Numerical Examination of a Forest Area Fire

Abstract

An important task of sustainability is the protection of Earth's forests and the prevention of forest fires. In this paper, the numerical examination of a typical Hungarian ash forest fire is presented. The connection between sustainability and forest fire simulations is also discussed. For the simulation, a Fire Dynamics Simulator was selected, and a particle-based model was used. The simulation setup, which includes a random location of trees following Poisson distribution, is also explained. Then, the simulation of a 10x10 m area of ash forest is presented. It was found that in case of arson, the fire spreads rapidly among the trees, and there will be a high-intensity fire in which the forest area burns down in 4 min. The mass loss rate, the temperature, and the heat release rate also increased fast (above 50 kg/s, above 2,000 °C and above 800,000 kW). The aerosol concentration reached a high pollutant concentration (1.3x10-6), and the carbon dioxide concentration also increased significantly (above 14,000 ppm). These changes have a direct effect on climate change. Therefore, it is important to examine them in a simulation environment. The simulation was compared to a pine tree forest simulation, and it could be observed that in the case of the pine tree, the values are similar, but phenomena occur faster. With the computer simulation, it is easier to determine the areas affected by the fire, which also helps fire prevention and firefighting. The aim of the research is to contribute to the prevention and more efficient extinguishment of wildfires and the sustainability of the Earth.