Title: CFD Analysis of the Ventilation System of a Hospital Room

1. General Overview:
The problem presented in this assignment will demonstrate how to apply your learning skills
for using the CFD analysis to solve real-life problems. In this assignment, you are required to
apply the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis and demonstrate its capability to
predict the performance of the ventilation system of a hospital room. The analysis aims to
evaluate the effectiveness of the current design by calculating the comfort criteria such as
the contaminant removal and thermal satisfaction of people. Based on your CFD analysis,
you need to suggest only ONE modification to the current design of the ventilation system
and carry out the CFD analysis on the new design and compare you results with the old
design.

2. Hospital Room Layout:

A typical hospital room that includes standard features such as patient bed, exhaust grills,
lightening, equipment and supply diffuser is shown in figure 1. The contaminant source is
assumed to be the patient breathing. The heat sources are ceiling lights, a medical
equipment, a TV set, a patient and a caregiver.

Figure 1 Layout of the Hospital Room.

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 3. Project Setting and Initial Conditions:
Use the following date to set-up you problem correctly before you run the CFD
simulation.

3.1 Project Definition:

SI units should be used for your calculations. Gases (Air & Expired Air) should be
used as a working fluid. Expired Air should can be added via user-defined from
engineering database by copy-pasting the pre-defined Air. Thermodynamic
temperature is 19.5C. You have to ignore the SOLIDWORKS offer for closing the
openings with Create Lids tool and disable the fluid volume component, then rebuild
your project.

3.2 Boundary Conditions (BC):

Specify the inlet and outlet boundary conditions as follows:
1. Forced inlet fresh air flow: Inlet Volume Flow (rate of 4.8 m^3/min & 100 % Mass
Fraction of Air).
2. Forced air removal: Outlet Volume Flow (rate of 2.6 m^3/min).
3. Washroom exhaust vent grille: Environment Pressure (P=101325 Pa & T=19.5C).
4. Patients mouth: Inlet Volume Flow (rate of 12 l/min & 100 % Mass Fraction of
Expired Air).

3.3 Specifying Heat Sources:

1. Patient: Heat Transfer Rate of 81 W.
2. Caregiver: Heat Transfer Rate of 144 W.
3. Ceiling Lights: Heat Transfer Rate of 120 W.
4. TV Set: Heat Transfer Rate of 50 W.
5. Hospital Equipment: Heat Transfer Rate of 50 W.

3.4 Calculation of Local Mean Age and Comfort Parameters:

Flow Simulation is capable of calculating Local Mean Age (LMA) and comfort
parameters. To do so, you have to enable these calculations in the Calculation
Control Option dialog during setting your project.

3.5 Convergence Criteria:

The following global goals can be specified as goals for convergence control:
1. Average Mean Radiant Temperature.
2. Average Operative Temperature.
3. Average Velocity.
4. Average Volume Fraction of Expired Air.

3.6 Meshing & Grid Independent Study:

In your CFD analysis, you need to perform the grid independent study. To do this, you need
to create at least three different grids and solve the problem until to confirm that your
solution is no longer affected by grid refinement. Use global and local mesh (patient &
caregiver) control parameters to generate the following three meshes:

1. Coarse mesh: the number of total cells is 150, 000 cell (allowance is 10 %).
2. Medium mesh: the number of total cells is 300, 000 cell (allowance is 10 %).
3. Fine mesh: the number of total cells is 500, 000 cell (allowance is 10 %).

4. Running the Solution:

After finishing the setting of your project, run the calculation. During the calculation process,
you have to monitor your convergence history and wait until your solution is fully converged.
Save copy from all convergence history curves and include them in your final report.

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 5. Results and Discussion:
After finishing the calculations, the main practice is to analyse the CFD data for both
flow and temperature fields to evaluate the performance of the current ventilation
system design, determining whether the air quality and temperature are safe and
comfortable for the people working or living within this environment. Then you need
to use this CFD information to modify the design of this system.
To perform compete analysis of your CFD data, you have to calculate the following
parameters and obtain the illustrative plots as follows:

5.1 Measuring the Ventilation System Effectiveness:

The following parameters should be calculated to measure the ventilation system
effectiveness:

[A]- With respect to the contaminant removal effectiveness

1. Contaminant Removal Effectiveness (CRE): This parameter is an index that
provides information on the effectiveness of a ventilation system in removing
contaminated air from the whole space. For a perfect mixing system CRE = 1. You
can obtain this value by right click the Results icon and select summary. Explain the
results.
2. Local Air Quality Index (LAQI): This is an index that provides information on the
effectiveness of a ventilation system in removing contaminated air from a local point

[B]- With respect to the thermal satisfaction of people.

