Study of the Hypoxic Environments Characteristics for the Protection of Objects from Fires
The analysis of two methods of using hypoxic media (HM) for fire extinguishing, and a brief overview of the technical means for obtaining HM have been carried out. The first method involves the use of nitrogen-oxygen HM in fire extinguishing systems instead of nitrogen. The presence of oxygen in HM increases the volume of fire extinguishing gas. A calculation has been carried out that makes it possible to estimate how many times the amount of gas in the system increases as compared to the nitrogen charge on the back of the residual oxygen concentration in HM. The second method ensures prevention of fire in the premises. The advantages of this method when applied in fire prevention systems (FPS) were noted. The main characteristics of HM for FPS is the combustible materials ignition threshold (IT). Methods for determining IT were presented. The limited data on IT hinder the use of FPS. The results of experimental studies were presented, which replenished the information about IT of a number of materials. Experiments proved that when the temperature in the protected premises drops, the IT of the combustible materials increases. This information provides an opportunity to significantly reduce the cost of FPS to protect industrial cold storage units and other facilities. “WAGNER Group GmbH” has developed a program for calculating the FPS performance equipment depending on the facility air-tightness, wind load on the facility walls, wind ingress frequency and a number of other parameters. The safety conditions to use the HM for people are shown. The research findings can be used in designing FPS and fire extinguishing systems to protect facilities with the help of HM.
