Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167

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Science of the Total Environment

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/scitotenv

An investigation of a passive opened top-end pipe as an alternative

solution for passive soil depressurisation systems for indoor
radon mitigation
Le Chi Hung a,b,c, Jamie Goggins b,c,⁎, Patrick Meier b,c, Eugene Monahan d, Mark Foley a
a
School of Physics, National University of Ireland Galway, Ireland
b
Civil Engineering, School of Engineering, National University of Ireland Galway, Ireland
c
MaREI Centre for Energy, Climate and Marine, Ryan Institute, National University of Ireland Galway, Ireland
d
All Clear Radon Ltd, Wexford, Ireland

H I G H L I G H T S G R A P H I C A L A B S T R A C T

• Passive opened top-end pipe can be a

solution for soil depressurisation sys-
tems.
• Negative pressure decreased with the
increase in wind velocity.
• While extracted gas velocity increased
with the increase in wind velocity
• Negative pressure and extracted gas
rate fluctuated with wind velocity fluc-
tuations.
• A novel opened top-head static cowl
performed better than a rotating cowl
in tests.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This study carried out a series of large-scale experimental tests and numerical simulations to investigate the per-
Received 7 April 2020 formance of a passive opened top-end pipe as an alternative solution for passive soil depressurisation systems for
Received in revised form 3 July 2020 indoor radon mitigation. Measurements were conducted in terms of wind velocity, extracted air velocity and
Accepted 20 July 2020
negative pressure at the sump-end inside the pipe. Investigations were performed with controlled and natural
Available online 26 July 2020
wind conditions. Test results confirmed that the passive opened top-end pipe can be used as an alternative solu-
Editor: Prof. Pavlos Kassomenos tion for indoor radon concentration mitigation at low additional construction cost. However, the extracted air ve-
locity and negative pressure were found to fluctuate when tested under natural wind conditions. This fluctuation
Keywords: would reduce the effectiveness of the performance of the passive pipe. To reduce this fluctuation, a novel static
Radon ventilator has been developed and can be added on the top-end of the pipe.
Soil depressurisation system © 2020 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://
Suction pressure creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Passive opened top-end pipe
Wind
Static ventilator

1. Introduction

⁎ Corresponding author at: School of Engineering, National University of Ireland

Indoor radon concentration is a critical issue that causes approxi-
Galway, Ireland. mately 9% of deaths from lung cancer in European countries (BMJ,
E-mail address: jamie.goggins@nuigalway.ie (J. Goggins). 2004). CEU (2014) has defined that the indoor radon concentration

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.141167
0048-9697/© 2020 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
2 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167
level should be lower than 300 Bq/m3. Other studies and regulations
stated that the indoor radon concentration level should be lower than
200 Bq/m3 (for example, BRE, 1992; EHLG, 1997). If the indoor radon
concentration in a building exceeds these thresholds, then a radon mit-
igation is required. Previous studies have indicated that active and pas-
sive soil depressurisation (SD) systems (Fig. 1) would provide greater
efficiency for radon mitigation amongst the other mitigation techniques
(Gadgil et al., 1991; Bonnefous et al., 1992; WHO, 2009; Hodgson et al.,
2011; Abdelouhab et al., 2010; Fuente et al., 2019a, 2019b; Hodgson and
Pudner, 2019).
The principle of the active and passive SD systems has been
discussed extensively in other studies (e.g. Diallo et al., 2015; Diallo
et al., 2018; Jiránek, 2014; Jiranek and Svoboda, 2007), and one of the
most critical parts of a SD system is the negative pressure creator,
which is either an electric fan (for the active SD system) or a passive
cowl (for the passive SD system). It has been proven that an electric
fan is the best solution to create negative pressure in an active SD sys-
tem (Abdelouhab et al., 2010; Hodgson et al., 2011; Vazquez et al.,
2011; Hung et al., 2019; Fuente et al., 2020). However, the cost for oper-
ating the fan could be a considerable factor for a homeowner. For this
reason, homeowners have been known to turn off the fan to reduce
their energy bill, which in turn would increase the indoor radon
concentration.
For passive SD systems, Hodgson and Pudner (2019) investigated the
effectiveness of different cowl types for passive sumps. These cowls
included fixed cowls, rotating cowls, and ridge vents. They observed
that the rotating cowls performed the best with a radon level reduction
factor (that is, radon level before remediation / radon level after remedi-
ation) of 2.1. Furthermore, the position of the vertical pipe section in the
passive sump system slightly impacted the reduction factor, i.e. the re-
duction factors were 1.5 and 1.6 when the vertical pipes were located
outside and inside the houses, respectively. This difference may be due
to the temperature difference exposed on the vertical pipe segments.
Hung et al. (2019) extensively investigated the effectiveness of dif-
ferent types of passive cowls under controlled wind conditions in the
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of a house with a SD system consisting of a passive opened top-end pipe (not to scale).
laboratory as a part of this study. These cowl types were two types of ro-
tating, one opened top-end pipe, and two cowls with caps (Fig. 2). The
best performance was observed for the two rotating cowls followed by
the opened top-end pipe and the cowls with caps. From these findings,
it is expected that the opened top-end pipe could be an alternative solu-
tion for passive SD systems. If the opened top-end pipe can be used, the
cost of constructing and operating the SD system would be reduced, i.e.
no additional fan cost or electricity to operate the electric fan for the active
SD system. Furthermore, an opened top-end pipe would have a long-term
service life in comparison with a rotating cowl. However, the limitations
of the opened top-end pipe's investigation in Hung et al. (2019) was the
length of the pipe which was short and the fan that was used to generate
controlled wind had a limited cross-sectional area. Therefore, it is essen-
tial to confirm the performance of the pipe using a full-scale prototype.
This study extended the work reported in Hung et al. (2019) to carry
out full-scale experimental investigations to examine the effectiveness
of the opened top-end pipe under the driving force from controlled
and natural wind conditions to extract the air from the pipe. The con-
trolled wind was generated using a 70-cm large diameter axial electric
fan. Measurements were recorded in terms of wind velocity, negative
pressure (Pm) and the extracted air velocity (VE) with the variation of
both natural and controlled wind velocities. The stack effect was not ex-
amined in this study because the test pipes were placed above the
ground surface in relatively homogeneous temperature and moisture
conditions. Therefore, the test pipes would not be representatively ex-
posed to the stack effect. Furthermore, a novel static ventilator, which
was developed to add to the top-end of the pipe to increase the flow
rate and negative pressure, is also briefly discussed.
2. Research methodology
2.1. Development of the prototype pipe test rig
The principle of the pipe test rig used in this study was developed
based on the pipe work configuration shown in Fig. 1. A three-
 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167 3

