Experimental and numerical investigation of building effects on wind erosion of a granular material stockpile

Abstract

In the present work, wind tunnel experiments and numerical simulations were carried out to evaluate the physical behaviour of the fluid flow of a stockpile in the presence of an isolated cubic building. Comparing the obtained experimental results with those for the isolated stockpile configuration and observing the differences in the erosion patterns and emission estimates was possible to conclude that (i) the emissions considerably increase due to the presence of the building; (ii) the higher the free stream velocity, due to the presence of the obstacle, the more efficient the dynamics of the pavement process; and (iii) the increase of the gap between the building and the pile does not generate expressive changes in the emitted mass measurements. These findings play an important role since it is possible to obtain an optimal industrial open yard configuration where fewer particles are emitted to the atmosphere.