Numerical investigation of passive cooling in open vertical channels

Numerical simulations have been carried out in order to investigate natural convection flow and heat transfer in vertical channels which are relevant to passive cooling of building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) systems. The numerical results have been validated against existing experimental data available in literature. It has been found that narrow vertical channels with different aspect ratios exhibit varied heat transfer behaviours, implying its significance in the design of passive cooling applications. In addition, the different behaviours of heat transfer may be explained by the turbulence quantities obtained through large-eddy simulations (LES). Based on the current numerical results, a correlation for turbulent natural convection in vertical channel has been determined to predict the average Nusselt number in terms of the relevant dimensionless parameters for the geometry considered in this study.

► Buoyancy-driven flow in a PV facade configuration has been numerically simulated.
► LES approach provides detailed insights into flow and thermal fluctuation fields.
► A correlation for average Nusselt number is developed.