Fig. 2. Rotating [Type (a, b)] and static [Type (c, d, e)] cowls examined as a part of this project and have been reported in Hung et al. (2019). The rotating cowls (a and b) performed the best
followed by the opened top-end pipe (d) and cowls with cap (type c and e).

dimensional view of the design for controlled wind is shown in Fig. 3,
and the test setups for testing with controlled wind and natural wind
are shown in Figs. 4 (a) and 4 (b) respectively. The pipe work system
consisted of three main segments, i.e. horizontal and vertical pipe seg-
ments and 30-cm distance 45-degree bend [Fig. 4 (c)].
For testing with natural wind, the lengths of the vertical and hori-
zontal segments were fixed at 6.5 m and 4.5 m, respectively. Further-
more, during testing the sump-end of the pipe was covered by a
breathing box to protect it from natural wind vectors that might occur
on the ground surface [Fig. 4(d)]. The paper box was selected by doing
trial tests with controlled wind to make sure it would not impact the
pressure and extracted air flow. In addition, there was a small gap of ap-
proximately 1 cm formed by two timber pieces placed between the box
and the ground in the concrete wall side (right side), while concrete
blocks were placed in the back side and the left side of the box to keep
it stable during testing. For testing with controlled wind, the test setup
was rigidly connected to a large steel structural frame. The vertical
pipe segment for testing with controlled wind speed was fixed at
4.6 m due to the limit of the steel frame height. The horizontal pipe
length for tests with controlled wind was set at 4.5 m. All pipe segments
used in this study had an inner diameter of 100 mm.
The sump-end was designed to be fully unrestricted [Case (i)], fully
restricted [Case (ii)], and partly restricted [Case (iii)]. These cases were
investigated in this study in order to reflect different air permeabilities
of the sub-slab. The air permeability of the sub-slab in a SD system could
vary significantly depending on the air permeability of the granular ma-
terial layer, as well as the air tightness degree of the sub-slab system.
Pressure sensors were attached along the pipe from the top-end to
the sump-end of the pipe with an interval of 2 m per sensor (Fig. 5).
The pressure sensors (model HSCDRRN002NDAA5) manufactured
by Honeywell company (Honeywell TruStability™, Golden Valley, MN,
USA) were used, and the negative pressures Pm were recorded using a
National Instruments NI 6210 data logger through the interpretation in-
terface coded in the LabVIEW program version 2016 (National Instru-
ments, Austin, Texas, USA). Two highly accurate wind speed sensors
model Testo 435 series with an accuracy of ±0.1 m/s were placed on
the top-end of the pipe to measure the natural wind speed (VwN) and
controlled wind speed (VwC), and at the sum-end of the pipe to measure
extracted air velocity VE (Fig. 5). For the controlled wind, a fixed wind
velocity can be created by regulating the speed of the fan using a fan
controller. The wind vector was generated horizontally and was per-
pendicular to the vertical pipe segment on the top-end of the pipe.
2.2. Testing programme
For controlled wind, tests were performed with Cases (i), (ii) and
(iii) (Fig. 5). The first two cases were simply tested by closing or opening
the sump-end of the pipe using a pipe cap. However, for Case (iii), it was
tested by drilling a number of holes (or representative permeability) on
the pipe cap varying the porosity from 4% to 31% to represent different

Fig. 3. Three-dimensional schematic diagram of passive opened top-end pipe test rig.
4 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167

Fig. 4. Experimental test setup of a passive opened top-end pipe. (a) the passive pipe was setup to test under controlled wind conditions. Wind was generated using a 70 - cm diameter
controllable electric fan. The vertical length of the pipe was 4.6 m which was the maximum length that could be setup in the lab. Tests were carried out with Cases (i), (ii) and (iii). (b) the
passive pipe was setup outdoor beside the Engineering Building at the National University of Ireland, Galway, Ireland. The wind direction came from the west. Tests were carried out with
Cases (i) and (ii). (c) 30 cm bend distance that was setup on the top of the pipe. (d) Fully opened sump-end is protected from natural wind vectors during the test using a box.

