Received: 21 February 2019 Revised: 23 May 2019 Accepted: 12 June 2019

DOI: 10.1002/fam.2746

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Study on the heat exhaust coefficient and smoke flow

characteristics under lateral smoke exhaust in tunnel fires

Zhisheng Xu1 | Qiulin Liu1 | Lu He1 | Haowen Tao1 | Jiaming Zhao1 |

Hongguang Chen1 | Linjie Li2 | Chuangang Fan1

1
School of Civil Engineering, Central South
University, Changsha, Hunan 410075, China Summary
2
School of Civil Engineering and Architecture, The heat exhaust coefficient and smoke flow characteristics under lateral smoke
Chongqing Jiaotong University, Chongqing
exhaust in tunnel fires were studied in this paper. Through the dimensional analysis,
400074, China
the dimensionless relationship between the heat exhaust coefficient, heat release rate,
Correspondence
exhaust vent size, and exhaust velocity was obtained. In addition, this paper also stud-
Professor Chuangang Fan, School of Civil
Engineering, Central South University, ied the effect of the lateral exhaust vent on the smoke flow field. Results showed that
Changsha, Hunan 410075, China.
the lateral smoke exhaust caused strong air entrainment on the downstream of the
Email: chuangang.fan@csu.edu.cn
exhaust vent and boundary layer separation on the upstream of the exhaust vent. As
Funding information
the exhaust velocity increased, the degree of air entrainment gradually increased, and
The Scientific and Technological Research
Program of Chongqing Municipal Education the smoke layer near the exhaust vent gradually became thinning and plug‐holing phe-
Commission, Grant/Award Number:
nomenon occurred; meanwhile, the boundary layer separation would be suppressed or
KJ1705120; National Key R&D Program of
China, Grant/Award Number: disappear, but the increase of the heat release rate would enhance the boundary layer
2017YFB1201204; Fundamental Research
separation. As the exhaust vent got narrower, the air entrainment downstream of the
Funds for the Central Universities of Central
South University, Grant/Award Number: exhaust vent was reduced, and the boundary layer separation also got weaker.
2018zzts668; National Natural Science Foun-
dation of China, Grant/Award Number: K E Y W OR D S
51608163
air entrainment, boundary layer separation, heat exhaust coefficient, lateral smoke exhaust, tunnel
fire

1 | I N T RO D U CT I O N
The construction of tunnel brings great convenience for transporta-
1
tion. However, the fire safety issue of tunnel is receiving increasing
attention.2 When a fire occurs in a tunnel, the smoke exhaust and heat
dissipation conditions are poor, and the toxic smoke with high concen-
tration and temperature is not easily discharged.3-5 The evacuation and
Nomenclature: A, cross‐sectional area of exhaust vent (m2); cp, specific heat at constant
pressure (J/g K); d, thickness of smoke layer (m); E, heat exhaust coefficient; g, gravitational
acceleration (m/s2); H, height of tunnel (m); h, hydraulic diameter of lateral exhaust vent
: :
(m); l, hydraulic diameter of tunnel (m); m, mass flow rate (kg/s); Q, heat release rate (kW);
T, temperature (K); ΔT, smoke temperature rise (K); u, velocity of smoke (m/s); V, exhaust
velocity (m/s); W, width of tunnel (m)
Greek symbols: ρ, density (kg/m3); Δ, difference between variables
Subscripts: a, fresh air; cs, upstream smoke flow; cs′, downstream smoke flow; es, smoke
exhausted from the vent; s, smoke
firefighting are difficult,6,7 and the damage of tunnel is serious. Fires can
cause traffic congestion and lead to serious casualties.8-11 Many tunnel
fire cases show that the toxic smoke is the main cause of casualties12-14;
thus, how to effectively control the smoke is an important issue for
emergency ventilation and smoke exhaust in tunnel fires.15-18 There
are mainly two kinds of ventilation systems in tunnels, that is, natural
ventilation and mechanical ventilation with jet fans.19,20
At present, mechanical ventilation is the most common mode in
actual engineering.18 In general, the heat exhaust coefficient is an
important parameter used to evaluate the performance of the exhaust
system, which is defined as the ratio of the exhaust rate of heat to the
release rate of heat of the fire, and the shape of the exhaust vent
shows a great influence on the heat exhaust coefficient.21
Moreover, the air entrainment should not be ignored during the
design of the exhaust system of the tunnel. Many scholars conducted
a large number of small‐scale experiments and numerical simulations

