This thesis includes a numerical comparison of different turbulence models and particle models in terms of convergence time and physical accuracy. A cyclone is used as the computational domain. Cyclones are common devices for separating two or more substances. The work is divided into an experimental part and a numerical part. In the experiments, characteristics of the cyclone were measured. This data is then used to evaluate different numerical modeling approaches. The numerical part consists of two parts, namely single phase flow and multiphase flow, where different modeling aspects are examined and presented. Furthermore, important parameters that characterize a cyclone, such as pressure drop and separation efficiency, are calculated. The separation efficiency, i.e. how much dust that actually goes to the dust bin, is calculated for two different types of dust. The software used for the numerical simulations has been Star-CCM+.

An important aspect in the process of architectural design is the testing of solution alternatives in order to evaluate them on their appropriateness within the context of the design problem. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis is one of the approaches that have gained popularity in the testing of architectural design solutions especially for purposes of evaluating the performance of natural ventilation strategies in buildings. Natural ventilation strategies can reduce the energy consumption in buildings while ensuring the good health and wellbeing of the occupants. In order for natural ventilation strategies to perform as intended, a number of factors interact and these factors must be carefully analysed. CFD simulations provide an affordable platform for such analyses to be undertaken. Traditionally, these simulations have largely followed the direction of Best Practice Guidelines (BPGs) for quality control. These guidelines are built around certain simplifications due to the high computational cost of CFD modelling. However, while the computational cost has increasingly fallen and is predicted to continue to drop, the BPGs have largely remained without significant updates. The need to develop a CFD simulation framework that leverages the contemporary and anticipates the future computational cost and capacity can, therefore, not be overemphasised. When conducting CFD simulations during the process of architectural design, the variability of the wind flow field including the wind direction and its velocity constitute an important input parameter. Presently, however, in many simulations, the wind direction is largely used in a steady state manner. It is assumed that the direction of flow downwind of a meteorological station remains constant. This assumption may potentially compromise the integrity of CFD modelling as in reality, the wind flow field is bound to be dynamic from place to place. In order to improve the accuracy of the CFD simulations for architectural design, it is therefore necessary to adequately account for this variability. This study was a two-pronged investigation with the ultimate objective of improving the accuracy of the CFD simulations that are used in the architectural design process, particularly for the design and analysis of natural ventilation strategies. Firstly, a framework for integrated meso-scale and building scale CFD simulations was developed. Secondly, the newly developed framework was then implemented by deploying it to study the variability of the wind flow field between a reference meteorological station, the Virginia Tech Airport, and a selected localized building scale site on the Virginia Tech campus. The findings confirmed that the wind flow field varies from place to place and showed that the newly developed framework was able to capture this variation, ultimately, generating a wind flow field characterization representative of the conditions prevalent at the localized building site. This framework can be particularly useful when undertaking de-coupled CFD simulations to design and analyse natural ventilation strategies in the building design process. / Doctor of Philosophy / The use of natural ventilation strategies in building design has been identified as one viable pathway toward minimizing energy consumption in buildings. Natural ventilation can also reduce the prevalence of the Sick Building Syndrome (SBS) and enhance the productivity of building occupants. This research study sought to develop a framework that can improve the usage of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analyses in the architectural design process for purposes of enhancing the efficiency of natural ventilation strategies in buildings. CFD is a branch of computational physics that studies the behaviour of fluids as they move from one point to another. The usage of CFD analyses in architectural design requires the input of wind environment data such as direction and velocity. Presently, this data is obtained from a weather station and there is an assumption that this data remains the same even for a building site located at a considerable distance away from the weather station. This potentially compromises the accuracy of the CFD analyses as studies have shown that due to a number of factors such the urban built form, vegetation, terrain and others, the wind environment is bound to vary from one point to another. This study sought to develop a framework that quantifies this variation and provides a way for translating the wind data obtained from a weather station to data that more accurately characterizes a local building site. With this accurate site wind data, the CFD analyses can then provide more meaningful insights into the use of natural ventilation in the process of architectural design. This newly developed framework was deployed on a study site at Virginia Tech. The findings showed that the framework was able to demonstrate that the wind flow field varies from one place to another and it also provided a way to capture this variation, ultimately, generating a wind flow field characterization that was more representative of the local conditions.