air permeability values of the sump-end. Each test was repeated at least
three times within approximately 3 min for each measurement (Fig. 6).
Furthermore, it was observed that there was a significant difference in
negative pressure when the sump-end was fully restricted and
unrestricted.
For natural wind, measurements were carried out with Cases (i) and
(ii). Unlike the controlled wind, natural wind profiles were found to
fluctuate significantly (Fig. 7). Therefore, each measurement was con-
tinuous monitoring for a period of approximately 12 h to record the
full profiles of the natural wind as well as the corresponding suction

Fig. 5. Wind velocity, extracted air velocity and negative pressure measurement system designed in this study.
 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167 5

Fig. 6. Example of the test measurements with controlled wind.

pressure and the extracted air flow rate. Test results will be discussed in
the next section.
The following test procedure was implemented to complete the test
programme:
(a) Setup the pipe test rigs, pressure sensors and wind speed sensors.
(b) Set a wind speed using the regulator for each of the controlled
wind speed tests.
(c) Activate the pressure and wind speed sensor systems to record
data simultaneously.
(d) Steps (b) and (c) were repeatedly conducted to complete all tests.
2.3. Development of a novel static cowl to improve the performance of the
passive opened top-end pipe
To improve the performance of the passive opened top-end pipe, a
static cowl has been developed (this is also known as a static ventilator)
(Fig. 8). The cowl consists of three 3D printed aerodynamically shaped
cone sections stacked together to increase and to stabilise the air flow
extracting from the passive pipe with a 5 cm gap between the cones.
These cones can be disassembled during testing to examine the effect
of the number of cones on the performance of the cowl. Experimental
tests were carried out to confirm the reliability and applicability of the

Fig. 7. Example of test measurements with natural wind for the test T9 [fully unrestricted sump-end, Case (i)]. Data recorded for the natural wind were found to vary significantly between
pressurisation (positive pressure) and depressurisation (negative pressure). (a)- Pressure developed at the sump-end location. (b)-Wind/extracted air velocity. Other test results show a
similar trend thus are not presented here.
6 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167

Fig. 8. Cowl configuration with three cones and orientation angle to the wind tunnel during testing. The cone support was directed at 00, 150, 300, and 450 from the centre of the wind
tunnel. The optimal orientation of the cowl when the cone support was directed at line 450 from the centre of the tunnel. The poorest performance of the cowl was found when the
cone support was directed to the centre of the tunnel.

cowl and to compare with the performance of the open passive pipe and connected in front of the fan to guide the wind vector from the fan to
the rotating cowl [type (b) in Fig. 2] at different wind velocities. the cowl. The wind tunnel had a diameter of 80 cm, and the distance be-
The 70-cm diameter electric fan used in the large-scale test was used tween the cowl to the mouth of the wind tunnel was 150 cm. The wind
to generate the wind for this test. A wind tunnel was intentionally tunnel was used to maintain the horizontal direction of the wind vector

Fig. 9. Photos of cowl setup with two cones. (a) newly developed cowl, (b) opened top-end pipe, (c) rotating cowl, (d) cowl height adjustment in front of wind tunnel. The height can be
adjusted using a flexible coupling to ensure the centre of the cowl was at the centre of the wind tunnel. All tests were conducted with fully unrestricted sump-end.
 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167 7

2.4. Computational fluid dynamic simulations

Prevailing wind boundary condition In practical design, it would be difficult to carry out an experimental
test before conducting the design. Instead, a numerical simulation can
Top-end be performed for the design (Andersen, 2001). Therefore, numerical
simulations using Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) simulations
were validated and performed to apply in the design of the passive
open pipe. The numerical simulations were validated for Case (i) for
fully unrestricted sump-end. It is because Case (i) is the worst case in
a practical situation with zero airtightness of the SD system. Two-
dimensional CFD models were conducted in this study to investigate
the behaviour of the pipe rig system under controlled wind conditions.
The commercial CFD package Ansys FLUENT version 15.0 (Ansys Inc,

h = 6.5 m
2013) was used in this study. Typical numerical mesh of a CFD simula-
tion is shown in Fig. 10.
Simulations were carried out with steady state analysis using the
Reynolds−Averaged Navier−Stokes (RANS) realizable k − ω turbu-
lence model, as this model has been proven to be the most accurate
model (Ansys Inc, 2014; Hung et al., 2019). The element mesh was

Sump-end
l = 4.5 m quadrilateral element type with a 5 mm mesh element size. The residual
convergence criterion for velocity was set to be 10−4 and the scaled en-
ergy residual was 10−6 in all simulations to ensure the convergence of
the simulations (Ansys Inc, 2014). Details of CFD simulation results
are discussed in Section 4.

