Swamp Cooler for a Building

Description

This module uses ANSYS Fluent to simulate a swamp cooler (evaporative cooling) system applied to building HVAC, a key topic in sustainable climate control engineering. Swamp coolers cool indoor air through water evaporation rather than mechanical refrigeration, offering an energy-efficient alternative to conventional air conditioning in suitable climates. The simulation models how cooled, humidified air distributes through a building space and affects indoor thermal comfort.

Methodology

The building geometry, including the swamp cooler components, is created/imported in ANSYS Fluent, with meshing designed to resolve both room-scale airflow and the finer details of the cooler unit. Boundary conditions define air intake properties (temperature, humidity) at the cooler inlet along with the building envelope's thermal characteristics (walls, windows). A turbulence model suited to low-speed, buoyancy-driven indoor flow is selected, alongside humidity and latent heat transfer modeling to capture the evaporative cooling process and its effect on air properties.

Conclusion

Results include temperature and humidity contour maps across the cooled space, along with air velocity vector fields used to evaluate air distribution and identify stagnant zones. Cooling efficiency and temperature reduction are quantified, along with estimates of water consumption and energy usage. These results support swamp cooler design optimization across different climates and inform their integration into sustainable, energy-efficient building HVAC systems.