CFD Analysis of Natural Ventilation Behaviour in Four Sided Wind Catcher

Wind catchers are traditional natural ventilation systems attached to buildings in order to ventilate the indoor air. The most common type of wind catcher is four sided one which is capable to catch wind in all directions. CFD simulation is the perfect way to evaluate the wind catcher performance. The accuracy of CFD results is the issue of concern, so sensitivity analyses is crucial to find out the effect of different settings of CFD on results. This paper presents a series of 3D steady RANS simulations for a generic isolated four-sided wind catcher attached to a room subjected to wind direction ranging from 0º to 180º with an interval of 45º. The CFD simulations are validated with detailed wind tunnel experiments. The influence of an extensive range of computational parameters is explored in this paper, including the resolution of the computational grid, the size of the computational domain and the turbulence model. This study found that CFD simulation is a reliable method for wind catcher study, but it is less accurate in prediction of models with non perpendicular wind directions.

Authors:

• M. Hossein Ghadiri
• Mohd Farid Mohamed
• N. Lukman N. Ibrahim

Keywords:

• Wind catcher
• CFD
• natural ventilation
• sensitivity study.

References:

[1] Mahlia, T., et al., "A review on fuel economy standard for motor vehicles
with the implementation possibilities in Malaysia". Renewable and
Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2010. 14(9): p. 3092-3099.
[2] Masoso, O. and L. Grobler, "The dark side of occupants' behaviour on
building energy use". Energy and buildings, 2010. 42(2): p. 173-177.
[3] Chan, H.Y., S.B. Riffat, and J. Zhu, "Review of passive solar heating
and cooling technologies". Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews,
2010. 14(2): p. 781-789.
[4] Khan, N., Y. Su, and S.B. Riffat, "A review on wind driven ventilation
techniques". Energy and Buildings, 2008. 40(8): p. 1586-1604.
[5] Liu, S., C. Mak, and J.L. Niu, "Numerical evaluation of louver
configuration and ventilation strategies for the windcatcher system".
Building and Environment, 2011.
[6] Saadatian, O., et al., "Review of windcatcher technologies". Renewable
and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2012. 16(3): p. 1477-1495.
[7] Bahadori, M., "Passive cooling systems in Iranian architecture". Sci.
Am.;(United States), 1978. 238(2).
[8] Nouanegue, H., L. Alandji, and E. Bilgen, "Numerical study of solarwind
tower systems for ventilation of dwellings". Renewable Energy,
2008. 33(3): p. 434-443.
[9] Montazeri, H. and R. Azizian, "Experimental study on natural
ventilation performance of one-sided wind catcher. Building and
Environment, 2008. 43(12): p. 2193-2202.
[10] Elmualim, A.A. and H.B. Awbi, "Wind tunnel and CFD investigation of
the performance of wind catcher ventilation systems". International
Journal of Ventilation, 2002. 1(1): p. 53-64.
[11] Elmualim, A.A., "Dynamic modelling of a wind catcher/tower turret for
natural ventilation". Building Services Engineering Research and
Technology, 2006. 27(3): p. 165-182.
[12] Li, L. and C. Mak, "The assessment of the performance of a windcatcher
system using computational fluid dynamics". Building and Environment,
2007. 42(3): p. 1135-1141.
[13] Elmualim, A., et al. "Evaluating the performance of a windcatcher
system using wind tunnel testing". 2001.
[14] Su, Y., et al., "Experimental and CFD study of ventilation flow rate of a
Monodraught™ windcatcher". Energy and buildings, 2008. 40(6): p.
1110-1116.
[15] Hughes, B.R. and S. Abdul Ghani, "A numerical investigation into the
effect of windvent dampers on operating conditions". Building and
Environment, 2009. 44(2): p. 237-248.
[16] Awbi, H. and A. Elmualim. "Full scale model Windcatcher performance
evaluation using a wind tunnel". 2002.
[17] Montazeri, H., "Experimental and numerical study on natural
ventilation performance of various multi-opening wind catchers".
Building and Environment, 2011. 46(2): p. 370-378.
[18] Montazeri, H., et al., "Two-sided wind catcher performance evaluation
using experimental, numerical and analytical modeling". Renewable
Energy, 2010. 35(7): p. 1424-1435.
[19] Chen, Q.Y., "Using computational tools to factor wind into architectural
environment design". Energy and buildings, 2004. 36(12): p. 1197-1209.
[20] Richards, P. and R. Hoxey, "Appropriate boundary conditions for
computational wind engineering models using the k- turbulence
model". Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics,
1993. 46: p. 145-153.
[21] Casey, M. and T. Wintergerste, "Best Practices Guidelines: Ercoftac
Special Interest Group on Quality and Trust in Industrial CFD". 2000:
Ercoftac.
[22] Franke, J. "Recommendations on the use of CFD in wind engineering".
2004.
[23] Blocken, B., T. Stathopoulos, and J. Carmeliet, "CFD simulation of the
atmospheric boundary layer": wall function problems. Atmospheric
environment, 2007. 41(2): p. 238-252.
[24] Tominaga, Y., et al., "AIJ guidelines for practical applications of CFD
to pedestrian wind environment around buildings". Journal of Wind
Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics, 2008. 96(10): p. 1749-1761.
[25] Mahyari, A., "The wind catcher: a passive cooling device for hot arid
climate". 1996.
[26] Straw, M.P., "Computation and measurement of wind induced
ventilation". 2000, University of Nottingham.