Fig. 10. Typical CFD numerical mesh of passive pipe system and boundary conditions. 3. Experimental test results and discussions

3.1. Controlled wind test results

during testing because the wind vector might be slightly oriented when
the fan blades were spinning. The centre line was rotated at different
angles (i.e. 0°, 15°, 30°, 45°) to the wind tunnel to examine the effect
of cone gap orientation on the performance of the cowl as shown in
Fig. 9.
An example of the test measurements for controlled wind speeds is
shown in Fig. 6. The temperature in the laboratory was kept constant at
24 °C ± 1 °C. As can be seen, the extracted flow (Fig. 6a) rate and the neg-
ative pressure (Fig. 6b) reached an equilibrium state simultaneously with
the wind speed. Other measurements showed a similar trend thus they

Fig. 11. Relationship between (a) controlled wind velocity and the pressure at sump-end; and (b) Controlled wind velocity and extracted air velocity. The sump-end was restricted at
different levels from fully restricted to fully unrestricted; (c) Relationship of absolute normalised |ΔP/L| and the extracted air velocity for calculating the air permeability of different
unrestricted sump-end levels; (d) Example of pressure reduction along the test pipe at wind speed of 4.5 m/s. This wind speed was selected because it is the average wind speed in
Ireland. The other wind speeds show similar pressure loss rate along the pipe thus they are not presented here.
8 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167
Table 1
Air permeability for different unrestricted levels of the sump-end.
No. kah (m2) Unrestricted level of sump-end
1 0.0 Fully restricted
2 4.8 × 10−09 4.1%
3 7.26 × 10−09 10.3%
4 2.10 × 10−08 15%
5 2.25 × 10−08 T2 Perm granular material⁎
6 2.38 × 10−08 21%
7 1.47 × 10−7 31%
8 1 Unrestricted
Note: * after Hung et al. (2018a).
are not presented here. Unless stated otherwise, all negative pressures
presented in this study were measured at the sump-end location of the
pipe, which is considered as the radon sump location in a SD system.
The relationship between the negative pressure with the controlled
wind speed for Cases (i), (ii) and (iii) is presented in Fig. 11a. It was
observed that the negative pressure increased non-linearly with the in-
crease in wind velocity. Furthermore, at the same wind velocity the neg-
ative pressure decreased with the decrease in the permeability of the
pipe cap. This means that if a SD system had a higher degree of the air-
tightness of the SD system, i.e. lesser air leakage of the system, it would
gain a higher negative pressure under its slab. For example, at a wind
speed of 4 m/s, the negative pressure is approximately −10 Pa for the
fully unrestricted sump-end [Case (i)], whereas at the same wind
speed the negative is approximately −20 Pa for the fully restricted
[Case (ii)].
Fig. 11b shows the relationship between the wind velocity and the
extracted air velocity for different sump-end cases. Unlike the develop-
ment of negative pressure with the wind velocity, the extracted air ve-
locity increased linearly with the increase in the wind velocity for any
given sump-end cases with a maximum VE/VWC of approximately 0.67
for Case (i)- fully unrestricted sump-end. This ratio deceased with the
decrease in the permeability of the sump-end and become zero for
fully restricted sump-end. In practical design, there would be no fully
Fig. 12. Example of test measurement T9 after separation. Occurrences of negative and positive pressures were counted to be 33,665 and 12,075 s, respectively.
unrestricted sum-end nor fully restricted sum-end but will be in be-
tween depending on actual conditions.
Based on Fig. 11c, the air permeabilities (kah) of associated unre-
stricted sump-ends were calculated by using the Darcy-Forchheimer
(D-F) equation (Eq. (1)) (Forchheimer, 1901). The D-F equation was se-
lected because it has been proven to be the most appropriate equation
for determining the kah value of granular permeable materials (Hung
et al., 2018a).
ΔP μ μ
¼c  v2 þ v ð1Þ
L kah kah
where ΔP (Pa) is pressure difference between inside and outside the
sump-end (Pa), L is thickness of the pipe cap (m) (L = 4.5 mm or
0.0045 m in this study), μ is the dynamic viscosity of the air (Pa.s), kah is
the air permeability of the sump-end (m2), v is the extracted air velocity
(m/s), c = the Forchheimer constant which depends on the unrestricted
degree of the sump-end. The c value is not examined in this study.
It is observed that the kah varied from 4.8 × 10−9 m2 for 4.1% unre-
stricted sump-end to 1.47 × 10−7 m2 for 31% unrestricted sump-end
(Table 1). In a practical situation, the unrestricted level of a sump-end
would be a combination of different factors, such as the airtightness of
the concrete slab, the air permeability of the native soil below the per-
meable granular material layer under the concrete slab. For example,
if there was a SD system that had a highly permeable granular layer
below the slab and high airtightness concrete slab. If the native soil is
a highly permeable soil, the unrestricted sump-end level would be
high and the pressure field extension would not reach all areas within
the permeable granular layer under the slab due to pressure loss
through the soil to the outside environment. Therefore, in order to
have the highest effectiveness of the SD system for this case, the air per-
meability of the native soil might be reduced by compaction work or by
filling additional fill material and compact this layer as a bearing layer
below the house before forming the sub-slab component.
Fig. 11d presents the pressure loss rate along the pipe for the con-
trolled wind at a wind speed of 4.5 m/s. The pressure measured from
the top-end of the pipe to the sump-end location with an interval of
 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167 9

