A Four-Zone Model and Nonlinear Dynamic Analysis of Solution Multiplicity of Buoyancy Ventilation in Underground Building

The solution multiplicity of natural ventilation in buildings is very important to personnel safety and ventilation design. In this paper, a four-zone model of buoyancy ventilation in typical underground building is proposed. The underground structure is divided to four zones, a differential equation is established in each zone, and therefore, there are four differential equations in the underground structure. By solving and analyzing the equilibrium points and characteristic roots of the differential equations, we analyze the stability of three scenarios and obtain the criterions to determine the stability and existence of solutions for two scenarios. According to these criterions, the multiple steady states of buoyancy ventilation in any four-zone underground buildings for different stack height ratios and the strength ratios of the heat sources can be obtained. These criteria can be used to design buoyancy ventilation or natural exhaust ventilation systems in underground buildings. Compared with the two-zone model in (Liu et al. 2020), the results of the proposed four-zone model are more consistent with CFD results in (Liu et al. 2018). In addition, the results of proposed four-zone model are more specific and more detailed in the unstable equilibrium point interval. We find that the unstable equilibrium point interval is divided into two different subintervals corresponding to the saddle point of index 2 and the saddle focal equilibrium point of index 2, respectively. Finally, the phase portraits and vector field diagrams for the two scenarios are given.