T. Kim et al., Indoor cooling/heating load analysis based on coupled simulation of convection, radiation and HVAC control, BLDG ENVIR, 36(7), 2001, pp. 901-908
A computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation for analyzing indoor coolin
g/heating load is presented in this study. It is coupled with a radiative h
eat transfer simulation and heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning (HVA
C) controlling system in a room. This new method feeds back the outputs of
the HVAC system control to the input boundary conditions of the CFD, and th
is method includes a human model to evaluate the thermal environment. It wo
uld be used to analyze the heating/cooling loads of different HVAC systems
under the condition of the same human thermal sensation (e.g. PMV, operativ
e temperature, etc.) even though the temperature and air-velocity distribut
ion in the room are different from each other.
To examine the performance of the new method, a cooling load and a thermal
environment within a semi-enclosed space, which opens into an atrium space,
is analyzed under the steady-state conditions during the summer season. Th
is method is able to analyze the indoor cooling load with changes of target
thermal environments of a room and/or changing clothing conditions of occu
pants considering the temperature and air-velocity distribution in the room
. In this paper, two types of HVAC system are compared; i.e. radiation-pane
l system and all-air cooling system. The radiation-panel cooling system is
found to be more energy efficient for cooling the semi-enclosed space. Chan
ges of the level of thermal environment reduce cooling load effectively in
case of the all-air cooling system while the radiation-panel system does no
t reduce cooling load even though the targeted thermal condition is relaxed
. Energy saving effect is expected by easing the clothing conditions of occ
upants. In this study, the reducing effect of cooling load is quantitativel
y evaluated with clothing conditions also. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. A
ll rights reserved.