Fire and Materials. 2019;43:857–867. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/fam © 2019 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 857
858
to study the air entrainment phenomenon during mechanical ventila-
tion in tunnel fires. Jiang et al22 used the theoretical analysis to obtain
the air entrainment coefficient of the one‐dimensional horizontal
smoke movement stage of the mechanical ventilation. Both the heat
release rate and the smoke exhaust velocity influenced the horizontal
entrainment coefficient. The horizontal entrainment coefficient first
increased as the heat release rate increased and then became relatively
stable. The entrainment coefficient increased as the exhaust velocity
increased because the smoke exhaust would enhance the momentum
of the smoke in the tunnel. Xu et al23 used numerical simulation to
study the influence of the smoke block board on the entrainment phe-
nomenon near the mechanical exhaust vent. The results showed that
the smoke exhaust performance of the board‐coupled shaft was
affected by the smoke block board layout, the heat release rate, and
the exhaust velocity. In addition, a reasonable size of the board could
effectively reduce air entrainment for optimal smoke exhaust effi-
ciency. He et al24 studied the phenomenon of entrainment near the
mechanical exhaust vent and analyzed the effects of heat release rate
and exhaust velocity on the air entrainment. It showed that with the
increase of the heat release rate and exhaust velocity, the amount of
entrained air was increasing, and the temperature of the smoke was
lowered because of the entrainment of a large amount of air when
passing through the exhaust vent.
Compared with mechanical ventilation, natural ventilation affects
the smoke layer propagation slightly. Many scholars25-29 studied the
air entrainment phenomenon during natural ventilation of shaft in tun-
nel fires. A critical criterion for determining the plug‐holing was pro-
posed, and the influence of the plug‐holing on the efficiency of
smoke exhaust was quantitatively analyzed.25 The smoke extraction
performances under different layouts of shaft size28 and shaft position
were compared,26 and the existing shaft structure was changed to
improve the efficiency of smoke exhaust.27
In the tunnel exhaust system, the exhaust vent and the tunnel are
connected by a right angle. When the smoke moves to the exhaust
vent under the strong horizontal inertial force, it will be immediately
separated from the wall of the exhaust vent; that is, boundary layer
separation occurs. 30 31
Ji et al used a 1:6 small‐sized tunnel to simulate
smoke exhaust by natural ventilation shafts and found that the bound-
ary layer separation occurred when the fire smoke passed through the
shaft. Boundary layer separation would affect the smoke exhaustion
effect. When the shaft height was relatively small, the boundary layer
separation was significant, and a vortex was formed in the upstream
region inside the shaft, causing backflow of the gas mixture and
preventing the throughflow of smoke. As the shaft height increased,
the boundary layer separation became insignificant, but the plug‐
holing occurred, causing the fresh air below the smoke layer to be
directly discharged, which would greatly reduce the efficiency of
exhausting smoke. Takeuchi et al32 used a 1:20 tunnel model to study
the natural ventilation performance of an underground road tunnel
with six vertical shafts. In the experiment, when the shaft height was
the same as the tunnel height, the plug‐holing occurred, and when
the shaft height was 0.24 times of the tunnel height, boundary layer
separation would occur.
XU ET AL.
However, previous researches lack the study of the smoke flow
characteristics and heat exhaust coefficient under lateral smoke
exhaust. Lateral smoke exhaust is mainly used in urban double‐deck
tunnels or underwater‐immersed tunnels, with heavy traffic volume
and high fire risk. It is necessary to carry out research on the smoke
flow characteristics under lateral smoke exhaust. Therefore, numerical
simulation of lateral smoke exhaust is carried out, the influence of heat
release rate, exhaust velocity, and exhaust vent size on smoke flow
characteristics is analyzed, and the empirical equation of the heat
exhaust coefficient under lateral smoke exhaust is proposed, which
is in good agreement with the simulation results.
2 | THEORETICAL ANALYSIS
Tunnel is a long and narrow underground building. The tunnel fire
development process has the commonality of both general building
fire and its own characteristics. During the tunnel fire, the spread of
smoke can be divided into five stages33: rising plume, turning region
near the ceiling, radial spreading under the ceiling, transition from
radial to one‐dimensional flow, and one‐dimensional flow under the
ceiling parallel to the tunnel axis. This study mainly focused on the
smoke flow characteristics caused by the presence of lateral smoke
exhaust during the fifth stage (one‐dimensional horizontal spreading).
The flow field of the smoke around the exhaust vent is shown in
Figure 1. The side of the exhaust vent near the fire source is denoted
as the upstream, while the opposite is downstream. Due to the suction
of lateral smoke exhaust, a strong air entrainment phenomenon is
formed in the exhaust vent.
The heat exhaust coefficient is an important parameter for evaluat-
ing the performance of the smoke exhaust system and is determined
by the heat transfer and mass flow in the tunnel. The heat exhaust
coefficient means the ratio of the heat carried by the smoke
discharged from the exhaust vent to the heat carried by the upstream
smoke flow, which can be expressed as
:
Qes
E¼ ; (1)
Q: cs
:
where E is the heat exhaust coefficient, Qes is the heat carried by the
:
smoke discharged from exhaust vent, and Qcs is the heat carried by the
upstream smoke flow.
: :
Qes and Qcs can be expressed as follows:
: :
Qes ¼ cp mes ΔT es ¼ cp ρes ues AΔT es ; (2)
: :
Qcs ¼ cp mcs ΔT cs ¼ cp ρcs dWΔT cs ; (3)
:
where cp is the specific heat at constant pressure, mes is the mass flow
:
rate of the smoke exhausted from exhaust vent, mcs is the mass flow
rate of upstream smoke flow, ΔTes is the temperature rise of smoke
at the exhaust vent, ΔTcs is the temperature rise of upstream smoke
flow, ρes is the density of smoke at the exhaust vent, ρcs is the density
XU ET AL. 859

