Generator Room Ventilation Applying Fans, ANSYS Fluent CFD Simulation Tutorial

Description

In this project, an industrial Generator room ventilation has been simulated, and the results of this simulation have been investigated by ANSYS Fluent software. We perform this CFD project and investigate it by CFD analysis.

Generators are one of the most widely used and essential sources of Electricity in various industries. Generators generate much heat, affecting thermal comfort if several generators are together. Therefore, operators can not approach the generators in summer due to extreme heat.

So to solve this problem, several fans are placed inside the generator room to make the indoor temperature suitable for the operators.

The present model is designed in three dimensions using Design Modeler software. The geometry for analyzing this simulation consists of a rectangular space in which 32 diesel generators are placed.

The meshing of the model has been done using ANSYS Meshing software. The element number is 3854957.

Generator Methodology

In this project, a generator room’s heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) are simulated using Ansys Fluent software.

The generator room is initially simulated without a fan; it is observed that the room temperature with 32 generators is very high. Thirty-two fans with 11,000 CFM are then used, which decreases the temperature considerably.

However, to improve ventilation and temperature and obtain the desired thermal comfort between generator rows, 32 fans with 36,500 CFM have been added.

The realizable k-epsilon model is used to solve turbulent fluid equations, and the energy equation has also been enabled to calculate the temperature change with the generator room.

Generator Conclusion

This project aimed to provide suitable thermal comfort for the generator room. In the first simulation, when no fan was on, it was observed that the temperature between the generators was more than 49 ° C.

Therefore, it was decided to use a fan to reduce the temperature. Thus, 32 small fans are used in the second simulation, each with 11,000 CFM. It is concluded that the room temperature was improved and reduced to 36 ° C.

Then, it was decided to use 64 fans (32 fans of 11,000 CFM and 32 fans of 13,500 CFM) to improve the thermal comfort of the generator room in the next simulation.

The latest simulation results show that the airflow velocity inside the room has improved compared to the previous simulation, and the temperature between the generators is equal to the outside temperature (30 ° C).