While the gas turbine research community is continuously pursuing development of higher cyclic efficiency designs by increasing the combustor firing temperatures and thermally resistant turbine vane / blade materials, a simultaneous effort to reduce the emission levels of high temperature driven thermal NOX also needs to be addressed. Lean premixed combustion has been found as one of the solutions to these objectives. However, since less amount of air is available for backside cooling of liner walls, it becomes very important to characterize the convective heat transfer that occurs on the inside wall of the combustor liners. These studies were explored using laboratory scale experiments as well as numerical approaches for several inlet flow conditions under both non-reacting and reacting flows. These studies may be expected to provide valuable insights for the industrial design communities towards identifying thermal hot spot locations as well as in quantifying the heat transfer magnitude, thus aiding in effective designs of the liner walls. Lean premixed gas turbine combustor flows involve strongly coupled interactions between several aspects of physics such as the degree of swirl imparted by the inlet fuel nozzle, premixing of the fuel and incoming air, lean premixed combustion within the combustor domain, the interaction of swirling flow with combustion driven heat release resulting in flow dilation, the resulting pressure fluctuations leading to thermo-acoustic instabilities there by creating a feedback loop with incoming reactants resulting in flow instabilities leading to flame lift off, flame extinction etc. Hence understanding combustion driven swirling flow in combustors continues to be a topic of intense research. In the present study, numerical predictions of swirl driven combustor flows were analyzed for a specific swirl number of an industrial fuel nozzle (swirler) using a commercial computational fluid dynamics tool and compared against in-house experimental data. The latter data was obtained from a newly developed test rig at Applied Propulsion and Power Laboratory (APPL) at Virginia Tech. The simulations were performed and investigated for several flow Reynolds numbers under non-reacting condition using various two equation turbulence models as well as a scale resolving model. The work was also extended to reacting flow modeling (using a partially premixed model) for a specific Reynolds number. These efforts were carried out in order investigate the flow behavior and also characterize convective heat transfer along the combustor wall (liner). Additionally, several parametric studies were performed towards investigating the effect of combustor geometry on swirling flow and liner hear transfer; and also to investigate the effect of inlet swirl on the jet impingement location along the liner wall under both non-reacting as well as reacting conditions. The numerical results show detailed comparison against experiments for swirling flow profiles within the combustor under reacting conditions indicating a good reliability of steady state modeling approaches for reacting conditions; however, the limitations of steady state RANS turbulence models were observed for non-reacting swirling flow conditions, where the flow profiles deviate from experimental observations in the central recirculation region. Also, the numerical comparison of liner wall heat transfer characteristics against experiments showed a sensitivity to Reynolds numbers. These studies offer to provide preliminary insights of RANS predictions based on commercial CFD tools in predicting swirling, non-reacting and reacting flow and heat transfer. They can be extended to reacting flow heat transfer studies in future and also may be upgraded to unsteady LES predictions to complement future experimental observations conducted at the in-house test facility. / Ph. D.

