Eddy–Viscosity Reynolds-Averaged Navier–Stokes Modeling of Air Distribution in a Sidewall Jet Supplied into a Room

Abstract

Air velocity is one of the key parameters affecting the sensation of thermal comfort. In mixing ventilation, the air is most often supplied above the occupied zone, and the air movement in a room is caused by jets that generate recirculating flows. An effective tool for predicting airflow in a room is CFD numerical modeling. In order to reproduce the air velocity distribution, it is essential to select a proper turbulence model. In this paper, seven Eddy–Viscosity RANS turbulence models were used to carry out CFD simulations of a sidewall air jet supplied into a room through a wall diffuser. The goal was to determine which model was the most suitable to adopt in this type of airflow. The CFD results were validated using experimental data by comparing the gross and integral parameters, along with the parameters of the quasi-free jet model. The numerical results obtained for Std k-ε and EVTM models were most consistent with the measurements. Their error values slightly exceeded 15%. On the contrary, the k-ω and RNG k-ε models did not reproduce the quasi-free jet parameters correctly. The research findings can prove beneficial for simulating air distribution in supplied air jets during the initial conceptual phases of HVAC system design.