A Numerical Study of the Effect of Inlet Vent Position and Size on the Velocity and Temperature Distributions in a Smaller Naturally Ventilated Theater in Canada

Many smaller churches and similar buildings in Canada have been converted into small theaters. Such theatres are often not fitted with an air-conditioning system. For performances in the fall these theaters sometimes rely on buoyancy driven natural ventilation to moderate the indoor air temperature. Such ventilation systems usually involve near floor inlet vents and a roof level air discharge system. A preliminary numerical study of the effect of inlet vent position and size on the performance of such a system has been undertaken. A simple model of a typical theater building of the type considered has been used. The heat generated by the audience has been represented by a uniform heat flux distributed over the audience area. Inlet vents have been assumed to be located low on the side walls of the theater and the air-flow leaving the theatre has been assumed to be through vents at the top of a chimney system. The flow has been assumed to be steady and symmetrical about the vertical center-line through the building. The Boussinesq approach has been adopted. The standard k-epsilon turbulence model has been used. The solution has been obtained using the commercial CFD solver ANSYS FLUENT^©.