Numerical Study of the Air Outlet Effect Inside a Living Room Connected to an Aerovoltaic Solar Air Heater

Abstract

In Sfax–Tunisia, Fossil fuels such as coal, fuel oil and natural gas, are the principle elements responsible for heating of buildings. The problem of pollution result is from the blazing of these fossil fuels and the dramatic increasing in the price of electricity. Thus aerovoltaic solar air heater (ASAH) appears to be a suitable and inexpensive technique for supplying hot air to heat buildings in the sunny area. The idea behind this paper is to employ the ASAH to improve the indoor air quality and thermal comfort by connecting the room and the panel through the use of a pipe. The objective of this work is to develop the design of ASAH and to study numerically the aerodynamic and thermal structures during the heating of a living room connected to an ASAH by means of ANSYS Fluent 17.0.Numerical simulation, implementing a RNG k-ɛ turbulence model, shows that this technique has a positive effect to improve the thermal comfort in a living room. Thus, it is suggested to employ an ASAH to heat buildings.