An accurate measurement of total temperature in turbomachinery flows remains critical for component life models and cycle performance optimization. While many techniques exist to measure these flows, immersed thermocouple based probes remain highly desirable due to well established practices for probe design and implementation in typical industrial flow applications. However, as engine manufacturers continue to push towards higher maximum cycle temperatures and smaller flow passages, the continued use of these probes requires new probe designs considering both improved sensor durability and measurement accuracy. Increased maximum temperatures introduce many challenges for total temperature measurements using conventional immersed probes, including increased influences of conduction, convection, and radiation heat transfer between the sensor, fluid and the surroundings due to large thermal gradients present in real turbomachinery systems. While these effects have been previously investigated, the available design models are very limited to specific geometries and flow conditions. In this Dissertation, a more fundamental understanding of the flow behavior around typical vented shield style total temperature probes as a function of probe geometry and operating condition is gained using results from high-fidelity Computational Fluid Dynamics simulations with Conjugate Heat Transfer. A parametric study was conducted considering three non-dimensional probe geometric ratios (vent location to shield length (0.029-0.806), sensor diameter to shield inner diameter (0.252-0.672), and shield outer diameter to strut/mount thickness (0.245-0.759)) and three operating conditions (total temperature (70, 850, 2500°F) and pressure (1, 1, 10 atm), respectively) at a moderate Mach number of 0.4. Results were further quantified in the form of new empirical correlations necessary for rapid thermal performance evaluations of current and future probe designs. Additionally, a new mixed-fidelity or Reduced Order Modeling technique was developed which allows the coupling of high fidelity surface heat transfer data from CFD with a generalized form of the 1-D conducting solid equations for evaluating radiation and transient influences on sensor performance. These new flow and heat transfer correlations together with the new Reduced Order Modeling technique developed here greatly enhance the capabilities of designers to evaluate performance of current and future probe designs, with higher accuracy and with significant reductions in computational resources. / Doctor of Philosophy / An accurate measurement of total temperature in turbomachinery flows remains critical for component life models and cycle performance optimization. While many techniques exist to measure these flows, immersed thermocouple based probes remain highly desirable due to well established practices for probe design and implementation in typical industrial flow applications. However, as engine manufacturers continue to push towards higher maximum cycle temperatures and smaller flow passages, the continued use of these probes requires new probe designs considering both improved sensor durability and measurement accuracy. Increased maximum temperatures introduce many challenges for total temperature measurements using conventional immersed probes, including increased influences of conduction, convection, and radiation heat transfer between the sensor, fluid and the surroundings due to large thermal gradients present in real turbomachinery systems. While these effects have been thoroughly described and quantified in the past, the available design models are very limited to specific geometries and flow conditions. In this Dissertation, a more fundamental understanding of the flow behavior around typical vented shield style total temperature probes as a function of probe geometry and operating condition is gained using results from high-fidelity Computational Fluid Dynamics simulations with Conjugate Heat Transfer (CHT) capabilities. Results were further quantified in the form of new empirical correlations necessary for rapid thermal performance evaluations of current and future probe designs. Additionally, a new mixed-fidelity or Reduced Order Modeling (ROM) technique was developed which allows the coupling of high fidelity surface heat transfer data from CFD with a generalized form of the 1-D conducting solid equations for readily predicting the impact of radiation environment and transient errors on sensor performance.

With the growing need to meet aggressive emissions targets in the aerospace industry in the coming decades, the electrification of propulsion systems has become an area of great research and commercial interest. In order to achieve full electrification of larger commercial aircraft, it is critical to improve power and energy densities of components within the propulsion system. The power densities of electric motors are steadily rising to meet this requirement. Among the various motor designs available, the high-speed radial flux permanent magnet motor is presented as an architecture capable of achieving high efficiencies and power densities. Increasing power densities, however, poses challenges for the thermal management system as higher losses need to be dissipated from a relatively small machine package. One of the failure modes specific to permanent magnet motors is the demagnetization of the magnets in the rotor at higher temperatures which leads to a loss in performance. Therefore it is critical that the thermal management system of the rotor must effectively dissipate the losses generated in the magnets and other components within the rotor. This thesis discusses the mechanical and thermal design of a 150 kW high-speed radial flux surface mounted permanent magnet motor for aerospace propulsion applications. The thesis first introduces the current landscape of aerospace electrification, focusing specifically on electric and hybrid propulsion architectures, currently available electric motors for aerospace propulsion, and ongoing aircraft electrification projects. A review is then provided of the current state-of-the-art in rotor cooling designs for high-speed speed radial flux motors for traction applications before introducing the design of the motor proposed in this thesis. The discussion of the mechanical design provides a high level overview of the design, manufacturing, and assembly of the stator and rotating assemblies while the thermal design provides a brief overview of the stator cooling design and a deep dive on the rotor cooling design. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) is used along with the Taguchi method for robust design to optimize the rotor cooling design for minimizing the magnet temperatures. Analysis for the optimized rotor cooling discussed is provided before providing recommendations for future work. / Thesis / Master of Applied Science (MASc)

