BEHAVIOUR OF A PASSIVE HOUSE IN CASE OF FIRE
TOM MOLKENS1
1 StuBeCo bvba, www.stubeco.be
ABSTRACT
Just till now there were no clear comments available about the real fire risks for the occupants themselves. We can only see in the journals some remarkable statements with a mix of true stories and complete scientific nonsense. Nevertheless the number of Passivhauses increases and is certainly higher then known due to complex administration rules.
The aim of this paper is to make our point of view clear by aid of some case studies of an apartment and a house. It will be shown by mean of a trustful 2-zone numerical model of those case studies that some simple rules can avoid dramatically evaluating natural fires. The same approach or model is used for a normal insulated building to create “reference” buildings.
The three principal actors in case of fire will be shortly discussed (ignition, fire load and ventilation) but more important the influence factors who determines the time till flash over, fire delay, temperature in the compartment/building and smoke level.
The comparison between the results of the numerical models will show out that the conventional fire curve is still a safe side conservative approach. More important are the recommendations in sense of applied materials.
