The effective use of the piston effect, natural cold sources, and energy saving in Beijing subways

Abstract

With the development of the subway, the energy consumption of subway ventilation and air-conditioning systems is increasing rapidly. To solve this problem, this paper describes the environment of a subway station in Beijing subway line no. 2 from July to September, 2011, and uses numerical methods to quantitatively analyze and evaluate the contributions of the subway piston effect and natural outdoor cold sources to energy saving in the air-conditioning system and improvement of the subway environment. The results show that the piston effect can be used for ventilation in each area of the subway station. During summer, part of the subway air-conditioning season, a natural cold source can introduce a cold capacity of 5,100 GJ to the subway station. © 2013 Zhenzhen Li et al.