Transient Analyses and Energy Balance of Air Flow in Road Tunnels

The issue of airflow dynamic in a road tunnel is considered in this study and its impact on smoke management and people safety is highlighted. It was an attempt to estimate the time needed to reach a final steady state of airflow when the operation mode of jet fans was switched. The numerical model of the tunnel was solved with the use of Ansys Fluent. To reproduce the decrease of atmospheric pressure with height, relative static pressure was applied using UDF (User Defined Function). The ambient weather conditions were taken into account as well. The wind influence was introduced by the additional component of dynamic pressure applied against one of the tunnel portals also using UDF. There are some theoretical foundations of airflow in a tunnel presented in this paper. The obtained results were compared with the measurements carried out in a real road tunnel and the results obtained while applying the above-mentioned physical model. The main contribution of the presented work is the indication of a relatively high relaxation time of airflow in a tunnel, which could be important when designing the emergency pattern of a ventilation system. Additionally, some considerations of kinetic energy exchange between fan jet and air volume would be helpful when choosing fans for ventilation systems being designed.