Integrating Computational Fluid Dynamics Simulations and Condensation Risk Assessments: Using Project Specific Analyses to Better Inform the Design of Buildings
The risk of condensation on the interior of building enclosure systems can be an important driver in the design and selection of both building enclosure and mechanical systems. Condensation risk is an especially important performance metric in sensitive spaces and humidified spaces, such as museums and healthcare facilities, where uncontrolled interior moisture has significant consequences. Traditional analyses of condensation risk use thermal modeling to predict the onset of condensation. Fenestration assemblies often have the lowest thermal performance, and thus the analyses of these systems are the most important for making informed decisions. Fenestration products typically are analyzed for their thermal performance through existing standards developed by the National Fenestration Rating Council (NFRC) and using tools such as finite element analysis (FEA) to estimate detailed performance of complex assemblies. These methods use fixed environmental conditions to enable a comparative analysis of different products and systems. However, these environmental conditions do not necessarily correlate to the air movements and localized temperatures near the fenestration for a specific project condition for which the mechanical systems were designed, and therefore may not accurately predict condensation risk. This leaves designers with an unclear understanding of how the actual space will perform. This paper will discuss the use of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analyses to more closely estimate the conditions inside a space relative to the current standards. The paper will also describe how the results of CFD models can be used as inputs for the thermal analyses typically used to predict the onset of condensation on fenestration systems. A case study will be presented to describe the approach to modeling both the enclosure and mechanical systems. It will further discuss how these studies can be correlated to statistics for weather events to provide owners and designers with better information to make more informed design decisions.
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