According to the United Nations, 55% of the world's population currently lives in urban areas and which is projected to increase to 67% by 2050. Thus, it is imperative that effective strategies are developed to mitigate urban pollution. Complementing field experiments, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analyses are becoming an effective strategy for identifying critical factors that influence urban pollution and its mitigation. This thesis focuses on two scales of the urban micro-climate environment: (i) evaluation of LES simulations with a simplified grid for modeling pollution dispersion in a street canyon and (ii) investigation of the effects of leaf surface micro-characteristics, wind speed, and particle sizes on the dry deposition of fine particulate matter (PM2.5). The first of these studies focuses on reproducing the pollution dispersion in a street canyon measured in a wind tunnel at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Germany. A simplified grid with the Large Eddy Simulations (LES) approach for canyon ratio W/H = 1 is proposed with the goal to reduce the computational cost by eliminating the need to model the entire canyon while striving to preserve the mixing induced by individual jets used to model vehicle emission in the experiment. LES is also capable of providing transient flow field and pollution concentration data not available with widely-used steady approaches such as RANS. The time-dependent information is crucial for pollution mitigation since pedestrians are usually exposed to pollution on a short-time basis. The predictions are in satisfactory agreement with the experiment for W/H = 1, yielding the Pearson correlation coefficient R = 0.81, with better performance near the leeward wall. Due to the small span modeled, three-dimensional instabilities fail to develop which could probably explain the overprediction of pollution concentration near ground level. However, other LES investigations where the full canyon was modeled also observed over-predictions. The use of a discrete emission source was not observed to provide benefits. The current model could be further improved by using a larger spanwise domain with a continuous line source to allow large wavelength instabilities to develop and increase turbulent diffusion. The second part of this thesis investigates the impact of trichome morphology and wind speed on the deposition of 0.3 μm and 1.0 μm particles on leaves. Using the one-way coupling approach to predict the fluid-particle interactions with the assumption that all particles that impact the leaf or trichome surface deposit, trichomes of 5 μm and 20 μm in diameter are modeled as equally spaced and uniform cylinders on an infinitely large plane. The results show that trichome diameter, density, and wind speed have a favorable impact on deposition velocity. Comparing to the smooth leaf, the presence of the thicker 20 μm hairs increases the deposition velocity by 1.5 – 4 times, whereas, the presence of short 5um trichomes reduces the deposition by 15 - 45%. Increasing trichome height from H/D = 20 to 30 shows benefits for the thinner trichomes but lowers the deposition for the densely packed thicker trichomes. Less aerosol deposition is also observed when the particle diameter increases from 0.3 μm to 1.0 μm. Due to the non-uniform contributions of these various traits, a non-dimensional ratio Rhp is proposed to model the aerosol deposition on leaf surface at wind speed of 1 m/s which yields a satisfactory linear correlation coefficient of 0.89 for 0 < R_hp < 0.3. Comparing to other published field and wind tunnel experiments conducted on a much larger scale, the deposition velocities predicted are at the lower end (U_dep^* = 0.002 to 0.012 cm/s) because of the idealized conditions. Nonetheless, the results still offer valuable insight into the effects of trichome morphology on pollutant deposition in isolation from other macro-factors. / Master of Science / According to the United Nations, 55% of the world’s population currently lives in urban areas and which is projected to increase to 67% by 2050. Thus, it is imperative that effective strategies are developed to mitigate urban pollution. Complementing field experiments, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analyses are becoming an effective strategy for identifying critical factors that influence urban pollution and its mitigation. This thesis focuses on two scales of the urban micro-climate environment: (i) evaluation of Large Eddy Simulation (LES) with a simplified method for modeling pollution dispersion in a street canyon and (ii) investigation of the effects of leaf surface micro-characteristics, wind speed, and particle sizes on the dry deposition of fine particulate matter (PM2.5). The first of these studies focuses on reproducing the pollution dispersion in a street canyon measured in a wind tunnel at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Germany. A simplified grid with the LES approach for canyon ratio W/H = 1 is proposed. The goal of this study is to reduce the computational cost by modelling the canyon with a very thin span instead of the entire canyon while providing time-dependent information which is crucial for pollution mitigation since pedestrians are usually exposed to pollution on a short-time basis. The predictions are in satisfactory agreement with the experiment for W/H = 1 with better performance near the leeward wall (i.e. the left wall) and overprediction of pollution concentration near ground level – as observed by other LES investigations. The current model could be further improved by using a larger spanwise domain with a continuous line source to allow instabilities to develop, thus improve prediction accuracy. The second part of this thesis investigates the impact of trichome (i.e. a hair or an outgrowth from leaf surface) morphology and wind speed on the deposition of 0.3 mm and 1.0 mm particles on leaves. The results show that trichome diameter, density, and wind speed have a favorable impact on deposition velocity. Less aerosol deposition is also observed when the particle diameter increases from 0.3 mm to 1.0 mm. No clear effects is observed by altering the trichome height. Due to the non-uniform contributions of these various traits, a non-dimensional ratio D∗ �D∗ �2 Rhp = hair hair is proposed to model the aerosol deposition on leaf surface at wind speed of D∗ H∗ S∗ p hair hair 1 m/s which yields a satisfactory linear correlation coefficient of 0.89 for 0 < Rhp < 0.3. This ratio includes trichome diameter (D∗ ), height (H∗ ), spacing (S∗ ) as well as the ratio of hair hair hair trichome diameter to particle diameter (D∗ /D∗ ). The results offer valuable insight into the hair p effects of trichome morphology on pollutant deposition in isolation from other macro-factors.

