A narrative review to credible computational fluid dynamics models of naturally ventilated built environments

Abstract

This narrative review describes the capabilities of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to support the scientific analysis of fluid flows inside buildings, focusing on natural ventilation. The challenges posed by CFD, such as mesh generation, boundary conditions specification, choice of turbulence or radiation models and the ability to estimate the accuracy of results are explored. For the first time, this work provides a summary of verification and validation studies relating to CFD models of different built environments, and detailed validation studies of naturally ventilated spaces. This review summarises the most common guidelines and conclusions drawn from literature relating to CFD modelling of indoor environments that are naturally ventilated. The work demonstrates current practices in CFD simulation of naturally ventilated indoor environments, highlighting the importance of quality assured validation data to support the credibility of models. The review shows that, despite the presence of best practice guidelines for verification and validation of computational models, the grid verification was infrequently reported in the literature when presenting CFD results of indoor environmental conditions. Moreover, a third of reviewed validation studies were only qualitative and lacked specific validation criteria. Credible CFD analysis of natural ventilation strategies in buildings requires the ability to interpret strongly variable field measurements when specifying boundary conditions, other computational parameters and validating model results. This research provides a background and general guidelines for researchers who are commencing work in the field of CFD simulation of indoor environments for flow problems relating to natural ventilation.