Table 2 test results recorded for the natural wind fluctuated because of the in-
Occurrences (in seconds) of positive and negative pressure with natural wind tests. herent variation in natural wind, in which the pressure developed at
Test case Test ID Negative pressure (A) Positive pressure (B) Ratio (A/B) the sump-end occurred as positive (pressurisation) and negative
T1 11,357 5574 2.04
(depressurisation) pressures. Therefore, an additional analysis was per-
T2 6761 2132 3.17 formed to separate the positive and negative pressure values with their
T3 10,230 4224 2.42 associated extracted air velocity and natural wind velocity.
T4 20,895 5842 3.58 Fig. 12 shows the separation for those presented in Fig. 7 for test T9
Case (i) T5 24,538 5495 4.47
[case (i)]. The occurrences of negative pressure and their associated nat-
T6 15,388 6533 2.36
T7 12,026 9477 1.27 ural wind velocity and extracted air velocity were counted, as well as
T8 5238 2085 2.51 the positive pressure and their associated natural wind velocity and
T9 33,665 12,075 2.79 supplied air velocity (VS). The occurrences of negative pressure were
T10 23,087 7852 2.94 33,665 s/45740 s, whereas the occurrences of positive pressure were
Case (ii)
T11 18,995 7655 2.48
Average 2.73
12,075/45740 s (where 45,740 s are the total experimental time)
(Table 2). The occurrences for other test cases are also presented in
Table 2 with a similar trend.
The ratios for fully restricted sum-end level for the tests T10 and T11
each sensor is 2 m, as previously discussed in Section 2.1. It is observed were found to be 2.94 and 2.48, respectively, which are similar to those
that the pressure loss rate is strongly dependent on the unrestricted obtained for fully unrestricted sump-end. This finding suggests that the
level of the sump-end, as well as the distance from the top-end of the occurrences of pressurisation and depressurisation at the sump-end is
pipe. For example, at the distance of 8.85 m from the top-end, the pres- independent of the sump-end restriction level. Furthermore, these find-
sure loss rates are 0.5 and 0.92 for fully unrestricted and 15% unrestricted, ings suggest that although the pressure fluctuated, because of the inher-
respectively. In practical situations, neither a fully unrestricted nor fully ent variation in natural wind, the negative pressure was predominant
restricted sump-end exist, but it will be in between these boundaries. with an average ratio of 2.73 (Table 2).
Hung et al. (2018a) reported that the air permeability of the T2 Perm The negative pressure recorded for the test T11 and its associated
granular material is 2.25 × 10−8 m2, which is in between the 15% and natural wind velocity are shown in Fig. 13. As can be seen from the fig-
21% unrestricted cases (Table 1). The T2 Perm granular material is a ure, the development of the negative pressure does not significantly dif-
standardised granular material for forming the permeable layer in SD fer from that recorded for fully unrestricted sump-end (Fig. 12a). This
systems in Ireland. At the unrestricted sump-end level of 21%, the pres- insignificant difference between fully unrestricted and fully restricted
sure loss rate was found to be 3% per metre. Therefore, it is expected sump-ends might be explained by the impact of high fluctuation be-
that if the T2 Perm material or similar materials were used as permeable tween pressurisation and depressurisation phenomenon which occurs
layers for the SD systems, the unrestricted level of the sump-end would in a very short period of time as discussed previously.
be between 15% and 21% and the pressure loss would be negligible. Fig. 14 presents examples of histogram distribution the relationship
between VE/VWN for two test cases T5 and T7. The ratio was found to be
3.2. Natural wind test results in between 0.33 and 0.53 for T5 and 0.22–0.43 for T7 at their highest fre-
quency of 21% and 31.6% respectively. A summary of all ratios for all
Examples of test measurements for natural wind were shown in cases is shown in Table 3. As can be seen from the table, the ratio VE/
Fig. 7. Unlike the measurement recorded for the controlled wind; the VWN was found to be varied for each case, which would depend on

Fig. 13. Example of test measurement T11 (fully restricted sump-end) after separation. Note: there is no extracted air flow when the sump-end is fully restricted.
10 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167

Fig. 14. Examples of histogram diagram of VE/VWN for tests T5 and T7.

Table 3 net target negative pressure ΔP = −0.6 Pa would be achieved

Highest density distribution of VE/VWN. (Dumais, 2018). Therefore, if a typical pressure on the ground floor
was approximately 1.5 Pa, the design negative pressure under the sub-
Test Test Avg. Highest VE/VWN at highest
case ID VE/VWN frequency (%) frequency
slab should be at least −2.1 Pa or net pressure ΔP = 1.5–2.1 = −0.6 Pa.
In reality, the sump-end and the horizontal pipe segment are within
T1 0.34 40.6 0.1–0.22
T2 0.68 24.9 0.3–0.5
the sub-based under the house. Therefore, in winter months, they may
T3 0.63 25.2 0.43–0.63 be exposed to a higher temperature from the ground in comparison
T4 0.75 30.7 0.1–0.3 with the air temperatures to which the vertical pipe segment is exposed
Case (i) T5 0.77 21 0.33–0.53 from the outdoor environment. This higher temperature under the
T6 0.68 25.1 0.26–0.46
house would cause larger pressure differences between the sump-end
T7 0.43 31.6 0.22–0.43
T8 0.42 27 0.44–0.84 and the top-end of the pipe; thus, enhancing the performance of the
T9 0.85 45 0.5–0.9 passive SD system. In other words, higher temperature under the
house in comparison to the outside temperature forces the air under
the house to go upward through the opened top-end pipe (Thorpe,
2018; Zhou et al., 2019). Although, the effect of the temperature differ-
ence on the test results was not examined in this study, it is expected
many factors for example wind profile and turbulence of the wind and
that the temperature difference between the sump-end and the top-
weather condition. Examples of associated VE and VWN are shown in
end of the pipe would improve the effectiveness of the opened top-
Figs. 15 and 16. The other tests showed a similar trend thus are not pre-
end pipe during winter months.
sented here. Summary of all test results are shown in and Tables 4 and 5.
Fig. 17 presents correlation between VWN, VE and negative pressure P
at sump location. Due to the natural fluctuation of the wind profile, the 4. CFD simulation results and discussions
correlation between negative pressure and wind speed was low with a
maximum correlation factor R2 of 0.33 was found (Table 6). This poor 4.1. CFD simulation model validation
correlation is a result of the significant fluctuation of the natural wind
profile during testing as shown in Fig. 13. CFD simulations were designed based on the prototype test setup
Furthermore, it is expected that a SD system should generally create presented in the previous sections. CFD simulations were validated
a lower design pressure under the sub-slab region in comparison to the using the test results with controlled wind. A parametric study was
pressure inside the house. Typical pressure at the ground floor in a stan- then performed to investigate the behaviour of suction pressure devel-
dard family house would be in between 1 Pa to 2 Pa, and this typical oped at the sump location on the pipe at different pipe lengths (i.e. from
pressure would be larger for higher buildings especially inside buildings 4 m to 32 m horizontal lengths and 6.5 m to 18 m vertical lengths).
with mechanical ventilation systems. Practical experience in Canada Comparisons between the CFD simulations and the measurements
have shown that a SD system would work effectively if a minimum with the controlled wind velocity are shown in Figs. 11 (a) and (b).