Dense fluid-particulate systems are widely encountered in the pharmaceutical, energy, environmental and chemical processing industries. Prediction of the heat transfer characteristics of these systems is challenging. Use of a high fidelity Discrete Element Method (DEM) for particle scale simulations coupled to Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) requires large simulation times and limits application to small particulate systems.  The overall goal of this research is to develop and implement parallelization techniques which can be applied to large systems with O(105- 106) particles to investigate particle scale heat transfer in rotary kiln and fluidized bed environments. The strongly coupled CFD and DEM calculations are parallelized using the OpenMP paradigm which provides the flexibility needed for the multimodal parallelism encountered in fluid-particulate systems. The fluid calculation is parallelized using domain decomposition, whereas N-body decomposition is used for DEM. It is shown that OpenMP-CFD with the first touch policy, appropriate thread affinity and careful tuning scales as well as MPI up to 256 processors on a shared memory SGI Altix. To implement DEM in the OpenMP framework, ghost particle transfers between grid blocks, which consume a substantial amount of time in DEM, are eliminated by a suitable global mapping of the multi-block data structure. The global mapping together with enforcing perfect particle load balance across OpenMP threads results in computational times between 2-5 times faster than an equivalent MPI implementation. Heat transfer studies are conducted in a rotary kiln as well as in a fluidized bed equipped with a single horizontal tube heat exchanger. Two cases, one with mono-disperse 2 mm particles rotating at 20 RPM and another with a poly-disperse distribution ranging from 1-2.8 mm and rotating at 1 RPM are investigated. It is shown that heat transfer to the mono-disperse 2 mm particles is dominated by convective heat transfer from the thermal boundary layer that forms on the heated surface of the kiln. In the second case, during the first 24 seconds, the heat transfer to the particles is dominated by conduction to the larger particles that settle at the bottom of the kiln. The results compare reasonably well with experiments. In the fluidized bed, the highly energetic transitional flow and thermal field in the vicinity of the tube surface and the limits placed on the grid size by the volume-averaged nature of the governing equations result in gross under prediction of the heat transfer coefficient at the tube surface. It is shown that the inclusion of a subgrid stress model and the application of a LES wall function (WMLES) at the tube surface improves the prediction to within ± 20% of the experimental measurements. / Ph. D.