FIGURE 1 Smoke flow diagram of exhaust vent [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]

of upstream smoke flow, ues is the velocity of smoke at the exhaust source was x > 1.671H, it was a one‐dimensional horizontal spread-
vent, A is the cross‐sectional area of exhaust vent, d is the thickness ing stage, where x was the horizontal distance from the center of
of smoke layer, and W is the width of tunnel. the fire source. In this paper, the one‐dimensional horizontal spread-
The thickness of the smoke layer can be calculated by the follow- ing stage starts from 11.967 m, and the exhaust vent was located
ing equation34: 16 m away from the fire source, so the exhaust vent was in the
one‐dimensional horizontal spreading stage. A series of ceiling tem-

: 1=3
m perature and velocity measuring points were arranged on the longi-
d¼η ; (4)
l2 tudinal center line, with a measuring point spacing of 1 m. In
: addition, a column of temperature measuring points was arranged
where m is the mass flow rate of fire‐induced smoke, l is the hydraulic
vertically at 8 m from the fire source with a spacing of 0.2 m. At
diameter of tunnel, and η is the calculation coefficient.
the position of the exhaust vent, four temperature measuring points
The Zukoski plume model35 is adopted to calculate the mass flow
and velocity measuring points were evenly arranged to measure the
rate in equation (4):
temperature and velocity data at the exhaust vent, which were
: 0:071 : 1=3 5=3 named 1– to 4 in order. The arrangement of measuring points is
m¼ Q H ; (5)
2 shown in Figure 2C. The average value of No. 1 and No. 3 velocity
: measuring points was taken as the upstream velocity, while the
where Q is the heat release rate and H is the height of tunnel.
average value of the No. 2 and No. 4 velocity measuring points on
the other side was taken as the downstream velocity. The ambient
3 | N U M E R I C A L SI M U LA T I O N temperature was set to 20°C and the simulated run time was 400 s.

