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The Role of Ventilation in Fires and Explosions

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Mine Ventilation

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Abstract

Mine fires and explosions can take place in both working and inactive mines. The latter case relates mostly to spontaneous self-ignition of coal seams, which proves impossible to extinguish and may remain active for decades. Coal-seam fires are a global problem because of the release of tonnes of CO, CO2, CH4, NOx, SOx, Hg and ashes with harmful effects on both soil and water quality. They are so extensive that an estimated 2–3% of global CO2 emissions from fossil fuels come from unextinguished fires in coal mines (Zhang et al. 2004a; Kuenzer et al. 2007). In addition to the above effects, if fires arise in coal seams of any great thickness, subsidence phenomena may occur, with unfortunate consequences for surface structures above them. According to the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSMRE), in the U.S.A., an estimated 98 coal-seam fires are currently active. This chapter will focus on the role that mine ventilation can play in controlling and extinguishing active mine fires.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Flammable materials refers to those combustible materials that can be easily ignited at room temperatures.

  2. 2.

    In modern mines, both the conveyor belts and their coatings are made of fire-resistant materials.

  3. 3.

    The draught (American English: draft) is the flow rate induced by the (chimney) stack effect.

  4. 4.

    The approximation is based on Charles’ law: “At constant pressure, the volume V of a gas is directly proportional to its absolute temperature T”. Therefore, the densities can be considered inversely proportional to the absolute temperatures.

  5. 5.

    The temperature in the fire zone is taken to be approximately 1073 K.

  6. 6.

    Normally, the direction of evacuation opposes that of the fresh airflow.

  7. 7.

    Ratio of uphill height to horizontal length (slope).

  8. 8.

    Note that, as stated in the document itself: “This annex is not part of the requirements of this NFPA document and is included only for information purposes”.

  9. 9.

    NH3 in the presence of air at 16–27%v can form explosive mixtures, but as this is a very high concentration it is generally considered to be non-explosive (Geadah 1985).

  10. 10.

    Note that in the gas data the sum is 100%, without any account being taken of the concentration of argon, probably because of difficulties in obtaining a detector for this gas.

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  1. Department of Mining, Topography and Structure Technology, University of Leon, León, Spain

    Carlos Sierra

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Sierra, C. (2020). The Role of Ventilation in Fires and Explosions. In: Mine Ventilation. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49803-0_7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49803-0_7

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