Research on the wind environment of parallel courtyard in campus

Abstract The purpose of this paper is to study the wind environment of parallel courtyard in campus which is affected by the yard aspect ratio and wind directions. Research done so far mainly focused on the thermal comfort of courtyards and wind environment at pedestrian level in urban. This article aims to study the wind environment of courtyards under aspect ratios via the high resolution RANS CFD simulation method. Two performance indicators are identified: 1) wind amplified velocity 2) age of air. The evaluation is based on the validation with field measurement. The results show that for single parallel courtyard, the best aspect ratio for air quality and ventilation locates in the range of 1 to 2. Furthermore, for double parallel combined courtyard, 0°and 15°is the most recommended approaching wind angle for ventilation. Contrarily, 75° to 90° are the worst inlet airflow direction for courtyard flow field because of insufficient abounding wind amplified area. Apart from this, only in the range of 0°to 30°, it is possible to enhance the inlet courtyard air quality in double combined yard shape compared to single courtyard.