3.1 | Model design

3.2 | SIMULATED CONDITIONS
The road tunnel fire model was established by Fire Dynamics Simu-
This paper mainly studied the effects of heat release rate, smoke
lator (FDS) (Version 6.5.3). The model construction is shown in
velocity, and exhaust vent size on heat exhaust coefficient and smoke
Figure 2, whose dimension was 60.0 m of length, 10.0 m of width,
flow characteristics under lateral smoke exhaust in tunnel fires. A total
and 7.0 m of height. The fire source was located on the centerline
of 45 simulated conditions were set, as shown in Table 1. There were
of the tunnel, 14.0 m from the upstream exit of the tunnel. Fire
five exhaust velocities in the simulation, which were 1, 2, 4, 7, and
source size was 2.0 m × 2.0 m, and the polyurethane was employed
10 m/s. The exhaust vent sizes were 6.0 m × 1.0 m, 4.0 m × 1.5 m,
as fuel. At the beginning of the simulation, the heat release rate rap-
and 3.0 m × 2.0 m. The heat release rates were 5, 8, and 20 MW,
idly increased to the maximum and then remained stable. The ther-
respectively.
mal loss was ignored in this paper. However, we built the tunnel
model with inert materials similar to concrete to reduce the effect
on results caused by thermal loss. The research focused on the 3.3 | Grid sensitivity analysis
smoke movement area where it was around the exhaust vent and
far from the fire source. Therefore, the effect of the radiative effect In the simulation, the choice of grid size has an important impact on
and the regime of combustion was ignored in the paper. The exhaust the accuracy of simulation results. When performing a large eddy sim-
vent was located on the sidewall of the tunnel, and the center of the ulation, the D*/δx standard has been widely used to estimate the accu-
exhaust vent was 16 m away from the fire source. Refer to research racy of the mesh,37 where δx is the size of the mesh and D* is the
36
results of previous scholars ; when the distance from the fire characteristic length, which can be calculated by
860 XU ET AL.

FIGURE 2 Simulation model [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]

and 0.30 m) were adopted to verify the grid independence with vary-

: 2=5
Q ing heat release rates.
D* ¼ pffiffiffi ; (6)
ρa cp T a g When the heat release rate is 5 MW, the D*/δx corresponding to
the grid sizes of 0.20, 0.25, and 0.30 m are 9.1, 7.3, and 6.1, respec-
: tively. When the heat release rate is 8 MW, the D*/δx corresponding
where Qρa is the density of air, Ta is the temperature of air, and g is the
to the grid sizes of 0.20, 0.25, and 0.30 m are 11.0, 8.8, and 7.3,
gravitational acceleration.
respectively. When the heat release rate is 20 MW, the D*/δx corre-
Hostikka37 recommends that the value of D*/δx should be
sponding to the grid sizes of 0.20, 0.25, and 0.30 m are 15.8, 12.7,
between 4 and 16. In general, the smaller the grid size is, the higher
and 10.6, respectively. All the above D*/δx are in the range of 4 to
the accuracy of the simulation results will be, but the time required
16, so the value of the grid size satisfies the requirements.
for the simulation will increase accordingly. In order to determine a
The vertical temperature distribution in the middle of the tunnel
reasonable grid size, the grid sensitivity analysis was needed.
with different grid sizes is shown in Figure 3. The results indicate that
Based on equation (6) and the recommended value of D*/δx, the
the temperature distribution curves with grid sizes of 0.20 and 0.25 m
grid size of the finest mesh for a 5‐MW fire in this tunnel was calcu-
are close to each other, while the deviation of 0.30‐m grid simulation
lated to be between 0.11 and 0.46 m, the grid size of the finest mesh
results is obvious. To save computational time and keep accuracy of
for an 8‐MW fire was calculated to be between 0.13 and 0.55 m, and
simulation, the grid size of 0.25 m was chosen at last.
the grid size of the finest mesh for a 20‐MW fire was calculated to be
between 0.19 and 0.79 m. Then, three different grid sizes (0.20, 0.25,

