Three-dimensional characterization of airflow, heat and mass transfer in a slot-ventilated enclosure

Abstract The performance of the fluid flow, heat and contaminant transfer is numerically experimented in a slot-ventilated container in which the flow -in and -out are occurred through inlet and exit ports in combination with thermosolutal sources. The inlet source of cold air is mechanically flushed in through left vertical wall to generate mixed convection flow regime combined with the buoyant force produced due to combined thermosolutal effect along right side wall and bottom surfaces. To characterize the system performance and smooth ventilation, a new configuration with the inhomogeneous distribution of thermal and solutal buoyant forces are taken into account. To obtain the physical insights of the flow phenomena, three dimensional structures of the flow field and cooling efficiency distribution are presented over a wide range of dimensionless flow parameters such as: Reynolds number, buoyancy forces and Richardson number to optimize the heat removal rate with maximum diffusion of contaminants. The distribution of average temperature and concentration are evaluated through Nusselt number and Sherwod number, where air change per hour and cooling efficiency are evaluated justifying the experimental observations. The performance evaluation criterion is defined through Bejan number and entropy generation and estimated by the most commonly used parameters to find the influence of inflow and out flow port locations. Interactions between inlet airflow and pressure drop resulting a heat loss through the sides of the component with high streamline curvature effect which can not be predicted in 2D flow pattern. The investigated results show that fluid flow greatly influence the contaminant transfer and exhibit a significant change in movement pattern with the location of inlet and outlet which is typically observed in experiments. The presented results indicate that contaminant's trajectory and effective cooling pattern might be an effective tool to analyze the indoor air quality and investigating the possible denser contaminant areas of the ventilated enclosure.