THERMAL PERFORMANCE OF A NATURAL VENTILATION SYSTEM

Natural ventilation in buildings using solar passive systems, such as solar chimneys, has emerged in the last years. Several theoretical and experimental studies in the literature show that their design parameters strongly depend on the ambient conditions, in which they are installed. In order to increase the knowledge of this kind of systems, this work presents the thermal behavior of a stand alone experimental solar chimney during one year. The dimensions of the solar chimney are 5.60 m high, 1.0 m width, and 0.52 m depth. The absorber plate is made of a common reinforced concrete wall of 4.5 m high, 1.0 m wide and 0.15 m depth. This system was designed by Marti J., and Heras M.R. in 2003 [1,2] and it is located in the Laboratorio de Ensayos Energeticos para Componentes de la Edificacion (LECE) in the Plata forma Solar of Almeria (PSA) in Spain. The entrance of this solar chimney was redesigned in 2007 by Arce et al [3] and also the instrumentation of the system was increased and improved During one year, the solar chimney was monitored and several experimental variables were measured. The results present the temperature profiles of the different measured elements of the solar chimney as well as the air mass flow rate through the solar chimney channel. It was observed that the effect of the outdoor wind added to the thermal effects plays an important role affecting the performance of the solar chimney studied.