1. Air Diffusion Performance Index (ADPI): This is the percentage of the space in
which the air speed is less than 0.35 m/s and the Draft Temperature falls between -
1.7 C and 1.1 C.
2. Mean Radiant Temperature (MRT): is the uniform surface temperature of an
imaginary black enclosure in which an occupant would exchange the same amount
of radiant heat as in the actual non-uniform space.
3. Operative Temperature: is the uniform temperature of an imaginary black
enclosure, in which an occupant would exchange the same amount of heat by
radiation plus convection as in the actual non-uniform environment
4. Draft Temperature: is the difference in temperature between any point in the
occupied zone and the control condition. Draft is defined as any localized feeling of
coolness or warmth of any portion of the body due to both air movement and air
temperature, with humidity and radiation considered constant.

These comfort parameters should be calculated for the fluidvolume component

(i.e. the entire fluid region within the computational domain), using the Volume
Parameters icon. Before specifying the Volume Parameters, you need to set the
value of Metabolic rate to 100 W/m^2 in the Default Reference Parameters icon.

The following Comfort Parameters should be obtained from Volume Parameters

window as follows:
1. Air Diffusion Performance Index (ADPI):
2. Mean Radiant Temperature (MRT).
3. Operative Temperature,
4. Draft Temperature.
5. Local Air Quality Index (LAQI) of Air,
6. Local Air Quality Index (LAQI) of Expired Air.
7. Predicted Percent Dissatisfied (PPD).

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 The following Reference values can be used for validation.

Parameter Average Bulk Average Volume [m^3]

Mean Radiant Temperature [c] 23.9847308 23.9811646 41.8581029
Operative Temperature [c] 23.4965288 23.4930785 41.8581029
PPD [%] 17.0303015 17.0086269 41.8581029
Draft Temperature [K] 0.721984015 0.718661076 41.8581029
ADPI [%] 63.4301412

5.2 The Flow and Temperature Fields Plots:

To see how the quality of air with respect to the contained contaminant changes through the
room, you have to obtain the flow field (Expired air) and temperature plots (cuts, surface,
isosurface, flow trajectory) at distance of 0, 0.25, 0.5, 0.75 and 1.0 meter from the floor.

Remember that, the thermal sensation scale (7-point) is shown below, that is based on the
heat balance of the human body. Thermal balance is obtained when the internal heat
production in the body is equal to the loss of heat to the environment.

cold cool slightly cool neutral slightly warm warm hot

-3 -2 -1 0 +1 +2 +3

5.3 Design Modification (geometry new features):

Suggest only one modification to the current ventilation system design and run the new
design (based on the optimum grid) and compare both results. Write your comments on this
new design based on your CFD analysis.

6. Guidelines for Writing your Report:

6.1 Introduction:
The intention of any scientific Introduction is to establish the purpose for doing the
current analysis that is to be reported. An effective introduction to a project report
typically performs the following tasks, generally in the order presented:

1. It establishes the learning context for the CFD analysis by:

a. Stating what the project is about, why was this project performed and why is it
relevant?
b. With the aid of a schematic diagram of the project, describe the necessary
background theory and explain it in the context of the CFD analysis
conducted. This would help reader to better understand the numerical
aspects applied during using the CFD analysis for your project.

2. It provides the primary goals of the analysis by presenting the objective(s) of the this
analysis which are important to state because their outcomes will be analysed in the
conclusion.

6.2 Solution Procedures:

This section should include brief description of the solution procedures with supporting
screen shots for the important setting parameters. With the aid of a schematic diagram of the
project (hospital room), you should be able to explain how did you specify the boundaries
and convergence criteria.

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 6.3 Results and Discussion:
The result section should contain raw data. Raw data consist of actual measured
parameters obtained after finished the solution. Use illustrated plots to present these
information. Results from the new design analyses should also be included in this section. In
discussing and comparing the results, you should not only analyse the results, but also
discuss the implications of those results.

6.4 Conclusions:
Whereas the "Results and Discussion" section has discussed the results individually, the
"Conclusion" section summarises the results and findings in the context of the entire project.
Usually, the objectives mentioned in the "Introduction" are examined to determine whether
the analysis succeeded. If the objectives were not met, you should analyse why the results
were not as predicted.

6.5 References:
In this section, you have to list all the references that were cited in this report, any handouts
accompanying the project, the textbook, and sources from the scientific literature. Use USW
Harvard referencing format.

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