Estimation of chemical heat release rate in rack storage fires based on flame volume

• Quantification of chemical heat release rate (HRR) is crucial to fire research.
• Measurements of HRR can be challenging for large fires with sprinkler protection.
• A new methodology was applied to estimate chemical HRR based on flame volume for rack storage fires.
• Results demonstrate that the new method compares reasonably well to oxygen consumption based method.

Quantification of heat release rate is crucial to many fire research works. Under certain conditions, such as very large fires and fire tests with sprinklers, measurements of fire heat release rate can be a challenging problem. This study attempted to develop a methodology of estimating chemical heat release rate using flame volume. This method is based on the theory that heat release rate per unit flame volume is relatively invariant, as long as the combustion is controlled by diffusion in buoyant fires under well-ventilated conditions. Test data were examined from a variety of fire experimental conditions to evaluate the proposed method. The results demonstrate that the flame-volume based method can provide reasonable estimation of heat release rate compared to oxygen-consumption based method.