TABLE 1 Simulated conditions 4 | RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Test Exhaust Vent Heat Release Rate, Exhaust Velocity,
Number Size MW m/s 4.1 | Heat exhaust coefficient of lateral smoke
1‐15 6.0 m × 1.0 m 5, 8, 20 1, 2, 4, 7, 10 exhaust
16‐30 4.0 m × 1.5 m 5, 8, 20 1, 2, 4, 7, 10
The control parameters for heat exhaust coefficient of the lateral
31‐45 3.0 m × 2.0 m 5, 8, 20 1, 2, 4, 7, 10
smoke exhaust in this study are heat release rate, hydraulic diameter
XU ET AL. 861

of lateral exhaust vent, hydraulic diameter of tunnel, exhaust velocity,

air density, ambient temperature, specific heat at constant pressure,
and gravitational acceleration. Similarly, the heat exhaust coefficient
can be expressed as
: 
E ¼ f Q; h; l; V es ; ρa ; T a ; cp ; g : (7)

L, T, M, and θ are selected as the basic dimensions; in addition, and l, ρa,

cp, and Ta are selected as the basic parameters, then the dimensionless
equations for the other four parameters can be expressed as below:
8 h iβ h iγ1 h i
> :
> α β γ ε
> π1 ¼ l 1 ρa1 cp1 T a1 Q ¼ L 1 ML
α −3 1
L2 T −2 θ−1 θε1 ML2 T −3
>
>
>
> h iβ2 h iγ2
>
>
>
< π2 ¼ lα2 ρβa2 cγp2 T εa2 h ¼ Lα2 ML−3 L2 T −2 θ−1 θε2 L
h iβ h iγ : (8)
>
> α3 β3 γ3 ε3 α3 −3 3 2 −2 −1 3 ε3
 −1 
>
> π ¼ l ρ c T V ¼ L ML L T θ θ LT
>
>
3 a p a ex
>
> h iβ h iγ h i
>
>
: π4 ¼ l ρa cp T ε4 g ¼ Lα4 ML−3 4 L2 T −2 θ−1 4 θε4 LT −2
α 4 β4 γ 4
a

(A)
The indexes of physical quantities can be solved by conservation:
8
> 3 3
>
> α1 ¼ −2; β1 ¼ −1; γ1 ¼ − ; ε1 ¼ −
>
> 2 2
>
< α ¼ −1; β ¼ 0; γ ¼ 0; ε ¼ 0
2 2 2 2
: (9)
>
> 1 1
>
> α3 ¼ 0; β3 ¼ 0; γ3 ¼ − ; ε3 ¼ −
>
> 2 2
:
α4 ¼ 1; β4 ¼ 0; γ4 ¼ −1; ε4 ¼ −1

So, the dimensionless equation can be simplified to

8 :
>
> : Q
> π
> 1 ¼ l−2 −1 −3=2 −3=2
ρ c T Q ¼
>
> a p a 3=2
>
> ρa cp T a3=2 l2
>
>
>
> h
>
< π2 ¼ l−1 h ¼
l (10)
>
> −1=2 −1=2 V es
>
> π3 ¼ cp T a V es ¼ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
>
>
>
> cp T a
>
>
>
> gl
>
: π4 ¼ lc−1 −1
p Ta g ¼
cp T a

(B)

FIGURE 3 Vertical temperature distribution of tunnels under FIGURE 4 The relationship between E and Q*, and h* and V* [Colour
different grids [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com] figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]
862 XU ET AL.

According to the relevant criteria of the similarity principle, the dimen- Equation (11) can be assumed to be
sionless equation (7) can be replaced by the following equation (11):  α  β  γ
E ¼ λ Q* ⋅ h* ⋅ V * : (12)
: !
E¼ f
Q
;
h V es
; p ffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
ffi;
gl The coefficients λ, α, β, and γ can be determined by numerical
3=2 2 l
ρa cp T 3=2
a l
cp T a cp T a simulation.
: !α

 !
Q h β V ex γ (11) In order to determine the relationship between the heat exhaust
¼ f ⋅ ⋅ pffiffiffiffi
ρa cp T a g1=2 l5=2 l gl coefficient, heat release rate, exhaust vent size, and exhaust velocity,
 
¼ f Q*α ⋅h*β ⋅V *γ ; as shown in Figure 4, the empirical equation for the heat exhaust
coefficient can be obtained by all simulated conditions and fitting with
Q*, h*, and V*:
:
Q h V es
where Q* ¼ , h* ¼ , and V * ¼ pffiffiffiffi. 0:0343V *1=2
ρa cp T a g1=2 l5=2 l gl E¼ : (13)
Q*1=4 h*

(A)

(D)

(B)
(E)

(C) (F)

(G)

(H)

FIGURE 5 Temperature distribution at the exhaust vent (4.0 m × 1.5 m) [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]
XU ET AL. 863

It can be seen from Figure 4 that the empirical equation obtained by

fitting is consistent with the calculation result of equation (1).
The coefficient of determination of the thermal efficiency prediction
model is 0.928 and the data points almost all fall within the error range
of 20%, indicating that the predictive capability of the expression is
good and the reference value of the predictive model is credible.

