poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA). The NSD and VSD were measured using an electric low-pressure impactor, while MSD was measured by weighing filters from the impactor using a microbalance. The parametrization of distributions was made assuming that each distribution can be expressed as the sum of an arbitrary number of log-normal distributions. In all materials, except PINE, the distributions of the particles emitted in fire experiments were the sum of two log-normal distributions; in PINE, the distribution was accounted for by only one log-normal distribution. The parametrization facilitated the determination of volume and mass abundances, and therefore, the relative density. The VSDs of particles generated in PINE, LPB, and PUR fires have similar location parameters, with a median volume diameter of 0.2–0.3 µm, whereas that of particles generated during PMMA burning is 0.7 µm. To validate the presented method, we burned samples made of the four materials in similar proportions and compared the measured VSD with the VSD predicted based on the weighted sum of VSD of raw materials. The measured VSD shifted toward smaller diameters than the predicted ones due to thermal decomposition at higher temperatures.

Invigorating Prescribed Fire Science Through Improved Reporting Practices

Interest in prescribed fire science has grown over the past few decades due to the increasing application of prescribed fire by managers to mitigate wildfire hazards, restore biodiversity, and improve ecosystem resilience. Numerous ecological disciplines use prescribed fire experiments to provide land managers with evidence-based information to support prescribed fire management. Documenting variation in the context and conditions during prescribed fire experimental treatments is critical for management inference, but inconsistencies in reporting critical experimental details can complicate interpretation. Such details are needed to provide ecological and empirical context for data, facilitate experimental replication, enable meta-analyses, and maximize utility for other scientists and practitioners. To evaluate reporting quality in the recent literature, we reviewed 219 prescribed fire experiments from 16 countries published in 11 refereed journals over the last 5 years. Our results suggest substantial shortcomings in the reporting of critical data that compromise the utility of this research. Few studies had specific information on burning conditions such as fuel moisture (22%), quantitative fuel loads (36%), fire weather (53%), and fire behavior (30%). Further, our analysis revealed that 63% of the studies provided precise coordinates for their study area, while 30% of studies indicated the prescribed fire date. Only 54% of the studies provided descriptions of the ignition characteristics. Given these common deficiencies, we suggest minimum reporting standards for future prescribed fire experiments. These standards could be applied to journal author guidelines, directed to researchers and reviewers by the editor, and promoted in the education of fire ecologists. Establishing reporting standards will increase the quality, applicability, and reproducibility of prescribed fire science, facilitate future research syntheses, and foster actionable science.

MECHANICAL BEHAVIOR AND CATENARY ACTION OF RESTRAINED STEEL BEAM UNDER FIRE

To investigate the mechanical behavior and catenary action of restrained steel beam under fire, experiments were performed on five H-section restrained steel beams exposed to ISO-834 standard fire. At first, mechanical property tensile tests were performed on 3 room-temperature specimens and 8 high-temperature specimens, and variation laws of the material properties of steel materials with temperature rising were investigated by the high-temperature steady-state tests. Through the fire experiments, the temperature data, mid-span deflections and failure modes of all specimens were obtained. The experimental results show that: (1) a restrained steel beam is prone to in-plane buckling failure under fire; (2) the loading ratio n and axial restraint stiffness Kx have great influences on the catenary action of restrained steel beam under fire; (3) when the loading ratio n is constant, the greater the axial restraint stiffness Kx, the later the catenary action occurs; when the axial restraint stiffness Kx is constant, the greater the loading ratio n, the earlier the catenary action occurs.

Experimental Study on the Spread Characteristics of Initial Fires According to Corridor Types

During an accidental fire in buildings, the corridor becomes the path for flame and smoke to spread, exposing the occupants to danger. Therefore, this study conducted real-scale fire experiments using corridors of size 2.4(L) × 10(W) × 2.4(H) m an “L-type” corridor for one-way evacuation and a “T-type” corridor for two-way evacuation to analyze the characteristics of fire according to the shape of corridors. The real-scale fire experiments were conducted in a fire room (2.4(L) × 3.6(W) × 2.4(H) m) with a single opening (2.0(W) × 1.8(H) m). The combustibles used inside the fire room were wood cribs, with a heat release rate of 651.4 kW, in the L-type corridor and chairs, with a heat release rate of 95.7 kW, in the T-type corridor. The temperature inside the corridor was measured during the real-scale fire experiments, and the average maximum measured temperature was 432.1 °C in the L-type corridor and 103.5 °C in the T-type corridor. The experimental results and the ventilation characteristics according to the corridor types were applied to BFD curves to show the process of designing fire growth models according to corridor types.

Study on Smoke Detector Characteristics Using Fire Simulations

To reduce the damage caused by fire detector malfunctions, we investigated the standards and literature pertaining to fire detectors in Korea. The domestic standards cite UL's technical specifications, which provide only the standards and types of combustible materials; however, additional research is needed because no facilities related to the experiments are investigated and no fire experiments have actually been conducted. In this study, we refer to UL 268, which is similar to the domestic standards, as well as detailed experimental conditions and methods to improve smoke detector performances; we also use wood as the combustion material from among the fire sources specified in UL 268. Experiments were conducted to measure the sensitization rates using an optical density meter and repeated to match the wood smoke profile standard provided in UL 268. Furthermore, we compared the smoke concentrations detected by the smoke detectors in the fire experiments with those from fire simulations using FDS software to confirm the detector characteristics. Through these comparisons, we show that this research could be used as preliminary data for performance testing of detectors using UL 268.