Steam turbines are widely used in various industrial applications, primarily for power extraction. However, deviation for operating design conditions is a frequent occurrence for such machines, and therefore, understanding their performance at off design conditions is critical to ensure that the needs of the power demanding systems are met as well as ensuring safe operation of the steam turbines. In this thesis, the aerodynamic performance of three different turbine airfoil sections ( baseline, mid radius and tip profile) as a function of angle of incidence and exit Mach numbers, is numerically computed at 0.3 axial chords downstream of the trailing edge. It was found that the average loss coefficient was low, owing to the fact that the flow over the airfoils was well behaved. The loss coefficient also showed a slight decrease with exit Mach number for all three profiles. The mid radius and tip profiles showed near identical performance due to similarity in their geometries. It was also found out that the baseline profile showed a trend of substantial increase in losses at positive incidences, due to the development of an adverse pressure zone on the blade suction side surface. The mid radius profile showed high insensitivity to angle of incidence as well as low exit flow angle deviation in comparison to the baseline blade. / Master of Science

Today, we see a renewed interest in aircraft with multiple propellers. To support conceptual design of these vehicles, one of the major needs is a fast and accurate method for estimating wing aerodynamic characteristics in the presence of multiple propellers. For the method to be effective, it must be easy to use, have rapid turnaround time and should be able to capture major wing–propeller interaction effects with sufficient accuracy. This research is primarily motivated by the need to assess the effectiveness of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) for simulating aerodynamic characteristics of wings with multiple propellers. The scope of the present research is limited to investigating the interaction between a single tractor propeller and a wing. This research aims to compare computational results from a Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) method, StarCCM+, and a vortex lattice method (VLM), VSP Aero. Two configurations that are analysed are 1) WIPP Configuration (Workshop for Integrated Propeller Prediction) 2) APROPOS Configuration. For WIPP, computational results are compared with measured lift and drag data for several angles of attack and Mach numbers. StarCCM+ results of wake flow field are compared with WIPP's wake survey data. For APROPOS, computed data for lift-to-drag ratio of the wing are compared with test data for multiple vertical and spanwise locations of the propeller. The results of the simulations are used to assess the effectiveness of the two CFD methods used in this research. / Master of Science / Today, we see a renewed interest in aircraft with multiple propellers due to an increasing demand for vehicles which fly short distances at low altitudes, be it flying taxis, delivery drones or small passenger aircrafts. To support conceptual design of vehicles, one of the major needs is a fast and accurate method for estimating wing aerodynamic characteristics in the presence of multiple propellers. For the method to be effective, it must be easy to use, have rapid turnaround time and should be able to capture major wing–propeller inter- action effects with sufficient accuracy. This research is primarily motivated by the need to assess the effectiveness of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) for simulating aerodynamic characteristics of wings with multiple propellers. Then only can we can take full advantage of the capabilities of the CFD methods and support design of emerging propeller driven air vehicles with an appropriate level of confidence. This research aims to compare high level methods with increasingly complex geometries and realistic models of physics like Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes (RANS) and low level methods that rely on simplified geometry and simplified physics models like Vortex Lattice Methods (VLM). We will analyse multiple configurations and validate them against experi- mental data and thus assessing the effectiveness of the CFD models. This research investigates two configurations, 1) WIPP configuration 2) APROPOS configuration, for which experimental data is available. The results of the simulations are used to assess the effectiveness of the two CFD methods used in this research.

Tesis por compendio / Through the last decades, building designers should deal with reliable design strategies to take advantage of natural resources in order to increase energy efficiency in buildings, as well as to promote sustainable development and add value to the society. This thesis proposes a reliable building design strategy to improve buildings energy efficiency by means of natural ventilation (NV) use. The strategy consists in evaluating the most suitable architectural solution in a particular case study taking into account environmental conditions and building surroundings in order to maximize NV use since the early building design stage. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) techniques are used to conduct the research. This is a powerful design tool that permits buildings NV behaviour simulation prior to building construction. Therefore, the aim of the thesis is to provide a real case study building in which the NV design strategy is applied to show a reliable example and support building design decisions since the design stage. The design strategy is based on the use of a commercial numerical code that solves the fluid mechanic equations. The CFD software simulates the features that influence NV and predicts its behaviour in the different building configurations prior to building construction. This numerical technique allows, on the one hand, the visualization of air flow paths in buildings. On the other hand, many quantifiable parameters are calculated by the software. Through the analysis and comparison of those parameters, the best architectural solutions are chosen. With regards to all possible architectural decisions, the research is focused on the façade configuration selection and the building location. First of all, the NV design strategy feasibility is analysed in a particular region: the Mediterranean Valencian Coastal area (Spain). The region is characterized by the uniform conditions of the prevailing wind during the warm season. Then, a validated CFD simulation is used to analyse qualitatively and quantitatively the building surrounding influence on wind paths through and around buildings. The objective is to compare different façade opening positions and select the alternative that takes more profit of the NV resources available. Additionally, a general quantification of the ventilated façade contribution to buildings energy efficiency is presented under the frame of the façade configuration selection. Secondly, two simulations are conducted to analyse two different building locations. The assessment of surrounding buildings influence on building NV behaviour is done through validated CFD models. Some parameters and visualizations are proposed to be used in the quantitative and qualitative assessment of each solution respectively. Then, the best location alternative with regards to NV performance is selected. Finally, the research is concluded with the case study building full-scale construction. The indoor CFD simulation used from the beginning is then successfully validated. The NV building behaviour is also successfully verified. Additionally, contrasted performance indexes are used to evaluate indoor comfort conditions: draught risk (DR), predicted mean vote (PMV) and predicted percentage of dissatisfied people (PPD). The results show that comfort conditions can be reached more energy efficiently by means of NV use. Afterwards, it is verified how the comfortable indoor environment conditions are ensured and optimized by the NV use. Although the design strategy is applied to a particular building design, the design strategy potential is that it could be applied to all buildings. Consequently, major potential energy savings could be achieved. / Durante las últimas décadas los agentes involucrados en el diseño de edificios deben de utilizar estrategias fiables de diseño que les permitan aprovechar los recursos naturales del entorno con el objetivo de aumentar la eficiencia energética de los edificios así como promover el desarrollo sostenible y generar valor añadido para la sociedad. Esta tesis propone una estrategia de diseño fiable de edificios para mejorar su eficiencia energética mediante el uso de la ventilación natural (NV por sus siglas en inglés "natural ventilation"). La estrategia consiste en evaluar la solución arquitectónica más adecuada teniendo en cuenta las condiciones ambientales y el entorno de los edificios con el objetivo de maximizar el uso de la ventilación natural desde la fase inicial de su diseño. En esta tesis se aplica la estrategia de diseño a un caso de estudio real y particular. La estrategia de diseño se basa en el uso de un código numérico comercial que resuelve las ecuaciones de la mecánica de fluidos (CFD por sus siglas en inglés "computational fluid dynamics"). El software CFD simula las características que influyen en la ventilación natural y predice su comportamiento en los edificios antes de su construcción. Esta técnica numérica permite la visualización del flujo de aire en los edificios. Además, el software permite calcular parámetros que son analizados y comparados posteriormente para elegir la solución arquitectónica que suponga un mejor comportamiento de la ventilación natural. Con respecto a todas las decisiones arquitectónicas posibles, la investigación se centra en la selección de la ubicación del edificio y de la configuración de los huecos de su fachada. En primer lugar, se analiza la viabilidad de la estrategia de diseño en una región determinada: la zona costera Mediterránea de la Comunidad Valenciana. La región se caracteriza por las condiciones uniformes del viento predominante durante la estación cálida. A continuación, se utiliza una simulación de CFD validada para analizar cualitativamente y cuantitativamente la influencia de los edificios circundantes en los flujos del viento a través y alrededor de los edificios circundantes. El objetivo es comparar distintas posiciones de los huecos de la fachada para seleccionar la alternativa que mejor aproveche los recursos de ventilación natural disponibles. Además, se presenta en el marco de la selección de la configuración de la fachada una cuantificación general de la contribución de la fachada ventilada a la