4.2 | Boundary layer separation of lateral smoke

exhaust

Taking the exhaust vent size of 4.0 m × 1.5 m as an example, the tem-
perature distribution characteristics at the exhaust vent are analyzed
and the slice position is shown in Figure 5A. When the heat release
rate is 8 MW and the exhaust velocities are 1 and 2 m/s, the temper-
ature on the upstream of exhaust vent is lower, indicating that there is
a large amount of air that exists on the upstream of exhaust vent, and
the smoke is mainly discharged from the downstream of the exhaust
vent, which reduces the effectiveness of lateral smoke exhaust. When
the exhaust velocity reaches 4 m/s, the amount of air on the upstream
of the exhaust vent is still very small. When the exhaust velocity
exceeds 4 m/s, the upstream of exhaust vent is filled with smoke.
According to the theory of fluid mechanics, when a fluid flows through
an expansion channel or an obstacle, the flow may be separated, and
an adverse pressure gradient is generated at the trailing edge of the
separation point; in addition, the larger the horizontal inertial force
of fluid flow, the stronger the adverse pressure gradient. However, if
the wall has a sharp corner, the boundary layer separation will also
occur at the corner. In the stable stage of exhaust smoke, the horizon-
tal inertial force of the smoke in the tunnel is constant under the same
heat release rate,38-41 and the suction force at the exhaust vent is con-
tinuously increased with the increase of the exhaust velocity. When
the exhaust velocity is low, the suction force formed at the exhaust
vent is insufficient to overcome the adverse pressure gradient gener-
ated by the boundary layer separation. The air in the tunnel will flow
into the exhaust vent and be mixed with the smoke in the upstream.
Therefore, the occurrence of boundary layer separation under lateral
smoke exhaust will greatly reduce the effectiveness of smoke exhaust.
By analyzing Figure 5 furthermore, when the heat release rate is
8 MW and the exhaust velocity is 1 m/s, there is a concave area in
the smoke layer near the exhaust vent; that is, the plug‐holing
occurs. As the exhaust velocity increases, the thickness of the smoke
layer near the smoke vent gradually decreases, and the plug‐holing
becomes more obvious, which leads to more fresh air entering the
exhaust vent, dramatically reducing the exhaust efficiency of lateral
smoke exhaust, but when the exhaust velocity exceeds 7 m/s, the
thickness of the smoke layer becomes relatively stable and does
not become smaller. However, when the exhaust velocity is 1 m/s,
the plug‐holing occurs at all three heat release rates, as shown in
Figure 5B,G,H, and as the heat release rate increases, the plug‐holing
area will gradually decrease. In comparison with previous studies on
ceiling smoke exhaust, it can be seen that the plug‐holing in the lat- FIGURE 6 Velocity distribution of upstream and downstream of
eral smoke exhaust is different from that in the ceiling smoke exhaust vent [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]
864
exhaust. The thermal buoyancy of the smoke in the ceiling smoke
exhaust is in the same direction as the negative pressure induced
by the ceiling exhaust vent. However, the thermal buoyancy of
smoke under lateral smoke exhaust is perpendicular to the negative
pressure induced by the lateral exhaust vent.
In order to analyze the boundary layer separation at the lateral
exhaust vent, the variation of airflow velocities along the upstream
and downstream of exhaust vent under different heat release rates
is studied, as shown in Figure 6. When the boundary layer separa-
tion occurs in the exhaust vent, the downstream velocity of the
exhaust vent is significantly larger than the upstream velocity. When
the boundary layer separation is weakened, the upstream and down-
stream velocities of the exhaust vent will be the same.
For the exhaust vent size of 3.0 m × 2.0 m, as shown in Figure 6A,
the downstream velocities of all simulated conditions are significantly
(A)
(B)
FIGURE 7 Temperature and velocity flow field distribution near the exhaust vent at different exhaust velocities (8 MW‐4.0 m × 1.5 m) [Colour
figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]
XU ET AL.
greater than the upstream velocities, indicating that boundary layer
separation occurs in all simulated conditions. In addition, the boundary
layer separation is more obvious than the other two heat release rates
when the heat release rate is 20 MW. This can be explained by the
fact that the greater the heat release rate, the greater the horizontal
inertial force of the upstream smoke flue, so the boundary layer sepa-
ration is prone to occur.
For the condition with the exhaust vent size of 4.0 m × 1.5 m and the
exhaust velocity of 1 m/s, the downstream velocity is greater than the
upstream velocity. When the exhaust velocity increases to 2 m/s, the
difference between the upstream and downstream velocities increases
with the increase of the heat release rate. When the exhaust velocity is
4 m/s, as shown in Figure 6B, the velocity distributions of the upstream
and downstream are relatively uniform at the heat release rates of 5 and
8 MW, indicating that the boundary layer separation has been
(C)
XU ET AL. 865

