This paper demonstrates the successful implementation
of an artificial neural network to accurately predict the designated
thermal radiation distance for jet fire, early pool fire, and late
pool fire hazard consequence analysis. Specifically, integrated feedforward
neural network models employing the backpropagation Levenberg–Marquardt
algorithm were trained using data sets obtained through separate PHAST
software simulations of 450 leak scenarios of 35 common flammable
chemicals. For each fire model (jet, early, late pool), there are
11 input parameters spanning both chemical parameters and release
conditions. Simulation data was randomly divided into 70% training,
15% validation, and 15% test sets to conduct cross-validation and
provide an independent measure of predictive accuracy for the neural
network models. Statistical values, namely, coefficient of determination
(R
2) and mean-square error (MSE), are
calculated to evaluate model regression performance. All three neural
network predictive models achieved considerably accurate predictions
of the logarithm format of the designated radiation effect distance.
The models give an overall R
2 of 0.9930
and an MSE of 0.0022 for jet fire, an overall R
2 of 0.9909 and an MSE of 0.0016 for early pool fire, and an
overall R
2 of 0.9899 and an MSE of 0.0015
for late pool fire.