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In this study, by cooling coil load calculation in under floor air distribution systems, the effect of separate location of the return and exhaust vents and return vent height on energy consumption, thermal comfort conditions and indoor air quality have been investigated. Based on the results obtained from this study, when the height of return vent is equal to 2.0, 1.3, 0.65 and 0.3 m, the amount of energy usage reduction compared to no return vent is equal to 10.9, 15.3, 18.9 and 25.7 percent respectively. Limiting factors in the amount of this reduction are thermal comfort of occupants and indoor air quality. To this end, thermal comfort indices (Predicted Mean Vote and Predicted Percentage of Dissatisfied), local thermal discomfort index (Temperature gradient in vertical direction), and indoor air quality index (Mean Local Air Age) have been probed with changing return vent height by CFD methods (AirPak software with SIMPLE algorithm by using Indoor Zero Equation turbulence model). Based on the results, by reducing the height of return vent from ceiling to floor, the exhaust air temperature increased, which causes to temperature gradient increase in vertical direction. The survey was conducted that choosing the location of 1.3 m(upper boundary of occupied space in seated mode) for return vent, causes to 15.3 percent reduction in the amount of energy consumption while maintaining the states of thermal comfort conditions and indoor air quality.

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Hybrid cooling systems is used to increase the cooling effectiveness of direct evaporative coolers. In this study, a hybrid cooling system including cooling tower, cooling coil and evaporative cooler have been discussed. The major aim of hybrid systems using is to reduce the energy consumption compare to the other cooling methods. So in this research, optimization of hybrid system was investigated. In order to have an accurate performance prediction of hybrid cooling system, a numerical simulation was performed and the results validated using experimental measurements. Moreover, genetic algorithm is used to determine the optimal design parameters. Minimizing the operation cost including water and electricity costs is considered as the objective function. All design constraints and standards were considered in optimization process. Investigated case study indicates that the optimal design can significantly reduce the operation costs. Optimization results revealed that in optimal case, air mass flow of cooling tower is lower than water mass flow. Also, the velocity of air through evaporative pad was obtained the minimum allowable value and the cross section of cooling tower was obtained the highest possible value according to the constraints. Finally, importance of water and electricity in the optimum system design was investigated due to lack of water in some areas.

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Conjugate heat transfer is one of the most important aspects of energy conversion and plays an important role in the thermal efficiency and fuel consumption of chambers. In the present work, a two-dimensional model for reacting flow is presented to calculate transport equations of mass, momentum, energy and species. A new solver is developed for the open-source OpenFOAM software. This new solver is able to predict the conjugate heat transfer effects of reactions and transport processes in fluid and heat conduction in solid as well as radiation in surrounding surface. The coupled method is used and the continuity of temperature and heat flux on the fluid and solid interface is applied in order to analyze conjugate heat transfer through boundary conditions. Experimental data of honeycomb burner is used to validate the new solver. Numerical results are in a good agreement with experimental data. The results show that change of fluid inlet condition and geometry dimensions affect the interaction of conjugate heat transfer and location of released heat of combustion. The location of flame is moved toward outlet as the inlet velocity is increased and toward inlet as the equilibrium ratio is increased. Increasing the length and thickness of solid reduces the preheat area as well.

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The aim of this study is numerical investigation of a evaporating and non-reacting diesel spray operating in a high pressure and high temperature constant volume combustion chamber, as an essential step in simulation of liquid fuels combustion. To this end, the impact of droplets diameter distribution on estimating two critical characteristic parameter i.e. liquid and vapor penetration lengths is studied using the open-source OpenFOAM code. In order to determine droplets diameter distribution effect, three different distribution ranging from 0.25-100 micron is chosen and the liquid and vapor penetration lengths are individually calculated for each distribution. The results are validated against the experimental data published by Sandia National Laboratory. The results show while the droplets diameter distribution has a remarkable effect on the predicted value of the liquid length, so that leads to overestimate liquid penetration lengths up to more than two times; its effect on the vapor length prediction is negligible. Also assuming a nozzle diameter distribution leads to non-physically increase in the value of liquid length. This non-physically prediction may lead to misleading prediction of spray impingement to piston and the cylinder walls resulting an error in unburnt hydrocarbons concentration as well as the engine efficiency estimation.

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A practical method for improving the COP of an air-cooled chiller is pre-cooling the entering air of its condenser via a water mist system. This article studies a water mist system with hollow-cone spray nozzles and investigates the effects of water flow rate, water droplet diameter and the number of spray nozzles on system performance. Simulations were run by software FLUENT applying Eulerian-Lagrangian method. Solution grid independency was obtained and it was validated with experimental data. According to the results, in a constant air flow rate of 8.3 (kg/s), with increasing the water flow rate from 0.05 to 0.4 (kg/s), percent increase of COP increases from 3 to about 14, but the percentage of evaporated water decreases from 12.13 to 7.62 (however the value of evaporated water increases). Besides, decreasing the water droplets’ diameter from 200 to 50 micrometer, results in percent increase of COP from 4 to 24. Due to less water evaporation in higher flow rates, the number of spray nozzles was raised in a constant total flow rate that according to the results, increasing the number of nozzles improves the system performance. Also with other simulations it was observed that increasing the number of nozzles is more effective in higher flow rates and less drop diameters. Finally by the case study, it was demonstrated using sufficient number of nozzles, it is possible to achieve higher COPs in lower flow rates and therefore in addition to energy consumption decline, the water consumption could be lowered.