Effect of controlling airflow in a solar chimney on thermal load in a built environment

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate a wall-integrated solar chimney for passive ventilation of a building cavity. Ventilation is required to improve the circulation of air in the built environment. This can be achieved through natural or forced convection. Natural circulation can be driven by renewable energy, and so it promotes sustainable exploitation of energy resources. Solar energy is one of the promising renewable energy resources. Design/methodology/approach The chimney was designed to face the Equator on the wall of a room which required ventilation. Mean monthly daily heating and cooling loads of the room were computed with and without a solar chimney by using hourly meteorological data from nine different weather sites at low, medium and high latitudes. The chimney was implemented with and without airflow control, and simulated by using the ESP-r software. Findings Results show that the solar chimney with airflow control marginally reduced the heating load in the building envelope, with a similar effect being exhibited by the chimney with uncontrolled airflow. The cooling load was reduced by the controlled airflow at all the nine sites. In contrast, the uncontrolled airflow increased the cooling load at some sites. In addition, the chimney with airflow control reduced the annual total thermal load at all the sites, while the chimney with uncontrolled airflow raised the total thermal load at some locations. Originality/value The performance of solar chimneys designed with and without airflow control systems has been investigated under the same prevailing meteorological conditions at a given site. Findings show that controlling airflow in a solar chimney reduces the total thermal load in the built environment. This information can be applied in different parts of the world.