suppressed; however, the upstream and downstream velocities still

maintain a large difference when the heat release rate is 20 MW; this
is because the suction force generated by the lateral smoke exhaust is
insufficient to overcome the horizontal inertial force of the smoke in
the tunnel at 20 MW; in this case, there is still a boundary layer separa-
tion on the upstream of the exhaust vent. When the exhaust velocity is
in the range of 7 to 10 m/s, the velocity distributions of the upstream
and downstream of the exhaust vent are very uniform at all heat release
rates, indicating that the boundary layer separation has been sup-
pressed or disappear, as shown in Figure 5E,F.
When the exhaust vent is 6.0 m × 1.0 m and the exhaust velocity is
1 m/s, the boundary layer separation occurs at all three heat release
rates, but as the heat release rate increases, the difference between
upstream and downstream velocity is larger, indicating that the
boundary layer separation is more severe. This can be explained by
the fact that the greater the heat release rate, the greater the horizon-
(A)
tal inertial force of the upstream smoke flue, so boundary layer sepa-
ration is prone to occur. When the exhaust velocity is 2 m/s, the
boundary layer separation still occurs when the heat release rate is
20 MW, and the boundary layer separation of the other two heat
release rates disappears. However, the boundary layer separation at
the three heat release rates disappears when the smoke exhaust
velocity exceeds 2 m/s.
It indicates that the narrower exhaust vent will cause the boundary
layer separation to become weaker, and when the exhaust velocity is
higher, the boundary layer separation also disappears, but the increase
of heat release rate enhances boundary layer separation.