Fig. 15. Examples of histogram diagram of VE for test T5 and T7.

 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167 11

Fig. 16. Examples of histogram diagram of VWN for test T5 and T7.

Table 4 Table 6
Values of VE at the highest frequencies. Correlation between negative pressure (P) with extracted air velocity (VE) and wind speed
(VWN). The correlation is build based on eq. P = a × VE or VWN.
Test Test Avg. VE Highest VE at highest frequency
case ID (m/s) frequency (m/s) Test Test P-VWN correlation P-VE correlation
(%) case ID
Parameter Correlation Parameter Correlation
T1 1.42 22.10 0.4–0.8 a factor (R2) a factor (R2)
T2 1.15 25.00 0.9–1.3
T1 −0.54 0.16 −0.76 0.22
T3 1.03 13.40 0.9–1.3
T2 −0.40 0.20 −0.83 0.25
T4 1.00 30.10 0.6–1.0
T3 −0.59 0.20 −0.98 0.33
Case (i) T5 0.98 30.00 0.8–1.2
T4 −0.45 0.23 −0.71 0.21
T6 1.01 13.25 0.5–0.9 Case
T5 −0.33 0.29 −0.85 0.24
T7 0.71 35.00 0.1–0.5 (i)
T6 −0.47 0.18 −0.70 0.21
T8 0.96 17.00 0.40
T7 −0.30 0.18 −0.86 0.12
T9 0.83 24.72 0.76
T8 −0.45 0.23 −0.69 0.24
T9 −0.32 0.19 −0.57 0.17
Average −0.43 0.21 −0.77 0.22
Case T10 −0.61 0.25 – –
(ii) T11 −0.58 0.23 – –
Table 5
Values of VWN at the highest frequencies.

Test Test Avg. Highest VW at highest frequency

case ID VWN frequency (m/s) From the comparison, it can be confirmed that the CFD simulations are
(m/s) (%)
suitable and reliable to simulate the passive opened top-end pipe for a
T1 2.66 12.20 1.8–2.2 SD system.
T2 2.20 13.50 0.9–1.3
T3 2.30 14.10 1.8–2.2
T4 2.50 12.00 1.5–1.9 4.2. CFD simulation of passive open pipe at different vertical and horizontal
Case (i) T5 1.54 22.50 0.6–1.0 lengths
T6 2.34 17.22 1.3–1.7
T7 2.10 15.94 1.04–1.44
T8 3.01 14.50 1.87–2.27
Parametric studies were performed to investigate the effect of verti-
T9 1.20 28.00 0.95–1.35 cal and horizontal lengths of the pipe on the performance of the passive
T10 2.53 17.00 1.4–1.8 opened top-end pipe. The first parametric study is to vary the horizontal
Case (ii)
T11 2.58 20.00 1.6–2.0 length of the pipe from 4 m to 32 m while fixing the vertical length at
6.5 m. The second parametric study is to vary the vertical length of the

