Investigation of Thermal Performance of a Ship Electrical Compartment-CFD Study

Abstract

Air-conditioning system is an integrated part of the ship design and plays an important role in providing comfortable and healthy cabin environment for crews, passengers and also ensuring efficient thermal management in electrical compartments encompassing IT equipment and computer systems. Understanding the temperature and velocity distribution and the redistribution of cold air to electrical compartments could greatly improve energy efficiency, necessary for thermal management and ensuring reliable operation. To this end, optimized design of a cabin air distribution system is a necessary aspect of the cabin air conditioning system. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is an excellent modeling tool that can be used in the design process to simulate thermal performance of the mechanical systems. In this paper, CFD simulation is utilized to analyze the thermal behavior of a warship electrical compartment to pinpoint the cooling issues. Steady state simulations are conducted by employing a Cartesian grid and the standard turbulence k-ε model and grid dependency tests are performed with respect to cabin exhaust temperature. Temperature field and flow pattern of a compartment will be studied to cast a light on the compartment cooling issues.