VIABILITY OF WIND TOWERS IN ACHIEVING SUMMER COMFORT IN THE HOT ARID REGIONS OF THE MIDDLE-EAST

Operation of conventional wind towers, or Baud-Geers, are described. Wind towers maintain natural ventilation through buildings due to wind or buoyancy effects. The tower structure is cooled externally through radiative transfer with the sky, and internally with the cool ambient air, circulated through the building and the tower during the night. During the day, the warm ambient air is partially cooled by the tower structure before entering the building. When passed over moist surfaces, air is cooled evaporatively. However, sensible and evaporative cooling potentials of conventional wind towers, which depend on the tower design, are limited. Another disadvantage of the conventional wind towers is the admittance of dust into the building. Two modern designs of wind towers are considered which eliminate the above disadvantages. One design incorporates one-way dampers in the tower head and a wetted column in the tower. This design, which is particularly suitable in areas with good winds, evaporatively cools the hot-dry ambient air before admitting it into the building. The other design incorporates evaporative cooling pads at the tower entrance. This design is particularly suitable in areas with very little or no winds. This latter design may be incorporated into the existing minarets of the mosques and shrines, church towers, or other existing tall towers, to supply evaporatively-cooled air into the space. Conventional and the modern versions of wind towers can be incorporated aesthetically into the designs of modern buildings in the hot-arid regions of the Middle East, and other areas of the world with similar climate, to provide summer thermal comfort with little or no use of electricity.