Fig. 17. Examples of relationship between negative pressure at sump location with VE and VWN. The results for other tests are similar thus are not presented here. Final correlation is shown
in Table 5.
12 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167
Fig. 18. Example of wind velocity contours obtained from CFD simulation of the open pipe
with horizontal length of 4.5 m and vertical length of 6.5 m.
pipe from 6.5 m to 18 m while fixing the horizontal length of the pipe at
6.5 m. The length of the pipe was numerically varied in increments of 2 m.
The results are presented in normalised negative pressure, and this nor-
malisation was calculated as the ratio of the negative pressure at the
sump location (Pm(sump)) of the pipe divided by the negative pressure at
the top (Pm(top)) of the pipe, i.e. (Pm(sump)/Pm(top). This practice would
allow a design engineer to perform a quick determination in the field
using the results presented in this study. The wind velocities were numer-
ically assigned as the typical wind speeds at 2.5 m/s, 4.5 m/s and 6.5 m/s.
Fig. 18 shows an example of wind velocity contour for the passive
opened top-end pipe with horizontal length of 4.5 m and vertical length
of 6.5 m. The wind speed of approximately 6.5 m/s was determined at
the pipe head in this example. The other wind velocity contours for
other simulations show a similar behaviour thus are not presented here.
Fig. 19 presents the normalised negative pressure at the sump-end
with the variation of vertical and horizontal lengths of the pipe for
Fig. 19. Effect of the variation of the horizontal and vertical pipe length on the suction pressure at the sump-end location of open pipe.
Case (i). This unrestricted sump-end level is presented because it is
the most critical case in a practical situation for a zero airtightness of a
SD system. In a real situation, airtightness of a SD system might deteri-
orate with time, e.g. a crack develops on the surface of concrete slab,
allowing the soil gas and air to pass freely (Hung et al., 2018b; Hung
et al., 2019). As can be seen from the figure, the reduction of the pres-
sure at the sump location decreased non-linearly with the increase in
both horizontal and vertical pipe lengths.
Fully restricted sump-end levels were not modelled here as it is ob-
served for this case the negative pressure developed at sump-end loca-
tion were identical with that at the pipe head. This conclusion is
supported by a comparison shown in Fig. 20. Negative pressure mea-
sured for fully unrestricted sump-end presented in Fig. 11 is extracted
and plotted in this figure for comparison. It is shown that when the
sump-end is fully restricted the negative pressure at the top-end and
the sump-end of the pipe are identical.
5. Prediction of in situ behaviour of the passive opened top-end pipe
This section presents the steps to determine the pressure develop-
ment using results presented in this study.
The first step is to determine the configuration of the house. A
typical family home in urban area with a length of 9 m is considered
here (Fig. 21). A 0.4 m-thick T1 Struc and a 0.2 m-thick T2 Perm gran-
ular fill layers are used as bearing layers of the floor of the house.
These materials are the standardised granular materials for con-
struction in Ireland described in NSAI (2016). The SD system consists
of a standard radon sump located at the centre of the house, which is
fully embedded in the permeable T2 Perm layer. A 100 mm pipe is
connected from the sump and extended to the outside of the house
by a passive opened top-end pipe. For simplicity, the full configura-
tion of the house is not presented here as this is similar to that
shown in Fig. 1. The pipe has a horizontal length of 4.5 m and a ver-
tical length of 6.5 m.
The second step is to obtain the negative pressure at the top of the
pipe. In this study, the negative pressure was selected from experimen-
tal tests with controlled winds (Fig. 20). Assuming that the average
wind speed is 4 m/s, therefore the pressure at the top of the pipe is es-
timated to be approximately of −20 Pa (interpolated from Fig. 20). By
using Fig. 19(a) for a horizontal pipe length of 4.5 m and the suction
pressure ratio is estimated to be 0.32. Therefore, the negative pressure
at the sump-end location would be 0.32 × (−20) = −6.4 Pa. By consid-
ering a safety factor of FS = 3 (Meyerhof, 1970; Meyerhof, 1984) in the
design, the design negative pressure of the sump-end location would be
−6.4 Pa /FS = −2.1 Pa.
The third step is to determine the pressure distribution under the
slab. In order to perform this step, design curves for the pressure field
 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167
Fig. 20. Negative pressure at the top-end of the pipe obtained from controlled wind tests.
Negative pressure measured at the sump-end location for Case (ii) is extracted from Fig. 9
and presented in this figure for comparison. It is shown that when the sump-end is fully
restricted [Case (ii)] the suction pressure at the top-end and the sump-end of the pipe
are identical as expected.
extension reported in Hung et al., (2018b) are required (Fig. 22). It
should be noted that an imperfectly sealed slab for the SD system should
be taken into account for a conservative design in practice.
From the above calculation, pressure distribution under the slab is
expected to be as shown in Fig. 23. The minimum pressure is obtained
to be approximately −0.6 Pa at the edge of the footing. As discussed
in Section 3, if a typical pressure above the slab was 1.5 Pa, this mini-
mum pressure at the edge of the footing should be −2.1 Pa. Therefore,
a minimum pressure of −0.6 Pa may not be enough to ensure the effec-
tiveness of the SD system. To achieve a minimum pressure of −2.1 Pa, a
number of factors could be considered, such as shortening the horizon-
tal length of the pipe, increasing the airtightness of the whole SD sys-
tem, or adding a static cowl on the opened top-end of the pipe. In this
case, by either (1) shortening the horizontal length or (2) adding a static
ventilator on the top of pipe would be better solutions. A novel static
ventilator has been developed and tested to solve this issue and is pre-
sented briefly in Section 6.
6. Novel design of a static ventilator to improve the performance of
the passive opened top-end pipe
Measurements were conducted in terms of wind velocity, extrac-
tion air velocity at the sump-end and negative pressure at the mea-
surement point inside the pipe [as has been shown in Fig. 9(a)]. A
total of 16 tests were performed (Table 7). As can be seen from the
Fig. 21. Configuration of a typical urban family house with 9 m length. The radon sump is assumed to be at the centre of the house (not to scale).
13
Fig. 22. Normalised suction pressure field extension curve for the SD system (adapted
from Hung et al., 2018b).
table, at the same wind velocity the best performance was found
for the static cone ventilator when its centre line was oriented in be-
tween 30° and 45° to the centre of the wind tunnel. For example, at
the wind speed of 5 m/s, the suction pressure values were measured
to be −2.6, −2.9, −4.0, −3.7 Pa for the centre line rotated at 0°, 15°,
30°, 45°, respectively.
In practice, it is expected that the final negative pressure would
be the average of these negative pressure values because the natural
wind direction would change rapidly in a short period of time. Fur-
thermore, the observation also showed that the static ventilator
had a better performance in comparison with the rotating cowl.
However, the reliability and applicability of the static ventilator
should be confirmed with field trials. Test results showed that the
newly developed static ventilator induced highest negative pressure
as well as extraction air velocity at sump location inside the pipe for
all wind directions.
7. Conclusion
Experimental tests were conducted to examine the behaviour of a
passive opened top-end pipe as an alternative solution for the passive
soil depressurisation system to minimise indoor radon concentration.
The use of the passive opened top-end pipe in a passive SD system
will minimise the incremental cost to reduce radon levels and will re-
duce the need for electric fans.
14 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167