4.3 | Flow field distribution near the exhaust vent

Figure 7 shows the temperature and velocity flow field distribution

near the exhaust vent at different exhaust velocities under the heat (B)
release rate of 8 MW with an exhaust vent size of 4.0 m × 1.5 m.
The flow field slice position is 0.4 m away from the sidewall of tunnel,
as shown in Figure 7A. When the exhaust velocity is 1 m/s, a vortex
appears in the lower right corner of the exhaust vent. Due to the gen-
eration of the vortex, the downstream smoke flows back, and the
velocity vector of the upper and lower portions of the tunnel becomes
nonuniform, a part of the streamline turns to the vortex, and the other
part remains horizontal. The vortex intensity also goes up with the
increase of the exhaust velocity, and the disturbance of the flow field
in the lower part of the tunnel is increasingly intense. More stream-
lines turn to the vortex direction, leading to a large amount of air
directly entering the exhaust vent. As the exhaust velocity increases,
the position of the vortex moves from the lower right corner to the
upper right corner of the exhaust vent.
In order to further analyze the flow field change at the exhaust
vent, Figure 8 shows the temperature distribution of the exhaust vent
at the heat release rate of 8 MW. In the condition where the exhaust
vent sizes are 4.0 m × 1.5 m and 3.0 m × 2.0 m, the temperature of the
No. 1 temperature measuring point is lower than the No. 2 when the FIGURE 8 Temperature variation for different exhaust vents
exhaust velocities are 1 and 2 m/s, and the difference between the (8 MW) [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]
866
two temperature data is larger when the exhaust vent is 3.0 m × 2.0 m,
indicating that boundary layer separation occurs on the upstream of
the exhaust vent when the exhaust velocities are 1 and 2 m/s; how-
ever, boundary layer separation is more obvious when the exhaust
vent size is 3.0 m × 2.0 m. The temperature of the No. 4 temperature
measuring point is higher than the No. 3, indicating that the vortex at
the lower right corner of the exhaust vent causes the smoke down-
stream of the exhaust vent to flow back. When the exhaust vent is
6.0 m × 1.0 m, the temperature of the No. 1 temperature measuring
point is higher than that of the No. 2 except for when the exhaust
velocity is 1 m/s; in addition, the temperatures of the No. 3 tempera-
ture measuring point and the No. 4 temperature measuring point tend
to be the same, indicating that when the exhaust vent is 6.0 m × 1.0 m,
the vortex will weaken.
As the exhaust velocity increases, the smoke layer at the exhaust
vent becomes thinner, and the temperature at the lower part of the
exhaust vent decreases. Due to the vortex in the lower right corner
of the exhaust vent, the smoke downstream of the exhaust vent is
caused to flow back and the thickness of the smoke layer down-
stream of the exhaust vent increases. As shown in Figure 7, due to
the presence of the vortex, a large amount of air is sucked in the
lower upstream of the exhaust vent, so the temperature in the lower
right corner of the exhaust vent (No. 4 temperature measuring point)
is higher than the temperature in the lower left corner (No. 3 tem-
perature measuring point), but the narrower the exhaust vent is,
the weaker the vortex will be.
5 | C O N CL U S I O N
In this paper, numerical simulation and theoretical analysis methods
were used to study the effects of different heat release rates, exhaust
vent sizes, and exhaust velocities on the lateral exhaust vent in tunnel
fires. The characteristics of smoke flow under the lateral smoke
exhaust were revealed, and the prediction model of heat exhaust coef-
ficient was proposed. The specific conclusions were as follows:
(1) Through dimensionless analysis and numerical simulation, an
empirical prediction model of heat exhaust coefficient under the
lateral smoke exhaust was obtained. The prediction model of heat
exhaust coefficient can predict the heat exhaust coefficient of the
lateral smoke exhaust before the fire occurs through the boundary
conditions of the tunnel and test the effectiveness of the smoke
exhaust system. It can show up from the prediction model that
the narrow exhaust vents are beneficial for improving the heat
exhaust coefficient, and the heat exhaust coefficient is propor-
tional to the exhaust velocity and inversely proportional to the
heat release rate.
(2) The narrower the exhaust vent was, the weaker the boundary
layer separation would be, and when the exhaust velocity was
larger, the boundary layer separation would be suppressed or
even disappear, but the increase of the heat release rate would
enhance the boundary layer separation.
XU ET AL.
(3) The lateral smoke exhaust caused strong air entrainment and
vortexing downstream of the exhaust vent. As the exhaust veloc-
ity increased, the degree of entrainment downstream of the
exhaust vent gradually increased, and the vortex rose from the
lower right corner of the exhaust vent to the upper right corner,
and the smoke layer near the exhaust vent tended to be thinner
and plug‐holing phenomenon occurred. In addition, the narrower
the exhaust vent was, the weaker of air entrainment downstream
of the exhaust vent would be.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of
China (No. 51608163), Fundamental Research Funds for the Central
Universities of Central South University (Nos. 2018zzts668,
502501004 and 502045009), National Key R&D Program of China
(No. 2017YFB1201204), and the Scientific and Technological
Research Program of Chongqing Municipal Education Commission
(No. KJ1705120).
ORCID
Qiulin Liu https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7818-7317
Linjie Li https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8317-6735
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How to cite this article: Xu Z, Liu Q, He L, et al. Study on the
heat exhaust coefficient and smoke flow characteristics under
lateral smoke exhaust in tunnel fires. Fire and Materials.
2019;43:857–867. https://doi.org/10.1002/fam.2746