Description

The characteristics of indoor airflow contributes to the dispersion patterns of contamination, and consequently, the quality of indoor air. To control contaminant dissipation, the understanding of airflow traits is of utmost importance. Boundary conditions in the indoor environment, such as a moving fluid-solid interface, can significantly change the airflow patterns. For example, in any indoor setting, doors are operated randomly and to accurately model the airflow, it is key to learn the transient effects of door opening and closing. But study transient airflow is very expensive and time consuming. In this paper, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) models were developed to simulate the movement of a single hinged door separating two zones. Subsequent models, with the boundaries moved away from the door such that the zones had a larger area with the door being at a fixed location, were created and location-specific air velocity profile over the zone was measured. The main aim is to study the change in airflow patterns with respect to the wall location. Results showed that no-slip wall boundary conditions created a velocity gradient, and consequently, altered the original flow of air. For walls that are closer to the door, the velocity gradient was more significant. Knowing these patterns and potential correlations between them may enable the construction of a prediction scheme to approximate transient airflow patterns by a set of known models. We characterize the accuracy of the approximation models and compare the computational intensity to the traditional time dependent CFD approach.

Citation: 2020 Winter Conference, Orlando, FL Conference Papers

Product Details

Published:

2020

Number of Pages:

8

Units of Measure:

Dual

File Size:

1 file , 980 KB

Product Code(s):

D-OR-20-C028