Test results and CFD simulations reported in this study are relevant
for other applications which are similar to the passive pipe reported in
this study. A similar research methodology could be adapted for other
boundary conditions, e.g. higher natural and controlled wind velocities,
different configuration of pipe bends.
Experimental tests of a novel designed static cowl were carried out
to compare with the performance of the passive opened top-end pipe
and the rotating cowl. It has been shown that the static cowl can in-
crease and stabilise the extraction air velocity and induce more the neg-
ative pressure at the sump-end location inside the pipe.
Although all efforts have been made to define findings presented in
this study, there are several limitations. For example, the measurements
of natural wind were not recorded with a real SD system and the novel
cowl designed was not tested with natural wind at large scale tests.
These limitations will be investigated further as an extension of this
study.

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Le Chi Hung: Conceptualization, Methodology, Investigation, For-

Fig. 23. Suction pressure under the concrete slab.
Test results with a controlled fan have shown that the negative pres-
sure decreased non-linearly with the increase in the wind velocity. At the
same wind velocity, the negative pressure decreased with the decrease
in the unrestricted level of the sump-end, which in turn will reflect the
airtightness of the SD system. Unlike the negative pressure, the extracted
air velocity increased linearly with the increase in the wind speed.
Test results obtained from natural wind have shown that the pres-
sure development fluctuated between positive and negative values
with the fluctuation of the natural wind velocities. However, a separa-
tion between these two pressure sides has been performed to deter-
mine the number of occurrences of the negative and positive pressure.
The occurrence of the negative pressure was found to be predominant
for all measurements.
CFD simulations were validated to be reliable and suitable for simu-
lating the behaviour of the passive open pipe in practical design. Para-
metric studies were carried out by varying vertical and horizontal
lengths of the pipe, as well as wind speeds at the top of the pipe. The
negative pressure at the sump-end location decreased with the increase
in the pipe length as expected.
mal analysis, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing.
Jamie Goggins: Conceptualization, Investigation, Writing - review &
editing. Patrick Meier: Methodology, Investigation, Writing - review
& editing. Eugene Monahan: Resources, Writing - review & editing.
Mark Foley:Conceptualization, Investigation, Writing - review &
editing.
Declaration of competing interest
The fourth author declares that the static ventilator reported in this
study is protected with the potential for making a commercial product
in the future. The authors declare that they have no known competing
financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
This study was performed as the extension of the OPTI-SDS project
carried out at the National University of Ireland Galway. The project
was funded by the Irish Environmental Protection Agency through grant
no. 2015−HW−MS5. The authors would also like to acknowledge Mr.
Simon McGuinness at the Department of Housing, Planning and Local
Government, Republic of Ireland for his reading and comments to im-
prove the paper.

Table 7
Experimental test results comparing the novel static cowl against a rotating cowl and a passive open pipe.

Test no. Static ventilator configuration VWC VE P

(m/s) (Pa)

1 Static ventilator with 2 cones, vanes at 45° to wind tunnel 3.2 1 −1.2
2 Rotating cowl [type (b) in Fig. 2] 3.2 1 −1.24
3 Opened top-end pipe 3.2 0.8 −0.8
4 Opened top-end pipe 5 1 −1.38
5 Rotating cowl [type (b) in Fig. 2] 5 1.5 −3.1
6 Static ventilator with 2 cones, vanes at 45° to wind tunnel 5 1.6 −3.7
7 Static ventilator with 2 cones, vanes at 0° to wind tunnel 5 1.3 −2.6
8 Static ventilator with 2 cones, vanes at 15° to wind tunnel 5 1.4 −2.9
9 Static ventilator with 2 cones, vanes at 30° to wind tunnel 5 1.6 −4
10 Static ventilator with 3 cones, vanes at 45° to wind tunnel 5 1.8 −4
11 Opened top-end pipe 7 2.3 −8.2
12 Rotating cowl [type (b) in Fig. 2] 7 3.1 −14.8
13 Static ventilator with 3 cones, vanes at 45° to wind tunnel 7 3.6 −17.9
14 Static ventilator with 3 cones, vanes at 0° to wind tunnel 7 3.3 −14.3
15 Static ventilator with 2 cones, vanes at 45° to wind tunnel 7 3.6 −19
16 Static ventilator with 2 cones, vanes at 45° to wind tunnel 7 3.7 −19.9
 L.C. Hung et al. / Science of the Total Environment 748 (2020) 141167
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