Abstract
Microchannels were initially developed for cooling electronic systems. But this innovative system can also be deployed for enhancing thermal resistance of building walls, where they can substitute conventional insulations in building envelop that include the use of certain materials such as wool, polystyrene, wood fiber, cotton denim, etc. This article presents the modelling and simulation results on performance of microchannels in a typical building wall to provide dynamic thermal resistance for the building envelop. The simulations are performed for aluminum microchannels with air and water as working fluids to compare the performance of the system when different fluids are utilized. The microchannels are of rectangular profile and kept with the same geometry for all different cases. Also, to ensure that the simulations are performed under laminar regime for both working fluids, the Reynolds number was maintained between 100 and 900 for different runs. The simulation and analysis results show that microchannels can be used in building envelop to provide dynamic thermal resistance and increase the energy efficiency in different buildings. The results also show that flow of a water-based fluid in microchannels has better heat transfer and heat sinking capabilities as compared to the flow of an air-based fluid.
