Solar chimney (thermal chimney) is a device which absorbs solar radiation to heat the air. The heated air, becoming buoyant, rises through the chimney’s passage and induces further air currents. When fitted to a building, solar chimney can thus induce fresh outside air to flow through the building for ventilation. Because only natural means (solar radiation here) are involved to cause the air flow, solar chimney is considered a natural-ventilation device. This work investigates computationally natural ventilation induced by a roof-mounted solar chimney through a real-sized 3-dimensional room, using a commercial CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) software package which employs the Finite Volume Method. A LES (Large-Eddy Simulations) formulation with Smagorinsky SGS (Sub-Grid Scale) model is used. All fluid properties are assumed to be constant and corresponding to those of air at 300K (27°C, constant ambient temperature) and standard pressure at sea level (101.3kPa); but Boussinesq approximation (wherein temperature change affects only the fluid density pertaining to buoyancy force) is also assumed. Air Mass-Flow-Rate induced through the room in terms of solar heat flux on the chimney has been obtained for two locations of the opening to the room. Comparison is made with computational results obtained from a RANS (Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes) formulation. Agreement between LES and RANS results indicate the trustworthiness of CFD methods used.


A Les Study of Ventilation Flow Through a 3-D Room Fitted With Solar Chimney

Division / Sponsors: 
Heat Transfer Division (HTD), Fluids Engineering Division (FED)

Heat Transfer Summer Conference
Paper Proceedings: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/HT/HT2020/volume/83709

18th International Conference on Nanochannels, Microchannels, and Minichannels
Paper Proceedings: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/ICNMM/ICNMM2020/volume/83693

Fluids Engineering Division Summer Meeting
Paper Proceedings: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/FEDSM/FEDSM2020/volume/83716

HT-ICNMM2020 - Virtual Conference, SHTC - Virtual Conference, FEDSM2020 - Virtual Conference

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