- Author
- Rehm, R. G. | McDermott, R. J.
- Title
- Fire-Front Propagation Using the Level Set Method.
- Coporate
- National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD
- Report
- NIST Technical Note 1611; NIST TN 1611, April 2009, 14 p.
- Keywords
- fire spread | wildland fires | wildland urban interface | fuels | equations | formulations | wind effects | methodology
- Identifiers
- Lagrangian equations; Eulerian equations; level set numerical method; initial results using the Level-set Method; progression of a wind-blown fire front; Ordinary Differential Equations (ODEs); Method of Lines (MOL)
- Abstract
- Propagation of an outdoor fire front in wildland or in a combination of wildland and structural fuels (the so-called wildland-urban interface or WUI fire), can be modelled as an initial-value problem using either a Lagrangian or an Eulerian description. The equations associated with each description arc presented, and the methods used to solve the equations are discussed. Some comparisons bctween the two methods are also made. The emphasis in this report is on the Eulerian equations and on the level-set numerical method. Earlier studies had presented the Lagrangian formulation, and a method-of-lines solution. Advantages of the Eulerian/level-set method are discussed, and several examples that illustrate these advantages are presented.