eficiencia energética de los edificios. En segundo lugar, se realizan dos simulaciones para analizar dos ubicaciones diferentes del edificio caso de estudio. La evaluación de la influencia de los edificios circundantes en el comportamiento de la ventilación natural del edificio caso de estudio se realiza mediante la utilización de modelos CFD validados. Se proponen distintos parámetros y visualizaciones para la evaluación cuantitativa y cualitativa de cada solución. A continuación se selecciona la mejor ubicación con respecto al comportamiento de la ventilación natural en el edificio caso de estudio. Finalmente, la investigación concluye con la construcción a escala real del edificio caso de estudio. Se valida con éxito la simulación CFD del interior del edificio utilizada desde la etapa de diseño. También se verifica con éxito el comportamiento de la ventilación natural del edificio. Además, se analizan las condiciones de confort interiores mediante la evaluación de los siguientes índices: riesgo de corrientes de aire (DR por sus siglas en inglés "draught risk"), voto promedio previsto (PMV por sus siglas en inglés "predicted mean vote") y el porcentaje previsto de personas insatisfechas (PPD por sus siglas en inglés "predicted percentage of dissatisfied people"). Los resultados muestran que el uso de la ventilación natural permite alcanzar, de manera más energéticamente eficiente, las / Durant les últimes dècades els agents involucrats en el disseny d'edificis utilitzen estratègies fiables de disseny que els permeten aprofitar els recursos naturals de l'entorn amb l'objectiu d'augmentar l'eficiència energètica dels edificis així com promoure el desenvolupament sostenible i generar valor afegit per la societat. Aquesta tesi proposa una estratègia fiable de disseny d'edificis per a millorar la seva eficiència energètica mitjançant l'ús de la ventilació natural (NV per les sigles en anglès "natural ventilation"). L'estratègia consisteix a avaluar la solució arquitectònica més adequada tenint en compte les condicions ambientals i l'entorn dels edificis amb l'objectiu de maximitzar l'ús de la ventilació natural des de la fase inicial del seu disseny. En aquesta tesi s'aplica l'estratègia de disseny a un cas d'estudi real i particular. L'estratègia de disseny es basa en l'ús d'un codi numèric comercial que resol les equacions de la mecànica de fluids (CFD per les sigles en anglès "computational fluid dynamics"). El programari CFD simula les característiques que influeixen en la ventilació natural i prediu el seu comportament en els edificis abans de la seva construcció. Aquesta tècnica numèrica permet la visualització del flux d'aire en els edificis. A més, el programari permet calcular paràmetres que són analitzats i comparats posteriorment per triar la solució arquitectònica que supose un millor comportament de la ventilació natural. Pel que fa a totes les decisions arquitectòniques possibles, la investigació es centra en la selecció de la ubicació de l'edifici i de la configuració de les obertures de la façana. En primer lloc, s'analitza la viabilitat de l'estratègia de disseny en una regió determinada: la zona costanera Mediterrània de la Comunitat Valenciana. La regió es caracteritza per les condicions uniformes del vent predominant durant l'estació càlida. A continuació, s'utilitza una simulació de CFD validada per analitzar qualitativament i quantitativament la influència dels edificis circumdants en els fluxos del vent a través i al voltant dels edificis circumdants. L'objectiu és comparar diferents posicions dels buits de la façana per seleccionar l'alternativa que millor aprofite els recursos de ventilació natural disponibles. A més, en el marc de la selecció de la configuració de la façana es presenta una quantificació general de la contribució de la façana ventilada a l'eficiència energètica dels edificis. En segon lloc, es realitzen dues simulacions per analitzar dues ubicacions diferents de l'edifici cas d'estudi. L'avaluació de la influència dels edificis circumdants en el comportament de la ventilació natural de l'edifici cas d'estudi es realitza mitjançant la utilització de models CFD validats. Es proposen diferents paràmetres i visualitzacions per a l'avaluació quantitativa i qualitativa de cada solució. A continuació es selecciona la millor ubicació pel que fa al comportament de la ventilació natural a l'edifici cas d'estudi. Finalment, la investigació conclou amb la construcció a escala real de l'edifici cas d'estudi. Es valida amb èxit la simulació CFD de l'interior de l'edifici utilitzada des de l'etapa de disseny. També es verifica amb èxit el comportament de la ventilació natural de l'edifici. A més, s'analitzen les condicions de confort interiors mitjançant l'avaluació dels següents índexs: risc de corrents d'aire (DR per les sigles en anglès "draught risk"), mitjana de vots previstos (PMV per les sigles en anglès "predicted mean vote") i el percentatge previst de persones insatisfetes (PPD per les sigles en anglès "predicted percentage of dissatisfied people"). Els resultats mostren que l'ús de la ventilació natural permet assolir, de manera més energèticament eficient, les condicions de confort. / Mora Pérez, M. (2017). Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) applied to buildings sustainable design: natural ventilation. Case study [Tesis doctoral]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/86208 / Compendio