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Study on hazard of smoke generated by mining cable fires

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Abstract

With the advancement of mine intelligence, mining cables find increasingly wider applications in mines. Accordingly, fire accidents caused by them deserve more attention. To accurately grasp the hazard of mining cable fires, this paper studied the pyrolysis characteristics, smoke production law, and smoke toxicity of mining flame-retardant cables by using a thermogravimetry infrared, a CCT-type cone calorimeter, a NBS smoke density test chamber, and a Fourier transform infrared smoke analyzer. The research shows that the pyrolysis processes of the mining cable at different heating rates are similar and experience three stages. During the three stages, the mining cable has activation energies of 22.14 kJ mol−1, 134.11 kJ mol−1, and 65.19 kJ mol−1, respectively, and hence its temperature during pyrolysis mainly ranges from 350 to 470 K. Besides, the primary gas products are CO2, H2O, CH4, HCl, and CO. With the increase of thermal radiation intensity, the mining cable shows a reduction in both the total smoke production and the peak smoke production rate and reaches the peak smoke production rate faster. Moreover, HCl and CO are the major causes of deaths and injuries in cable fires, followed by SO2, HCN, NOx, and CO2. The research results are of guiding significance for personnel evacuation and early monitoring and warning of mining cable fires.

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Funding

This work was supported by the National Key R & D Plan of China (2021YFE0105000), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (52074213), Shaanxi Key R & D Plan Project (2021SF-472 and 2021GY-131), Yulin Science and Technology Plan Project (CXY-2020-036 and CXY-2020-037), Science and Technology Fund for Outstanding Young People of Xi’an University of Science and Technology (2019YQ2-01), and Xi’an Science and Technology Plan Project (2020KJRC0068).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Safety Science and Engineering, Xi’an University of Science and Technology, Xi’an, 710054, Shaanxi, China

    Weifeng Wang, Yuhang Huo, Furu Kang, Hanfei Liu, Hao Ren, Bo Yang & Cuizhen Lu

  2. Postdoctoral Research Mobile Station in Mining Engineering, Xi’an University of Science and Technology, Xi’an, 710054, Shaanxi, China

    Weifeng Wang

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  1. Weifeng Wang
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Correspondence to Yuhang Huo.

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Wang, W., Huo, Y., Kang, F. et al. Study on hazard of smoke generated by mining cable fires. J Therm Anal Calorim (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10973-023-12136-x

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